Simon completed his BSc and MSc at ETH Zurich as a scholar of the German Academic Scholarship Foundation, where he developed a fascination for the complexity of biological systems, the way nature has come up with intricate designs, and the possibility of engineering biology to help solve urgent challenges.

This led him to work on several research projects in related fields, including metabolic engineering for autonomous genetic code expansion in E. coli at ETH Zurich’s D-BSSE. For his master’s thesis, he joined the laboratory of Prof. Hiroaki Suga at the University of Tokyo, where he focused on RiPP enzymology in combination with mRNA display–based drug discovery. He also contributed to developing methods for in silico chloroplast genome design at the Max Planck Institute of Molecular Plant Physiology.

At GBI, his research focuses on advancing genome synthesis technologies with the aim of expanding our design capabilities at the organismal scale.

Outside work, Simon enjoys playing a variety of sports, reading philosophy and traveling.