Please give us a personal quote or a quote of a famous person (e.g. of Albert Einstein) that describes you and your life/work.
“I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us with sense, reason, and intellect has intended us to forgot their use” Galileo Galilei

Please describe your job in only one sentence and tell us what the most important goal of this work is.
I’m the Instrument Scientist of CHEOPS and I think the most important part of this job is to check that the instrument we are designing will perform according to the scientific requirements.

How did you get into this research/work field?
I did my PhD and two postdocs in Planet Formation (modelling). I started to collaborate with the CHEOPS team before CHEOPS was selected as the first ESA S-mission. After the selection of CHEOPS I was offered to be a member of the team. It was a big challenge as this work is completely different from my previous work, but it is worth the effort and I’m very happy with the change.

What would be the greatest discovery you would like to see in your life time?
I would like to see a self-consistent explanation for planet and planetary system formation.

You work for the NCCR PlanetS. What do you think will the NCCR enable you to do you couldn’t do without it?
To have the unique possibility of interaction between theoreticians and observers in order to understand planet formation.