Rate My Professor Silvan Scheller

Silvan Scheller is an Associate Professor in the Department of Bioproducts and Biosystems at Aalto University's School of Chemical Engineering, heading the Biochemistry research group since establishing it in 2017. His academic background includes training in organic and analytical chemistry, culminating in a PhD from ETH Zurich in 2012, for which he received the ETH Zurich medal for outstanding doctoral thesis. Prior to joining Aalto, Scheller worked in Professor Victoria Orphan's group at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech), focusing on the mechanisms of anaerobic oxidation of methane in environmental microbes.

Professor Scheller's research group designs energy-relevant biochemical conversions, specializing in biocatalytic transformations using methanogenic archaea to produce renewable fuels and chemicals from CO2 and hydrogen. The group's work encompasses biochemical CO2 valorization, metabolic engineering in Methanococcus maripaludis and Methanosarcina acetivorans using CRISPR/Cas12a genome-editing toolboxes and promoter-RBS libraries, and mechanistic studies of enzymes and cofactors from Methanothermobacter marburgensis. Key publications include "Artificial electron acceptors decouple archaeal methane oxidation from sulfate reduction" (Science, 2016), "Deconstructing Methanosarcina acetivorans into an acetogenic archaeon" (Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 2022), "Efficient CRISPR/Cas12a-Based Genome-Editing Toolbox for Metabolic Engineering in Methanococcus maripaludis" (ACS Synthetic Biology, 2022), "Thiol-Disulfide Exchange Kinetics and Redox Potential of the Coenzyme M and Coenzyme B Heterodisulfide" (ChemBioChem, 2024), and "Structure of the ATP-driven methyl-coenzyme M reductase activation complex" (Nature, 2025). Scheller has obtained major funding, such as 1,081,000 euros from the Jane and Aatos Erkko Foundation in 2024 for a biotechnological CO2 valorization project. His contributions align with UN Sustainable Development Goals on clean energy and climate action. Additionally, he has given invited talks including "Eating CO2 and hydrogen" (2021) and engaged in school outreach activities.