The Belgian research vessel RV Belgica is currently underway in the waters of Iceland. Two researchers from the University of Bonn are also on board. The goal of the mission is to better understand a natural thermostat of the Earth: the weathering of rocks at the bottom of the sea. This process binds carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. It may also be possible to use it in the fight against climate change.
Prof. Dr. Klaus Mølmer from the Niels Bohr Institute in Copenhagen is to receive a research prize from the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation. The €60,000 award, which is presented in Germany to researchers from abroad, is considered a major honor. Prof. Mølmer has been collaborating with the working group led by Prof. Dieter Meschede and Prof. Sebastian Hofferberth at the University of Bonn’s Institute of Applied Physics (IAP) for many years now. In fact, it was Meschede and Hofferberth who had put their Danish colleague’s name forward for the accolade. The prize money will now enable them to step up their cooperation.
On Monday, the European Commission announced its chosen recipients for the second round of funding in the European Universities initiative. NeurotechEU—the European University of Brain and Technology, which the University of Bonn is part of, is among the alliances to have secured a further four years of funding. Led by Radboud University in Nijmegen, eight other universities are involved in NeurotechEU alongside the University of Bonn. They are joined by over 250 partners from industry, academia and civil society. The aim is to build an innovative, trans-European network of excellence for brain research and brain technologies.
The contracts for a visiting professorship scheme designed to support outstanding Brazilian researchers were signed during an online event held last Friday. Participants included Prof. Dr. Mercedes Bustamante, President of the CAPES Foundation (Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior, or Coordination for the Improvement of Higher Education Personnel), as well as the Rector of the University of Bonn and its Vice Rector for International Affairs.
Prof. Dr. Thomas Schultz from the Institute for Computer Science II at the University of Bonn and Priv.-Doz. Dr. Theodor Rüber from the Clinic and Polyclinic for Epileptology at the University Hospital Bonn are the first winners of the “Modelling for Life and Health” Transdisciplinary Research Prize, which is presented by the Modelling and Life & Health Transdisciplinary Research Areas (TRAs) at the University of Bonn. The €120,000 award funds highly innovative research projects at the interface between mathematics or computer science on the one hand and the topics covered by the TRA Life & Health on the other.
Researchers at the University of Bonn can receive up to € 50,000 to further develop science-based and innovative start-up ideas. For this purpose, the Transfer Center enaCom invites applications for prototyping grants to prepare start-up projects from research for commercialization. The application deadline for the current call is August 25, 2023.
The University of Bonn was recently gifted an extraordinary book, the donation of which had been promised 70 years ago by the since deceased Dutch ambassador and sinologist Robert van Gulik. The work is a volume titled “Erotic colour prints of the Ming Period: with an essay on Chinese sex life from the Han to the Ch'ing dynasty, B.C. 206 - A.D. 1644”. The work was printed in Tokyo in 1951 in a limited edition of only 50 copies. The ambassador’s son, Prof. Thomas van Gulik, presented the book to Prof. Dr. Ralph Kauz of the University of Bonn Department of Oriental and Asian Studies in a special ceremony.
The European Space Agency's Euclid space telescope was launched into space today at 17:11 CEST on a Falcon 9 rocket from the U.S. space company SpaceX. From its destination, the Lagrange Point 2 (L2) of the Earth and Sun, it will observe over a third of the entire sky for at least six years and map the spatial distribution of several billion galaxies. The data obtained will provide information about the influence of dark matter and dark energy on the structure of the Universe. With six research institutes, Germany is strongly involved in the international Euclid Consortium. Among them is the Argelander Institute for Astronomy (AIfA) at the University of Bonn.