Viola Vogel, also known as Viola Vogel-Scheidemann, (born 1959 in

Tübingen Tübingen (, , Swabian: ''Dibenga'') is a traditional university city in central Baden-Württemberg, Germany. It is situated south of the state capital, Stuttgart, and developed on both sides of the Neckar and Ammer rivers. about one in three ...

, Germany) is a German biophysicist and bioengineer. She is a professor at

ETH Zürich (colloquially) , former_name = eidgenössische polytechnische Schule , image = ETHZ.JPG , image_size = , established = , type = Public , budget = CHF 1.896 billion (2021) , rector = Günther Dissertori , president = Joël Mesot , a ...

, where she is head of the Department of Health Sciences and Technology and leads the Applied Mechanobiology Laboratory.

Biography

Vogel was born in 1959 in the university town of

in the state of

Baden-Württemberg Baden-Württemberg (; ), commonly shortened to BW or BaWü, is a German state () in Southwest Germany, east of the Rhine, which forms the southern part of Germany's western border with France. With more than 11.07 million inhabitants across a ...

Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...

. In 1988 she won an

Otto Hahn Medal The Otto Hahn Medal (german: Otto-Hahn-Medaille) is awarded by the Max Planck Society to young scientists and researchers in both the natural and social sciences. The award takes its name from the German chemist and Nobel Prize laureate Otto Hahn ...

for her doctoral work with Hans Kuhn at the

Max Planck Institute for Biophysical Chemistry The Max Planck Institute for Biophysical Chemistry (german: Max-Planck-Institut für biophysikalische Chemie), also known as the Karl-Friedrich Bonhoeffer Institute (german: Karl-Friedrich-Bonhoeffer-Institut), was a research institute of the Ma ...

Göttingen Göttingen (, , ; nds, Chöttingen) is a university city in Lower Saxony, central Germany, the capital of the eponymous district. The River Leine runs through it. At the end of 2019, the population was 118,911. General information The ori ...

. In 1990, after two years as a postdoctoral fellow at the Department of Physics at the

University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant u ...

, she took a faculty position in the Department of Bioengineering at the

University of Washington The University of Washington (UW, simply Washington, or informally U-Dub) is a public research university in Seattle, Washington. Founded in 1861, Washington is one of the oldest universities on the West Coast; it was established in Seattl ...

Seattle Seattle ( ) is a seaport city on the West Coast of the United States. It is the seat of King County, Washington. With a 2020 population of 737,015, it is the largest city in both the state of Washington and the Pacific Northwest regio ...

where she initiated the molecular bioengineering program. She was subsequently founding director of the Center for Nanotechnology at the University of Washington (1997-2003). In 2004 she relocated to

in Switzerland, first as a professor in the Department of Material Sciences, and later as a founding member of the Department of Health Sciences and Technology (2012). She has been a faculty member of the Wyss Translational Center in

Zürich , neighboring_municipalities = Adliswil, Dübendorf, Fällanden, Kilchberg, Maur, Oberengstringen, Opfikon, Regensdorf, Rümlang, Schlieren, Stallikon, Uitikon, Urdorf, Wallisellen, Zollikon , twintowns = Kunming, San Francisco Zürich ...

since it began in 2015. Since 2018 she has been an Einstein Visiting Fellow at the . In 2020, Vogel was appointed by

European Commissioner for Innovation, Research, Culture, Education and Youth The European Commissioner for Innovation, Research, Culture, Education and Youth is a member of the European Commission. The portfolio was previously titled ''European Commissioner for Education, Culture, Youth and Sport'' until 2019 when it was ...

Mariya Gabriel Mariya Ivanova Gabriel ( bg, Мария Иванова Габриел) (''née'' Nedelcheva, bg, Неделчева) (born 20 May 1979) is a Bulgarian politician and a member of the GERB party serving as European Commissioner for Innovation, ...

to serve on an independent search committee for the next president of the European Research Council (ERC), chaired by

Helga Nowotny Helga Nowotny (born 1937) is Professor emeritus of Social Studies of Science, ETH Zurich. She has held numerous leadership roles on Academic boards and public policy councils, and she has authored many publications in the social studies of science ...

Research

The direction of Vogel's work is to take microscopic pieces of living tissue and investigate their mechanical properties, with a view to developing new technologies. Her interests include molecular self-assembly, cell adhesion, and the construction of biological minerals, materials, and tissues. Her experimental and computational discoveries of how stretching proteins changes their function, and how cells sense and respond to force, have applications in stem cell differentiation, tissue growth and

regeneration Regeneration may refer to: Science and technology * Regeneration (biology), the ability to recreate lost or damaged cells, tissues, organs and limbs * Regeneration (ecology), the ability of ecosystems to regenerate biomass, using photosynthesis ...

, angiogenesis, and

cancer Cancer is a group of diseases involving abnormal cell growth with the potential to invade or spread to other parts of the body. These contrast with benign tumors, which do not spread. Possible signs and symptoms include a lump, abnormal b ...

Awards

Vogel won a in 2005 and shared the for Applied Physics in 2006. She was elected to the German

Academy of Sciences Leopoldina The German National Academy of Sciences Leopoldina (german: Deutsche Akademie der Naturforscher Leopoldina – Nationale Akademie der Wissenschaften), short Leopoldina, is the national academy of Germany, and is located in Halle (Saale). Founded ...

in 2018, member of US

National Academy of Engineering The National Academy of Engineering (NAE) is an American nonprofit, non-governmental organization. The National Academy of Engineering is part of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, along with the National Academy of ...

in 2020 and US National Academy of Sciences in 2021.

References

1959 births Living people German women biologists Women biophysicists Biophysicists German women physicists German women engineers German biophysicists German bioengineers Mechanobiologists Academic staff of ETH Zurich Members of the German Academy of Sciences Leopoldina 21st-century women engineers People from Tübingen Engineers from Baden-Württemberg {{Germany-scientist-stub