• 1986 - 1992 Biology at the Universities of Bayreuth and Tübingen
• 1992 - 1996 PhD student in the laboratory of Walter Neupert at the Department of Physiological Chemistry in Munich
• 1996 - 1998 Postdoc in the laboratory of Randy Schekman at the University of California in Berkeley, USA
• 1999 - 2006 Group leader (wissenschaftlicher Assistent) in the Department of Physiological Chemistry at the LMU Munich
• 2006 - Arnold Sommerfeld Award of the Bavarian Academy of Sciences
• since 2006 - Professor of Cell Biology, Faculty of Biology, University of Kaiserslautern. Head of the Department
• 2008 - Personal Teaching Award, Rheinland-Pfalz
• Feb 2009 -  Feb 2012 Dean of the Biological Faculty
• 2010 - Award for Excellent Teaching in Rheinland-Pfalz
• 2011 - FEBS National Lecture Award, Brussels
• 2011 - 2017 - Spokesperson of the GBM studygroup Redox Biology
• since 2016 Member of the DFG Panel Biochemistry (Fachkollegium 201), since 2020 as speaker
• 2017 - 2019 President of the GBM (German Society of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology)
• since 2021 Member of the German Academy of Sciences Leopoldina
• Membership on Editorial Boards of BBA-General Topics, of Biological Chemistry, and Microbial Cell

The focus of our group is the biogenesis of mitochondrial proteins. A small number of these proteins is synthesized on mitochondrial ribosomes. Owing to their hydrophobic nature, mitochondrial translation products are inserted into the inner membrane in cotranslational process which relies on the tight membrane binding of mitochondrial ribosomes. Most mitochondrial proteins are synthesized as precursors in the cytosol. How these precursors reach the mitochondrial outer membrane, how they are prevented from folding and aggregation and how they are degraded if their import fails are current questions in the lab.

Krämer L, Dalheimer N, Räschle M, Storchova Z, Pielage J,, Boos F, Herrmann JM. 2023. MitoStores: chaperone-controlled protein granules store mitochondrial precursors in the cytosol. The EMBO Journal e112309.

Schlagowski AM, Knöringer K, Morlot S, Sánchez Vicente A, Flohr T, Krämer L, Boos F, Khalid N, Ahmed S, Schramm J, Murschall LM, Haberkant P, Stein F, Riemer J, Westermann B, Braun RJ, Winklhofer KF, Charvin G, Herrmann JM. 2021. Increased levels of mitochondrial import factor Mia40 prevents the aggregation of polyQ proteins in the cytosol. The EMBO Journal e107913.

Backes S, Bykov YS, Flohr T, Räschle M, Zhou J, Lenhard S, Krämer L, Mühlhaus T, Bibi C, Jann C, Smith JD, Steinmetz LM, Rapaport D, Storchova Z, Schuldiner M, Boos F, Herrmann JM. 2020. The chaperone-binding activity of the mitochondrial surface receptor Tom70 protects the cytosol against mitoprotein-induced stress. Cell Rep. 25, 108936. doi: 10.1016/j.celrep.2021.108936.

Saladi S, Boos F, Poglitsch M, Meyer H, Sommer F, Mühlhaus S, Schroda M, Schuldiner M, Madeo F, Herrmann JM. 2019. The NADH Dehydrogenase Nde1 Executes Cell Death after Integrating Signals from Metabolism and Proteostasis on the Mitochondrial Surface. Mol. Cell 77, 1–14.

Boos F, Krämer L, Groh C, Jung F, Haberkant P, Stein F, Wollweber F, Gackstatter A, Zöller E, van der Laan M, Savitski MM, Benes V, Herrmann JM. 2019. Mitochondrial protein-induced stress triggers a global adaptive transcriptional programme. Nat. Cell Biol. 21, 442-451.

Hansen KG, Aviram N, Laborenz J, Bibi C, Meyer M, Spang A, Schuldiner M, Herrmann JM. 2018. An ER surface retrieval pathway safeguards the import of mitochondrial membrane proteins in yeast. Science. 361, 1118-1122.

Beckmann R, Herrmann JM. 2015. Mitoribosome oddities. Science 348, 288-289

Pfeffer S, Woellhaf MW, Herrmann JM, Förster F. 2015. Organization of the mitochondrial translation machinery studied in situ by cryoelectron tomogrphy. Nature Commun. 6, 6019

Riemer J, Bulleid N, Herrmann JM. 2009. Disulfide formation in the ER and mitochondria: two solutions to a common process. Science 324, 1284-1287

Neupert W, Herrmann JM 2007. Translocation of Proteins into Mitochondria. Annu Rev Biochem 76, 723-749

Mesecke N, Terziyska N, Kozany C, Baumann F, Neupert W, Hell K, Herrmann JM. 2005. A disulfide relay system in the intermembrane space of mitochondria that mediates protein import. Cell 121, 1059-1069

Complete list of publications