Meet the
COMENZE Team
Experts in Enzyme Engineering & Sustainable Polymer Innovation Across 8 Countries
Meet the
COMENZE Team
Experts in Enzyme Engineering & Sustainable Polymer Innovation Across 8 Countries
Our Network of Experts
The COMENZE project brings together leading scientists and early-career researchers, many of whom have secured high-ranked grants, attained professorships, or founded startups. Our team includes academic supervisors guiding the next generation of doctoral candidates and non-academic partners who bring strong entrepreneurial expertise and experience as (co)founders of SMEs or industry leaders. Their role is crucial in driving innovation and ensuring commercially viable processes.
COMENZE Project Supervisors
Lígia O. Martins
project coordinatorLígia O. Martins is an experienced Enzymologist and Head of the Microbial and Enzyme Technology Lab. She has led cutting-edge research in Molecular Biotechnology, focusing on biocatalytic processes for selective lignocellulose valorization. As both a team member and coordinator in large EU-funded projects, she has (i) pioneered the identification and characterization of bacterial laccases and pyranose oxidases; (ii) enhanced oxidoreductive enzymes via directed evolution, uncovering the role of allosteric mutations and epistatic interactions; and (iii) designed sustainable enzymatic bioprocesses, achieving 100% yields in the production of (neo)lignans and rare sugars from.
She has extensive experience supervising postdoctoral researchers and PhD candidates and currently serves on the Biocatalysis Board of the European Federation of Biotechnology.
Marco W. Fraaije
Marco W. Fraaije holds the chair of Molecular Enzymology and is a full professor at the University of Groningen. His main research interests are the discovery, engineering, and application of redox enzymes. He has made significant contributions to the field of oxidative biocatalysis by, amongst others: (1) structural elucidation and redesign of Baeyer-Villiger monooxygenases, (2) discovery of numerous monooxygenases, oxidases, and bacterial DyP-peroxidases, (3) establishing artificial covalent flavin-protein linkages, and (4) designing an artificial peroxygenase.
He has extensive experience in PhD and post-doc supervision. He is also a co-founder of GECCO-biotech, which focuses on developing enzymes and enzyme-based processes.
Andrea Mattevi
Andrea Mattevi is an ERC-Advanced grant holder internationally recognized for pioneering work in structural enzymology, enzyme function, and biocatalysis. With deep expertise in the characterization of enzymes and protein complexes, the lab has consistently pushed the boundaries of our understanding of macromolecular functions’, druggability, and biotechnological potential.
Over the past decade, his groundbreaking work has been published in top-tier journals, including JACS, Angewandte Chemie, PNAS, JBC, Nat Struct Biol, Nat Catal, and ACS Catal. His team’s expertise is further recognized through invitations to contribute reviews and commentaries to leading publications such as Trends Biochem Sci. (TiBS), Curr. Opin. Struct. Biol., and Chem. Rev.
Sílvia Osuna
Sílvia Osuna is an ICREA research professor at UdG. Her research studies biochemical processes mainly related to enzyme catalysis at the interface between computational chemistry and biology. Her lab is developing new computational tools for predicting which amino acid changes are required to the enzyme structure to allow novel function, enhance a promiscuous side reaction, or expand its substrate scope.
Her group’s goal is to enable the routine computational design of proficient enzymes to boost their use in industry for the synthesis of pharmaceutically relevant targets. She also applies the developed methodologies to studying biomolecules’ recognition and assembly processes with carbon-based materials. The European Research Council project funds the group – Consolidator Grant (ERC-2022-CoG-101088032) and 2 ERC- Proof of Concept.
Anett Schallmey
Anett Schallmey is an experienced enzymologist with a special interest in enzyme catalysis and a Professor of Biochemistry at the Technische Universität Braunschweig. Her interdisciplinary research focuses on (i) the identification and characterization of novel enzymes, (ii) their application for the valorization of renewable feedstocks and the synthesis of fine chemicals or pharmaceuticals, (iii) the engineering of enzymes employing computer-aided semi-rational design, as well as enzyme immobilization, and her group has made significant contributions to the field.
She is a member of the Braunschweig Integrated Center of Systems Biology (BRICS) as well as the Center for Pharmaceutical Engineering at TUBS. She has ample experience in the supervision of PhD students and Post-docs.
Artur Góra
Artur Góra is the head of the Tunneling Group and the initiator of the core facility for protein-ligand interaction studies at BCSUT. His research focuses on computational chemistry, bioinformatics, and tool development. He has pioneered a novel method for protein interior analysis using a molecular probe tracking approach. His expertise lies in engineering enzyme activity and selectivity through modifying transportation pathways.
He has coordinated and developed the institute’s strategy in integrating multidisciplinary research across chemistry, structural biology, molecular biology, microbiology, bioinformatics, and medical and environmental biotechnology. Additionally, he serves as a Work Package leader in the EIC Pathfinder – Europa Horizon project (101046815).
Ulrich Schwaneberg
Ulrich Schwaneberg graduated in chemistry and received his PhD in 1999 (supervisor Prof. R. D. Schmid) from the University in Stuttgart. He was, after a post-doc at Caltech in the lab of the Noble laureate Prof. Frances H. Arnold, appointed as Professor at the Jacobs University Bremen in 2002. In January 2009 he moved to the RWTH Aachen University as Head of the Institute of Biotechnology and is since 2010 co-appointed in the Scientific Board of Directors at the Leibniz Institute for Interactive Materials.
