Mario Birkholz

As a physicist by training, my professional life began with biophysical studies of an archaic form of photosynthesis as practiced by halophilic bacteria using the proton-pumping membrane protein bacteriorhodopsin. The doctoral thesis and subsequent positions were devoted to the technical harvesting of electrical energy from solar radiation and photovoltaic thin film materials. Since the beginning of the millennium, I have been dealing with the interface between biological and semiconducting materials. In the Joint Laboratory Bioelectronics of IHP and TU Berlin, I am investigating the possibilities of microelectronics for biomedicine and biotechnology.