Sibylle Vonesch

Sibylle Vonesch is a group leader at the VIB-KU Leuven Center for Microbiology and a part-time assistant professor at the Department of Microbial and Molecular Systems at KU Leuven.

Sibylle’s group develops CRISPR/Cas-based tools to precisely modify the genomes and transcriptomes of microbes at scale, for use in high-throughput screening and functional genomics approaches. The group applies these technologies to better understand how genetic differences between individuals translate to individual differences in phenotype, using the yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae as a model system. A particular focus lies on studying how mutations that do not alter a protein’s amino acid sequence (synonymous mutations) impact phenotypic diversity, and how the genetic context of mutations alters their impact on phenotype.

Trained as a molecular biologist, Sibylle performed her doctoral research in quantitative and systems genetics in the group of Ernst Hafen at ETH Zurich, Switzerland. After successfully defending in 2015 she moved to Heidelberg, Germany for her postdoc with Lars Steinmetz at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL). Her postdoc research focusing on genomics and high-throughput genome editing technology development was supported by two postdoc fellowships. Sibylle started her current position in Leuven in May 2021.