Dr. Tessa E.F. Quax
Professor
Tessa studied Biology at the University of Utrecht, where she obtained her BSc (2007) and MSc (2009) with distinction. She performed her PhD training in a joint project in the group of Prof. Dr. John van der Oost at Wageningen University and in the group of Dr. Prangishvili at the Institut Pasteur in Paris. She obtained her PhD degree in 2013 for her work on archaeal virus-host interactions. Next, she obtained a Pegasus-Marie-Curie fellowship to do a post-doc in the lab of Prof. Dr. Rob Lavigne at Leuven University (2014). Supported by an EMBO long term fellowship and a Marie-Curie post-doctoral fellowship, in 2015 she moved to the University of Freiburg for a post-doc on archaeal chemotaxis and motility in the group of Prof. Dr. Sonja-Verena Albers. In 2018 she received a Maragete von Wrangell independence grant in order to start her own research line on viruses of haloarchaea at the University of Freiburg. This was followed by an Emmy Noether grant from the German Science Foundation (DFG) to expand her line of research in Freiburg. In 2021 Tessa was appointed as associate professor at the University of Groningen, the Netherlands. Here she obtained an ERC starting grant (2022) and a Vidi grant from the Dutch Research Council NWO (2023) to built up her group on Biology of Archaea and Viruses. Her work has received several prizes such as a Hector RCD Award from the Hector Fellow Academy, the Beijerinck premium from the Royal Netherlands Society for Arts and Sciences (KNAW) and the KNAW Early Career award. She is currently coordinating several international networks such as a Marie Curie Doctoral Network with 10 European partners and an Human Frontiers in Science Program consortium with partners from 4 different continents. She was promoted to full professor at the University of Groningen in 2025
t.e.f.quax@rug.nl
Side activities:
Board member of the Scientific Advisory Board of the International Society for Viruses of Microbes
Spokesperson VAAM (German Microbiology Society) special group on Viruses of Microbes
(Vice)-Chair for the Gordon Research Conferences (2023/2025) on Archaea.
Board Member of the Groningen Biomolecular Sciences and Biotechnology Institute
Sabine Schwarzer
post-doc
Sabine studied Biology at the University of Freiburg, where she obtained her BSc degree in 2016. She continued her studies at the same University further focusing on microbiology. She obtained her MSc degree in 2019 for her work on archaeal cell division in the group of Prof. Dr. Sonja-Verena Albers. In the same year she joined the Quax lab as a PhD candidate.
sabine.schwarzer(at)biologie.uni-freiburg.de
s.schwarzer(at)biologie.uni-freiburg.de
+49761-203-2774
Bastiaan Kuiper
PhD candidate
Bastiaan studied Biomolecular Sciences at the University of Groningen, where he obtained his BSc degree in 2018. He obtained his MSC degree in 2021 for his work on ER-resident chaperone proteins in the group of Prof Dr. Ikuo Wada at the Fukushima Medical University. In 2022 he joined the Quax lab as a PhD candidate.
b.p.kuiper(at)rug.nl
Rabia Sensevdi
PhD candidate
Rabia studied at the University of Freiburg, where she obtained her BSc degree in 2019. She continued her studies at the university of Freiburg with the focus on biochemistry and microbiology. In 2022 she obtained her MSc degree for her work on the characterization of the sRNAs Hts1 and Hts10 and their role in osmoregulation in Haloferax volcanii in the group of Prof. Dr. Sonja-Verena Albers. In 2022 she joined the Quax lab as a PhD candidate. Rabia was selected as an associated PhD student of the Hector Fellow Academy (Germany)
e.r.sensevdi(at)rug.nl
Anna Schöntag
PhD candidate
Anna studied Biotechnology at the Technical University of Berlin and obtained her BSc degree in 2018. She continued her studies there and obtained her MSc degree in Medical Biotechnology in 2022 for her work on protein interaction studies with cell-free synthesized S. aureus enterotoxins in the group of Dr. Anne Zemella and Dr. Marlitt Stech at the Fraunhofer IZI-BB in Potsdam. Anna joined the Quax lab in the same year as a PhD candidate working on the project funded by the ERC-starting grant.
