Nick Olrichs graduated in Chemistry (2003) and received his PhD degree (2010) at the department of Biochemistry of Membranes of prof. B. de Kruijff at Utrecht University. His PhD project involved the design of new methods to identify novel players in the cell wall biosynthesis pathway of bacteria, with the aim of finding new targets for antibiotics. He utilized cell wall peptides modified with fluorescent or photocrosslink labels and showed that these compounds were taken up by bacterial cells and used for cell wall synthesis. This provided new insights into the organization of cell wall modifying proteins before and during cell division.

From 2010 he is working as a Post-doc in the department of Biochemistry and Cell Biology of prof. Helms at the faculty of Veterinary Medicine. His research focusses on the role of amyloid in the function of the mammalian autophagy-regulating protein Golgi-Associated plant Pathogenesis-Related protein 1 (GAPR-1) and its inhibitory activity against aggregation of the Alzheimer’s peptide Aβ. Special interest lies in the membrane binding and the di-/oligomerization properties of GAPR-1.

From 2016 he is managing director of the Institute of Biomembranes.