Meet our team

Marius is a PostDoc at the Department of Biomedical Imaging and Image-guided Therapy at the Medical University of Vienna. During his PhD he worked extensively on the development of antagonists for the muscarinic acetylcholine receptor. His research interest cover radiotracer development, carbon-11 and fluoride-18 radiochemistry and radiopharmaceutical evaluation of PET tracer.

Karsten is a PhD student in his last year and his research interests are in PET radiotracer development, medicinal chemistry and preclinical drug evaluation. He is based on the Department of Biomedical Imaging and Image-guided therapy of the Medical University of Vienna. In cooperation with MUW and CBmed Graz, we develope small molecule inhibitors towards oncological targets. Karsten performs his organic synthesis in our labs.

Marlon started his PhD in March 2020 in the neurochem group. He has extensive knowledge in computational methods for drug design as well on organic medicinal chemistry. He is involved in the muscaPET Project and develops small molecular inhibitors for the muscarinic acetylcholine receptor based on a pirenzepine-associated core structure.

Irem started in our group in July 2022 and completes our interdisciplinary and international team. Irem works on our patented dynamic 3D cell culture and has a strong expertise in biomedical engineering, cell culture and advanced biochemical technologies. This project is in strong cooperation with the FH Technikum Wien, Medical University of Vienna and DOCMedikus GmbH.

Lukas Kogler

Lukas studied chemistry and biochemistry at the university of vienna and synthesized precursors and reference compounds for the establishment of a new carbon-11 labelling strategy during his master´s thesis. For his Phd, he is now working in the "Microone" project, which tries to determine potential negative health impacts of microplastics. For that labelled microparticles need to be synthesized, which can be used to determine biodistribution and accumulation in vivo.

Verena Maisetschläger

After her “Aspirantenjahr”, Verena returned to the neurochem group for her PhD thesis in January 2023. Like Irem, she works on our patented dynamic 3D cell culture project. She brings along a know-how in analytics, especially working with HPLC. Her main part in the project is working with radiotracers at our cooperation partner, the Medical University of Vienna.

Sarah Stellenberger

Sarah studied pharmaceutical sciences and molecular biology and started her PhD in April 2023. She is our analytical expert and is responsible for developing assays using our fully automated SiriusT3 system to do physicochemical profiling of CNS active neurochemicals. For her PhD she focuses on investigating the effect of bioplastics on human health through biological evaluation and chemical characterization.

Markus Spreitzer

Markus is a PhD Student working in the field of pharmaceutical analytics. Currently he is investigating metabolism of in house developed muscarinic acetylcholine receptor antagonists. Prior to his PhD project, he was involved in pharmacokinetic studies of novel modafinil analogues in the group of Dr. Judith Wackerling. For his master thesis, in the group of Prof. Vittorio Pace, he developed a novel method for monofluoromethylation. This new synthesis pathway significantly improved the conditions for transferring the CH2F unit to a series of heteroatom-centered nucleophiles.

Lisa Aichinger

During her pharmacy studies, Lisa gained 3 years of work experience in a pharmaceutical company and joined the neurochem group for her PhD in 2023. She strongly collaborates with the Department of Nuclear Medicine at the Medical University of Vienna, where she is deepening her knowledge in radioisotope synthesis (e.g. carbon-11, fluorine-18). She is currently working on her dissertation-topic: "Assessment of micro- and nanoplastic induced inflammatory processes in vivo & in vitro by medical imaging".

Simon Watzinger

Simon started with his PhD project in September 2023 and focuses strongly on the investigation of nondisplacable-binding of drugs and drug candidates in the central nervous system. He presents a combination of extensive experience with in vitro research methods and related biochemical assays together with radiopharmaceutical labeling experience.

Viktoria Mair

Viktorias research focuses on the investigations on ligand-receptor interactions of antagonists towards the muscarinic acetylcholine receptors.

Fjolla Sejdiu

Fjolla works on the biological evaluation on advanced mAChR targeting rotamers compounds and fluorescence techniques.

Magdalena Wadsak

Magdalena's research is dedicated to the development of an innovative bile acids radiotracer with the aim of its utilization in Positron Emission Tomography. The project is bridging the Faculty of Chemistry and the Faculty of Life Sciences at the University of Vienna, together with the Department of Nuclear Medicine at the Medical University of Vienna.

Thomas Scheiblauer

Thomas is studying chemistry at the University of Vienna. His interests lie in organic synthesis, drug development and medicinal chemistry. During an exchange semester at the University of Gothenburg in 2023, he gained valuable experience in those topics. Currently, Thomas is doing research on the development of a new BBB radio tracer for the GLP-1 receptor for his master's thesis.

Alaa Mohammed

Alaa evaluates the toxicity of micro- and nanoplastic particles in vitro.

Ceren Okuducu

Ceren supports our team to investigate silk scaffolds for advanced 3D cell culture methodology. She is currently studying in the Master programme Drug design and development.

Matea Stojanovic

Matea is actively involved in our team's investigation into the inflammatory effects of micro- and nanoplastic particles on different cancer cell lines in vitro. She is currently pursuing her Master's degree in pharmacy.