Jh Hacker

Biography

Professor Hacker, who is presently the President of the German Academy of Sciences Leopoldina, served as a Professor of Microbiology (1988-93) at the University of Wuerzburg. He became full professor in 1993 at the same university and was elected to the chair of Institute of Molecular Infections Biology (ZINF). Since March 2008 he is the successor of Professor Reinhard Kurth to become the President of Robert Koch Institute, Berlin, under the Federal Department of Health of Germany. Professor Hacker's major work area is the molecular biology of bacterial pathogens such as Escherichia coli, Legionella pneumophila and Staphylococcus aureus. He is the pioneer in unraveling niche specific pathogenic properties of Escherichia coli and has extensively contributed to the evolution of virulence in the same. Professor Hacker is an authority on genetic recombination in bacteria and he has been well known for his pathbreaking discovery of the pathogenicity islands for the first time in bacterial pathogens. He was the first to prove the idea of extraneous acquisition of virulence gene cassettes in bacteria. His discovery of the LEE (locus of enterocyte effacement) elements and their roles in E. coli/Shigella infections is regarded as one of the very highly significant contributions by Hacker.

Research Interest

Analysis of the Molecular Biology and Evolution of Pathogenicity Factors, Analysis of the Spread and Variability of Pathogenic Microorganisms, Study of the Interactions between Microbes and Host Cells