a.m.c.schontag(at)rug.nl
Úlfur Atlason
PhD candidate
Úlfur Ágúst Atlason studied thermophilic bacteria and later viruses as a part of his Bsc studies at the University of Iceland. Graduating in 2019 he moved to Groningen the following year to further his studies. During his Msc he worked with diverse microorganisms from standard Saccharomyces cerevisiae to phytopathogen Xanthomonas citri. He obtained his Msc degree in 2023, joining the Quaxlab the same year as a PhD candidate
Ruby Satiawan
PhD candidate
Ruby studied Chemistry at the Jakarta State University with a focus on biochemistry and obtained his BSc degree in 2009. He continued his studies at the Universitas Indonesia and obtained an MSc degree in 2014 for his work on endoglucanase from indigenous bacteria. In the same year, he was accepted as a full-time researcher at the Indonesian Institute of Sciences. In 2024, he got a scholarship from the Indonesia Endowment Fund for Education Agency (LPDP) and joined Quax Lab as a PhD student.
r.setiawan@rug.nl
Joshua Petters
PhD candidate
Joshua obtained his B.Sc. in Biology from the University of Freiburg in 2022, where he studied the egress mechanism of the haloarchaeal virus HFTV1. He then continued working on archaeal viruses as a lab assistant in the group of Prof. Dr. Tessa Quax in Groningen in the final year of his bachelor’s, before returning to Freiburg for his master’s studies. During his master’s, he worked as a field technician for Testo Industrial Services. In 2024, he completed his M.Sc. in Translational Biology with his thesis on optimizing glycoprotein production in moss in the group of Prof. Dr. Ralf Reski. In the same year he re-joined the Quax lab as a PhD candidate as part of the ARCTECH program.
j.g.petters@rug.nl
Mariana Galvan-Salim
PhD candidate
Mariana studied Biological Sciences at the Federal University of Santa Catarina, Brazil, where she obtained her BSc in 2020. She completed her MSc in Molecular and Microbial Biology at the University of the Algarve, Portugal, in 2024, where her thesis focused on polyhydroxyalkanoates production by haloarchaea, under the supervision of Conceição Egas at the University of Coimbra. In 2024, she joined Prof. Tessa Quax’s lab as a PhD candidate.
m.galvan.salim@rug.nl
Leon Bäcker
post-doc
Leon obtained a B.Sc. and M.Sc. in Water Science at the University of Duisburg-Essen, Germany. During his PhD at KU Leuven, Belgium, he created synthetic circuits in bacteria to achieve time-resolved population programming and division-of-labour strategies. Additionally, he studied viral infection dynamics to create highly engineered viruses that program their hosts for bioprocessing applications. In 2025, Leon joined Prof. Tessa Quax’s lab as a postdoc, working on a Hector Fellow Academy founded interdisciplinary project that focuses on the viral life cycle development and its regulation in viruses infecting haloarchaea.
l.e.baecker(at)rug.nl
Hanna Martin
PhD candidate
Yogy Ariyanto
PhD candidate
Yogy obtained his BSc in Biology from IPB University, Indonesia, in 2020, where he worked on the development of probiotic products derived from lactic acid bacteria under the supervision of Prof. Anja Meryandini. He then completed his MSc in Biotechnology at IPB University in 2024. His Master’s thesis focused on the heterologous expression of a bacterial lipase gene in the expression system of Cereibacter sphaeroides 2.4.1 under the supervision of Prof. Antonius Suwanto. In 2025, he was awarded a scholarship from the Indonesia Endowment Fund for Education Agency (LPDP) and joined Quax Lab as a PhD student.
y.s.ariyanto(at)rug.nl
Olaf Muskee
PhD candidate
Olaf started his studies in Biology and Medical Laboratory Research at the Hanze University of Applied Sciences Groningen. After obtaining his BSc in 2021, he continued his studies at the University of Groningen and acquired his MSc in Biomolecular Sciences in 2025. During his Master, Olaf conducted two projects in the field of biochemistry. In the first project, he studied the engineering of Flavin Dependent Halogenases with Directed Evolution under the supervision of Dr. Clemens Mayer. In his second project, he investigated the stability of flavoproteins by incorporating an unnatural covalent bond between the cofactor and the protein (known as Flavin Fixing). This last project was supervised by both Prof. Dr. Katarzyna (Kasia) Tych and Prof. Dr. Marco Fraaije. Olaf has been a PhD Candidate in the Quax lab since January 2025.
o.q.m.muskee(at)rug.nl
Alumni
Colin Tittes
Zaloa Aguirre-Sourrouille