Peter Walter, SVP & Institute Director of Altos Labs in San Francisco elucidated in his key-note “Targeting the Cell´s Stress Pathways for Therapeutic Benefit” the advances in the lab’s efforts to understand the molecular details of the unfolded protein response (UPR), a conserved signaling network that surveys the protein folding status in the endoplasmic reticulum. In our interview with Peter we learned about the main success factors of his career life and the foundation of Altos Lab: