Lars M. Blank studied Chemical Engineering from 1990 to 1997 at the
University of Dortmund (Germany) and Biology from 1992 to 1997 at the
Ruhr-University of Bochum (Germany). During his master theses he worked
in the field of Metabolic Engineering in the group of Prof. E. T.
Papoutsakis at Northwestern University, IL, USA and in yeast cell
biology in the group of Prof. W.-H. Kunau at the Ruhr-University of
Bochum. In his Ph.D. in the group of Prof. L. K. Nielsen at the
University of Queensland, Australia (1998 to 2002), he developed a
continuous process for hyaluronic acid production using lactic acid
bacteria. During his Ph.D. he worked as a visiting scientist at the
Technical University of Denmark (DtU), Lyngby, Denmark (Sept. - Dec.
1999), reprogramming Lactococcus lactis from a purely anaerobe to a
partially respiratory organism. As a postdoctoral fellow of the Deutsche
Akademie der Naturforscher Leopoldina (Halle, Germany) he established
flux analysis as an additional tool for yeast Systems Biology in the
group of Prof. U. Sauer at the ETH Zurich, Switzerland. Since November
2004 Lars M. Blank leads the group Systems Biotechnology at the
Laboratory of Chemical Biotechnology at the Technische Universität
Dortmund and is a senior research fellow at the ISAS-Institute for
Analytical Sciences in Dortmund, an institute of the Leibniz
association. In January 2010 he finalized his Habilitation.