Building Blocks of Matter and Fundamental Interactions (TRA Matter)

What does the inside of a carbon atom’s nucleus look like? A new study by Forschungszentrum Jülich, Michigan State University (USA) and the University of Bonn provides the first comprehensive answer to this question. In the study, the researchers simulated all known energy states of the nucleus. These include the puzzling Hoyle state. If it did not exist, carbon and oxygen would only be present in the universe in tiny traces. Ultimately, we therefore also owe it our own existence. The study has now been published in the journal “Nature Communications.”

The German Chemical Society (GDCh) is to present the Hildegard Hamm-Brücher Prize for Equal Opportunities in Chemistry to the project entitled “Women In Supramolecular Chemistry (WISC) – an international network supporting equality, diversity and inclusion within supramolecular chemistry.” The team led by Assistant Professor Dr. Anna McConnell from the University of Siegen will receive the award on September 4 at an event to mark the opening of the GDCh Science Forum Chemistry (WiFo) in Leipzig. Also on board is Dr. Larissa von Krbek from the Kekulé Institute of Organic Chemistry and Biochemistry at the University of Bonn. The researcher is head of an Emmy Noether research unit and a member of the Matter Transdisciplinary Research Area.

Two researchers from the University of Bonn have been awarded a Proof of Concept Grant by the European Research Council (ERC) as part of a program designed to help researchers translate their ideas from previous ERC projects into commercial applications. Biologist Prof. Dr. Bernardo S. Franklin from the University Hospital Bonn and physicist Prof. Dr. Simon Stellmer will thus each receive €150,000 over a period of around one year.

In seeking an explanation to what holds the world together at its core, particle physicists face many unresolved mysteries. The matter and energy we know make up only five percent of the cosmos; but what is the remaining “dark matter” and “dark energy” made of? Why is there so much matter but so little antimatter in the universe? And why do the second most common known particles in the universe, called neutrinos, have such tiny masses? To answer these fundamental questions, the new Clausius Professor Jun.-Prof. Dr. Lena Funcke and her team are developing models beyond the Standard Model of particle physics and applying novel computational methods for calculating model predictions for future experiments. This will be a new research focus at the University of Bonn in the Transdisciplinary Research Area “Building Blocks of Matter and Fundamental Interactions” (TRA “Matter”).