Furthermore, he coordinates with Prof. Bergs the competence center Bio4MatPro (one of two BMBF flagship projects in the bioeconomy model region), the Materials Lab Incubator MerLIn, serves in the board of directors in the Bioeconomy Science Center, and is Speaker of the RWTH profile area Molecular Science & Engineering. He cofounded the companies SeSaM Biotech & Aachen Proteineers and has a special interest in Protein engineering to understand fundamental structure-function relationships and to design with own methodologies tailored proteins as building blocks for the biological transformation of material science and production. In 2016, he received the BMBF-Forschungspreis for the next generation of bioprocesses and has published >400 original manuscripts and is coinventor on >30 patents, mostly with industry.
Ferran Sancho
Ferran Sancho has a PhD in Theoretical Chemistry and Computational Modeling and is the Chief Scientific Officer (CSO) at Zymvol, specializing in computational solutions for industrial biocatalysis. He has developed proprietary algorithms and led customer projects, optimizing enzyme discovery and design.
He co-managed a team of six developers for 2.5 years and supervised 20+ students, including >10 MSCA-SE secondments. His expertise in bioinformatics, molecular modeling, and leadership drives innovation in sustainable enzyme-based solutions.
Nikola Lončar
Nikola Lončar has a PhD in biochemistry from the University of Belgrade (Serbia) and spent 5 years as a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Groningen (The Netherlands) working on the discovery and engineering of oxidoreductases.
Lončar is the CEO of GECCO Biotech B.V. and CSO of OXYCO—The Enzyme Factory S.L.
Valerio Ferrario
Valerio Ferrario has a multidisciplinary background in different aspects related to biocatalysis, organic chemistry and industrial biotechnology. Valerio Ferrario has an MS in Biotechnology and a PhD in Pharmaceutical Chemistry.
He has already been involved in international collaborations and different publicly funded projects. His main scientific interests are related to computational enzyme design and selection to address practical challenges in industrial applications.
Meet Our Doctoral Candidates
Bringing together bright minds from 8 countries, our PhD students are advancing enzyme technology and sustainable biocatalysis. Discover the researchers driving innovation within the COMENZE network.
Chiara Demingo
University of Rome, Tor Vergata, Italy
Chiara holds a Master’s degree in Biotechnology from Tor Vergata University. During her thesis, she spent 10 months at the University of Groningen (Erasmus Programme), where she specialized in enzyme engineering of oxidases.
Her research focused on broadening the substrate scope of enzymes to convert lignin-derived compounds into valuable intermediates for pharmaceuticals, such as paracetamol.
She will be Working on IRP 1 – Engineering of enzymes toward higher affinity to solid surfaces
Maria Nabatova
University of Amsterdam & Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam,
The Netherlands
Maria is an MSc Chemistry graduate with expertise in biocatalysis, synthetic organic chemistry, photochemistry, and polymer chemistry. During her master’s research project, she focused on developing novel photobiocatalytic cascades for the synthesis of high-value chemicals.
She will be Working on IRP 2 – Discovery/engineering of transaminases for alcohol-amine transformation
Miguel Bayo Valero
Autonomous University of Madrid, Spain
Miguel holds a Eurobachelor’s degree in Chemistry from the Autonomous University of Madrid. He also completed an Erasmus Mundus Master of Science in Theoretical Chemistry and Computational Modelling, specializing in Computational Biochemistry.
He will be Working on IRP3 – Computational tools for enzyme discovery and surface engineering
Evgeniia Kostina
University of Milan, Italy
Evgeniia holds an MSc in Quantitative Biology. She is passionate about structural bioinformatics, computational biophysics, and the development of sustainable bioactive compounds.
She will be Working on IRP4 – Computational platform for enzyme discovery, improvement, and evaluation
Lena Janke
Graz University of Technology, Austria
Lena studied Chemistry at Graz University of Technology before completing a Master’s degree in Biotechnology. In her master’s program, she specialized in protein production and enzyme engineering.
She will be Working on IRP5 – Engineering of oxidative enzymes for functionalization and/or polymerization of lignin monomers
Position is open @ Universidade NOVA de Lisboa, Portugal
IRP 6 – New Engineered Oxidative Enzymes for Synthesis of polymers’ building blocks
Paola Agustin Velez
Instituto Politécnico Nacional, Ciudad de México, Mexico
Paola holds a Master of Science degree in Biotechnology with experience in the design, expression, purification, and characterization of recombinant proteins. Her research focuses on engineering environmentally significant enzymes to reduce pollution and enhance their biochemical and biophysical properties.
She will be Working on IRP 7 – Engineering solvent stability in enzymes for lignin depolymerization and functionalization of lignin-derived aromatics
Maria Orfanidou
Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece
Maria has an MSc in Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, with research experience in synthetic chemistry, molecular biology, and microbiology. Her interests focus on protein engineering for sustainable biotechnology and circularity.
She will be Working on IRP 8 – Development of polyamide-binding peptides
Márta Sundström
Uppsala University, Sweden
Márta holds a Master’s degree in Molecular Biotechnology Engineering, with a focus on biophysics. Her academic interests include enzyme engineering, biocatalysis, and structural biology.v
She will be Working on IRP9 – Design and characterization of polyamide fusion enzymes
Matias Brezina Borges
Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität, Munich, Germany
Matias holds an MSc in Molecular Cell Biology and has an academic background that combines wet-lab microbiology with structural bioinformatics. His research focuses on protein interfaces, conformational changes, and protein de novo design.
He will be Working on IRP 10 – Engineering of oxidoreductases for polymer building blocks production
Our Commitment to Gender Balance & Diversity
At COMENZE, we believe that diversity drives innovation. We are committed to fostering an inclusive research environment where talent thrives, and equal opportunities are ensured for all. Gender balance is a key priority, and we actively encourage fair representation and participation in science and innovation.
By promoting an open and supportive research culture, we aim to create a team where different perspectives contribute to scientific excellence and meaningful progress.
