Team
Gottfried Dasen is co-founder of the CCOS and the current CEO. He is also a member of the board.
Christian Kunkel is the new curator at CCOS.
He studied biotechnology at the Zurich University of Applied Sciences ZHAW after several years of lab experience at Syngenta Crop Protection Münchwilen AG bevor he finally found his way to CCOS. His expertise lies in the handling of fungal cultures.
Board of Directors
Martin Sievers is the head of the microbiology and molecular biology section of the Zurich University of Applied Sciences ZHAW at the Institute of Chemistry and Biotechnology, and in addition he is co-founder and the chairman of the board of CCOS.
He studied biology at the Leibniz University of Hannover, focusing on microbiology and biochemistry. Martin Sievers received his PhD from the Christian-Albrechts-University of Kiel. In 1990 he joined the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology ETH Zurich, where he described Acetobacter europaeus, isolated from industrial vinegar fermentations, and Acetobacter intermedius, isolated from kombucha tea, as two new species. In 1997 he moved to the ZHAW as a lecturer and was appointed Professor in 2002. He has been involved in many research projects funded by the Innovation Promotion Agency CTI in Bern. Projects carried out include work on the identification of wine lactic acid bacteria, expression of membrane proteins, and diagnostics and therapy for Lyme disease.
Gottfried Dasen is co-founder of the CCOS and the current CEO. He is also a member of the board.
He is mainly working at the Zurich University of Applied Sciences ZHAW as a lecturer in microbiology and molecular biology and as Biosafety Officer (BSO).
Gottfried Dasen studied food sciences at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology ETH Zurich and did his thesis in the Laboratory of Food Microbiology, where he worked on molecular classification and identification of propionibacteria. As a postdoctoral researcher, he investigated antibiotic resistant bacteria present in food and their detection by molecular methods.Periods were also spent working on titan dioxide disinfection techniques in drinking water microbiology at the EAWAG in Dübendorf and on developing methods for the investigation of gut microflora in the Laboratory of Food Biotechnology at the ETH Zurich. Before joining the ZHAW, he worked in the Clinical Laboratory of the Vetsuisse Faculty in Zurich on feline immune deficiency virus (FIV).
Co-Founders
Tobias Wermelinger is co-founder and scientific assistant at the Zurich University of Applied Sciences ZHAW.
He studied biotechnology at ZHAW and completed his diploma thesis at the ProBioGen AG in Berlin working on cell cultures. He is involved in the teaching of bachelors and masters students in the fields of microbiology and molecular biology, and is responsible for the microbiology and molecular biology laboratories at the ZHAW.
David Frasson is co-founder and research assistant at the Zurich University of Applied Sciences ZHAW.
He worked as technician in biology at the ETH Zurich and at the University of Zurich, where he was responsible for animal cell cultures, establishing of transgenic plants and protein expression in bacteria, plant callus cultures and insects cells. In 2007 he graduated in biotechnology at ZHAW and worked on different CTI projects in the areas of membrane proteins, new expression systems and characterization of new bacteria species and teaches students and apprentices in the fields of microbiology and molecular biology.
Silvano Landert, co-founder and former CEO of CCOS.
He studied chemistry at the Zurich University of Applied Sciences ZHAW and worked on different CTI projects in the areas of membrane proteins, molecular methods for the identification of bacterial and yeast strains and the development of industrial processes for the production of yeast cultures for feed purposes. In 2010 he successfully led CCOS to ISO 9001 certification and was our CEO from 2015 to 2017.