He obtained his Ph.D. from the University of Stuttgart, Germany, and was a postdoctoral fellow and instructor at the Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center/Harvard Medical School in Boston, before he joined Mayo Clinic. Work in his laboratory focuses on inter- and intracellular signaling that leads to development and progression of pancreatic cancer. Specific interests are to understand the roles of acinar-to-ductal metaplasia and immune cell infiltration in these processes.