Jörg Hacker obtained his PhD in biology from the University of Halle (Saale) in 1979. He went on to become Associated Professor for Microbiology at the University of Würzburg, where he became Full Professor and Director of the Institute for Molecular Infection Biology in 1993. His research focuses on the molecular analysis of infectious bacteria and of host-pathogen interactions.Hacker was a visiting researcher at the Institute Pasteur in 2000 and 2005, and was a guest professor at Tel Aviv University in 2006. In 2003-2009 Hacker was Vice President of the German Research Foundation (DFG), and in 2008-2010 President of the Robert Koch Institute in Berlin. He is Honorary Senator of the University of Würzburg since 2009 and Honorary Professor at the University of Greifswald since 2010. Since March 2010 he is the President of the German National Academy of Sciences Leopoldina.