People

Dr. Johanna Strobl, PhD is a researcher and board-certified dermatologist at the Department of Dermatology, Medical University of Vienna. She holds a doctoral degree from the PhD Program Immunology at the Medical University of Vienna. She has performed pre-and post-doctoral research in the research group of Univ. Prof. Dr. Georg Stary, the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center and the University of Washington (Seattle, USA), and - most recently - the Haniffa Lab at Wellcome Sanger Institute in Cambridge, UK. Her clinical and research interests focus on T cell–mediated inflammatory skin diseases and tick-borne infections. Johanna Strobl is co-founder of the Young Immunologists Austria (Next Generation Immunologists) and serves on the board of the Austrian Society for Immunology (ÖGAI).

Florian is a second-year PhD student at the Medical University of Vienna. After graduating from medical school in 2022, he completed nine months of basic medical training at the Department of Internal Medicine at Franziskus Spital Margareten and at the Department of General Surgery at Hanusch Krankenhaus in Vienna. He then started his specialization training at the Department of Dermatology at the Medical University of Vienna in August 2023. At the same time, he enrolled in a clinical PhD, which he initially pursued during his work as a medical resident. Since May 2025, Florian has been working full-time as a PhD student analysing single-cell RNA-seq data of inflammatory skin diseases, with a current focus on the contribution of tissue-resident memory T cells to the disease process.

Michael Frömmel is currently pursuing an MSc in Molecular Microbiology, Microbial Ecology, and Immunobiology at the University of Vienna, with a specialization in Immunobiology. Alongside his studies, he conducts research at the Department of Dermatology, Medical University of Vienna, where he investigates the behaviour of Borrelia burgdorferi in the skin and its interaction with the immune system.

Earlier in his academic journey, he earned a BSc in Medicinal Chemistry and Pharmaceutical Sciences from Technological University Dublin, graduating with distinction and receiving the Student Excellence Award. Prior to that, he completed his secondary education in Biochemistry and Molecular Biotechnology at HBLVA Rosensteingasse in Vienna.

Sophie is a PhD candidate in the Immunology program at the Medical University of Vienna, jointly supervised by the Georg Stary Lab.

She first gained valuable experience in translational basic research during her diploma thesis and later through the university’s prestigious MD-PhD excellence program, where she conducted research on cutaneous Lyme disease in the lab of Univ.-Prof. Dr. Georg Stary. Since completing her medical degree, Sophie has been fully dedicated to investigating the interactions between microorganisms and the cutaneous immune system and nervous system as part of her PhD research.
Her current scientific focus lies on Lyme disease and atopic dermatitis, with an emphasis on understanding the underlying immunological mechanisms and their clinical relevance.

Anna Lagodka is a physician-scientist who has been working as a dermatology resident at the Department of Dermatology at the University Hospital Wiener Neustadt since December 2022. Her interest in translational skin immunology research began during her diploma thesis in the Stary Lab (Medical University of Vienna), where she investigated the interactions of immune cells with spirochetes in human skin. Anna currently combines her clinical training with translational research in Johanna Strobl’s lab, focusing on the role of tissue-resident memory T cells in the tumor microenvironment of Kaposi’s sarcoma.