We are proud to share that Simon Elsässer, Professor of Synthetic Biology at the University of Freiburg and one of the fifteen ORFeus principal investigators, has been formally awarded an Alexander von Humboldt Professorship, Germany’s highest-valued international research prize.
The award provides five million euros over five years and was presented in Berlin on 12 May 2026. Simon moved from the Karolinska Institutet in Stockholm to the University of Freiburg in October 2025 to take up the professorship, strengthening Freiburg’s “Signals of Life” research focus within the CIBSS Cluster of Excellence.
Simon’s group develops innovative chemical biology approaches for studying how cells interpret genetic and epigenetic information, including methods for incorporating non-canonical amino acids into proteins in living cells. In ORFeus, this expertise drives DC5, which captures secreted and diffusible microproteins that conventional methods miss using biorthogonal tagging and crosslinking mass spectrometry. Simon also co-supervises DC8 on evolutionary prediction of microprotein function.
An extraordinary recognition, and a great sign for the science at the heart of ORFeus.