New professorship for cellular therapies
The University Council has appointed Professor Heinz Läubli as Clinical Professor of Cellular Therapies at the Faculty of Medicine. Furthermore, it has also approved the renaming of the Faculty of Theology.
19 May 2026
Cellular immunotherapy is an innovative method for treating tumors. Like other types of immunotherapy, it makes use of the body’s own defense mechanisms: immune cells are taken from patients’ blood and modified in such a way that they can detect and fight tumor cells.
With the newly created professorship, the university is strengthening a research field that offers promising new therapeutic approaches for malignant diseases and plays a key role in combining translational research and clinical innovation. The University Council has now appointed Professor Heinz Läubli to the professorship; his appointment with a position at University Hospital Basel will take effect on 1 June 2026.
Heinz Läubli is a research group leader at the Department of Biomedicine and a senior physician at University Hospital Basel. From 2020 to 2025, he served as assistant professor at the University of Basel, during which time he established Basel as a national pioneer in the field of cell therapies. He was appointed adjunct professor of medical oncology in March 2025.
Läubli studied medicine at the University of Zurich, where he obtained doctorates in both medicine and natural sciences. In addition to his specialist training in internal medicine and oncology at University Hospital Basel, he conducted postdoctoral research at the University of California, San Diego from 2012 to 2014. In 2019, he also completed a research stay at Stanford University’s Cancer Cell Therapy Program.
Läubli’s translational research focuses on the further development of immunotherapies for cancer. Using cell culture systems and mouse models, he specifically investigates how polysaccharides and immune cells interact during the immune response. Another focus of his work is the development of cell therapies such as TIL and CAR-T cells to strengthen anti-tumor immunity.
Renaming of the Faculty of Theology
The University Council has approved the renaming of the Faculty of Theology as the Faculty of Theology and Religion. With this change, the faculty wishes to express the close dialog theology maintains with religious studies and Jewish studies, as well as its increased focus on religious plurality, cultural studies and contemporary issues. The President’s Office has been tasked with implementing the name change.
New adjunct professorships
The University Council has also approved the decision by the Senate to appoint the following adjunct professorships in the Faculty of Medicine:
- Professor Christian Appenzeller-Herzog for experimental medicine
- Professor Jan Ebbing for urology
- Professor Katja Birgit Hatz for ophthalmology
- Professor Klaus Arne Mehrkens for spinal surgery
