Dr. Thijs Ettema

Biography

Thijs J. G. Ettema is an evolutionary microbiologist at Wageningen University in the Netherlands, where he heads the Laboratory of Microbiology. His research focuses on exploring microbial diversity through next-generation genomics and cultivation approaches. Thijs received his PhD from Wageningen University in 2005, followed by a brief postdoctoral stay at Radboud University Nijmegen. In 2006, he moved to Uppsala University in Sweden, where he was appointed associate professor in the Department of Cell and Molecular Biology in 2014. Thijs was appointed chair professor at Wageningen University in 2019. His research group addresses a variety of scientific questions related to microbial diversity and evolution, including the domains of life and viruses. A significant aspect of his research involves studying evolutionary transitions and the origins of complex cell types, particularly eukaryotes. Thijs's group discovered the Asgard archaea, providing compelling evidence for the evolutionary lineage that leads to complex cellular life. He has received several prestigious awards, including the Kluyver Award from the Royal Dutch Society for Microbiology in 2007 and was named a 'Future Research Leader' by the Swedish Foundation for Strategic Research in 2012. He was elected as an EMBO Young Investigator by the European Molecular Biology Organization in 2016.

Research Interests

Experience