Prof. Dr. Nick Wierckx (Germany) works at the Forschungszentrum Jülich where he leads the Microbial Catalysis group. His scientific focus is on the development of microbial catalysts for the sustainable production of chemicals, and the fundamental understanding of the underlying cellular processes. This involves metabolic engineering, synthetic biology, microbial physiology, and bioprocess-oriented strain development. Besides the bio-based production of plastics monomers, aromatics, organic acids, and secondary metabolites, the bio-upcycling of plastics is also investigated.