Dario Leister has been Professor (Chair) of Plant Molecular Biology at the LMU Munich since 2005. In 1995, he received his PhD in Genetics from the Max-Planck-Institute for Plant Breeding Research. He habilitated in genetics at the University of Tübingen in 2001. He has received numerous prizes and awards, including the Karl-Lohmann-Prize from the German Society for Biological Chemistry (2003), a Top Author Award from the American Society of Plant Biologists (2015), and election to the Leopoldina - National Academy of Sciences (2017). He was a member of the Scientific Advisory Board of the Viikki Plant Science Centre, Helsinki, Finland, and founding director of the Copenhagen Plant Science Centre (2013-2016). He is the spokesperson of the Transregio-SFB 175 (The Green Hub - Central Coordinator of Acclimation in Plants) since 2016 and the coordinating PI of the ERC Synergy Cluster "PhotoRedesign" since 2020. He was Dean of the Faculty of Biology for 6 years (2017-2023). His current research focuses on the regulation and improvement of photosynthetic light responses, using a variety of approaches and organisms.