Raphael Trösch: The Plant Cell First Author

Raphael Trösch, co-first author of “Fast and global reorganization of the chloroplast protein biogenesis network during heat acclimation”

Current Position: Post Doc in Dr. Reimo Zoschke’s research group at the Max Planck Institute of Molecular Plant Physiology in Golm.

Education: Ph.D. in Plant Biology, University of Leicester, UK; MSc in Plant Biology, ETH Zurich, Switzerland; BSc in Biology, ETH Zurich, Switzerland.

Non-scientific interests: Piano playing, reading, learning almost anything

Brief Bio: When I was an undergraduate biology student at ETH Zurich, the Master Degree Major of plant science was so unpopular that it had to be advertised to the students to keep the department alive. My propensity for unpopular things, combined with a slight trauma from courses in animal dissection, influenced my decision to enroll for a Master in plant sciences. Driven by well-intentioned advices regarding occupational prestige, I almost started an additional course to become a teacher, but this was gladly prevented by an unexpected PhD opening that was too attractive to be ignored. I thus started the bohemian life of a young scientist, travelling from lab to lab and converting results into publications. My PhD in England in the group of Prof. Paul Jarvis on the topic of chloroplast protein import was funded by the Gatsby Charitable Foundation. I then joined the group of Prof. Felix Willmund at the TU Kaiserslautern to study translational regulation in the chloroplasts of green algae, after which I started a second Post Doc in the group of Dr. Reimo Zoschke at the Max Planck Institute of Molecular Plant Physiology to study further aspects of chloroplast translation in land plants.