A receding hairline, a total loss of hair from the crown, and ultimately, the classical horseshoe-shaped pattern of baldness: Previous research into male pattern hair loss, also termed androgenetic alopecia, has implicated multiple common genetic variants. Human geneticists from the University Hospital of Bonn (UKB) and by the Transdisciplinary Research Unit "Life & Health" of the University of Bonn have now performed a systematic investigation of the extent to which rare genetic variants may also contribute to this disorder. For this purpose, they analyzed the genetic sequences of 72,469 male participants from the UK Biobank project. The analyses identified five significantly associated genes, and further corroborated genes implicated in previous research. The results have now been published in the prestigious scientific journal Nature Communications.

The third Nacht der Technik (“Engineering Night”) Bonn/Rhein-Sieg is coming up soon, and the University of Bonn will have its own station at the event for the first time in order to give visitors insights into various areas of its research. From 6 pm to midnight on Friday, October 20, 2023, the University will be one of 49 places in the region to open their doors and showcase engineering innovations with the help of interactive experiments from the worlds of robotics, geodesy and geoinformation, and astronomy. All its events at the University of Bonn will be held in the Institute of Computer Science at Friedrich-Hirzebruch-Allee 8.

Once again, a great many students will be starting their degree program at the University of Bonn in the coming weeks. For many of them, it will also mean getting to grips with a new city. With the First-Semester Students’ Welcome, the University says hello to its new students and supplies them with a wealth of information and advice so that they can find their way around the University, their department and the city of Bonn. The celebrations will be rounded off with a big party.

The University of Bonn is to welcome in the new academic year 2023/2024 with a ceremony in the main auditorium of its Main Building starting at 5 pm on Wednesday, October 18. All members of the University, including students in particular, are warmly invited to attend the celebrations, as are the media and anyone else living locally who might be interested. Registration is required as space is limited.

Producing sufficient food, feed, fiber, and fuel for our world population while simultaneously reducing the environmental footprint of agricultural production is a great challenge for humanity. DigiCrop.Net is a new platform of four leading research organizations from across the world who aim at supporting this endeavor with technology-driven approaches as key elements of possible solutions. Together, the partners seek to address central challenges and investigate novel ways for achieving sustainable crop production. 

The mathematician Prof. Dr. Angkana Rüland from the Hausdorff Center for Mathematics (HCM) Cluster of Excellence at the University of Bonn is to be presented with the illustrious New Horizons Prize for her outstanding work on applied analysis. The high-caliber $100,000 award is conferred by the Breakthrough Prize Foundation. The 35-year-old researcher and University of Bonn alumna was only appointed to one of its prestigious Hausdorff Chairs at the start of the year. In her research, she draws inspiration from problems encountered in the natural sciences.

Two archaeologists from the University of Bonn have been presented with major awards in recognition of their many years of successful research work in Mongolia. At a ceremony held at the Ministry of Education and Science of Mongolia in the capital Ulaanbaatar, State Secretary M. Batgerel pinned the Order of the Polar Star - the highest honor that the country can award to a foreign citizen - onto Professor Jan Bemmann’s lapel. Susanne Reichert received the Friendship Medal. The two researchers are currently working in Mongolia as part of Research Unit 5438, “Urban Impacts on the Mongolian Plateau - Entanglements of Economy, City, and Environment,” which has recently secured funding from the German Research Foundation (DFG). 

A great many criteria determine whether or not we get seriously ill from COVID-19. Besides our age and any previous or existing conditions, they also include genetic factors. Right from the start of the pandemic, the “COVID-19 Host Genetics Initiative” has been investigating the links between genetic factors and severe COVID-19. The international research consortium has now discovered 28 new risk factors, pushing the total number of candidate genes identified by the initiative up to 51. Its findings have now been published in the prestigious journal “Nature.”