Tanja Matt was born in 1983 in Germany. After finishing high school in 2003, she studied natural sciences at the University of Stuttgart in addition to research fellowships in the U.S. (Yale University) and Switzerland (Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, ETH). In 2008 she received a Diploma degree in Biotechnology (University of Stuttgart) and became member of the Life Science Graduate School Zurich, where she joined the group of Prof. Erik C. Böttger at the Institute of Medical Microbiology, University of Zurich. Having finished her PhD studies in December 2012 she is now working as a project and product manager at Hutman Diagnostics AG in Basel (see ZLSD 2013 success story).