News
ERC Advanced Grant
Prof. Dr Christian Hertweck secures €2.5 million of funding.
Portrait of Prof. Dr Christian Hertweck
Image: Anna SchrollLong before photosynthesis released free oxygen into the atmosphere, the Earth was already home to numerous organisms. As oxygen was life-threatening to them, these organisms developed metabolic pathways entirely different to those that occur in plants, animals and humans.
Anaerobic bacteria have survived the aeons in specific, oxygen-free niches. In fact, some of these niches are very close to us, as anaerobic bacteria make up part of the human gut microbiome. However, certain anaerobic bacteria can also trigger diseases, such as tetanus and botulism.
The »AnoxyGen« projectExternal link, for which Prof. Dr Christian Hertweck (pictured) has been awarded an Advanced Grant by the European Research Council (ERC), aims to decode novel active substances produced by anaerobic bacteria and shed light on their role in nature. Hertweck works at the Leibniz Institute for Natural Product Research and Infection Biology – Hans Knöll InstituteExternal link (HKI) and is Professor of Natural Product Chemistry at the University of Jena.
The project relies on a powerful expression system to identify and modify active substances. This allows the
team to produce and research the toxins and virulence factors of pathogenic anaerobic bacteria without having to cultivate the pathogens in significant quantities. [Gawlik]
ERC Consolidator Grant
Prof. Dr Ilona Croy awarded €2 million for her research project on interpersonal touch
Portait of Prof. Dr Ilona Croy
Image: Anne Günther (University of Jena)People need physical touch. However, the frequency of interpersonal contact is steadily declining. Increasingly impersonal interactions are contributing to a reduction in trust and an increase in stress in interpersonal relationships. The psychosocial implications and processes of this trend are the focus of several broad-based studies conducted by Prof. Dr Ilona Croy (pictured). A Professor of Clinical Psychology, Croy has now been awarded a Consolidator Grant by the European Research Council (ERC) to support her work.
One of the aims of her »TOUCHNET« project is to establish a database of behaviour related to everyday interpersonal physical contact. She will conduct an ecological momentary assessment, recording more than 100,000 instances of physical touch in day-to-day life, and then link these instances with social and health-related factors. The new database will then be used to examine the mechanisms by which touch achieves its effects. In addition, her research team plan to use a technique called »hyperscanning « to analyse how interpersonal touch leads to a synchronization of neuronal processes. [US]
ERC Synergy Grant
Prof. Dr Carsten Ronning and his interdisciplinary research team gain €14 million for the »ATHENS« project.
Portrait of Prof. Dr Carsten Ronning
Image: Jens Meyer (University of Jena)Based at the University of Jena, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) and the École Polytechnique Fédérale
de Lausanne (EPFL) in Switzerland, the »ATHENS« project seeks to combine methods from the fields of electronics and photonics—and has now been awarded an ERC Synergy Grant.
By applying novel ideas and materials, researchers hope to significantly improve data transmission rates and speeds in information and communications technologies. They will deploy electro-optical translators and amplifiers, which convert electrical signals into optical signals and can transmit data at far higher speeds.
The researchers have already demonstrated that these electro-optical translators and amplifiers can function on a tiny chip. Now, their focus is on expanding and optimizing this technology. The Jena-based team led by Prof. Dr Carsten Ronning (pictured) of the Institute of Solid State Physics has two aims: firstly, to implant ions from light centres into passive optical components and, secondly, to integrate non-linear optical materials into photonic integrated circuits. [abu]
Research Training Group for polymer informatics
German Research Foundation (DFG) allocates €5 million to support early career researchers in Jena and Bayreuth.
Prof. Dr. Ulrich S. Schubert and Dr. Natalie Göppert in front of a synthesis robot for automated copolymerisation.
Image: Anna Schroll/Universität JenaPolymers can be used to make almost anything, especially when different polymers can be effectively combined. The properties of these materials, known as »copolymers«, can be modified through targeted adjustments. The potential uses of copolymers range from medicine to packaging and transport.
However, if these copolymers are to be manufactured in a more effective, targeted manner in the future — not only by chemists but also by computer scientists — then chemical expertise will be required alongside knowledge of IT and robotics. A new Research Training Group (RTG) called »COIN – Copolymer Informatics: Blending digital technologies and copolymer chemistry – From design to application« will impart this knowledge over the next five years. The RTG will concentrate expertise centred in Jena and Bayreuth—two leading locations for polymer science in Germany—in relation to synthesis, analytics, polymer chemistry, theoretical chemistry, engineering, informatics and robotics.
»Polymer informatics will offer the participating doctoral candidates highly interdisciplinary training, enabling
them to communicate across disciplinary boundaries and find new avenues of research,« emphasizes Prof.
Dr Ulrich S. Schubert (pictured, left) of the University of Jena, who has been appointed spokesperson of the new RTG. [abu]
Support for young minds
Thuringia’s first Psychotherapeutic Outpatient Clinic for Children, Adolescents and Families established at the University of Jena.
Prof Dr Julia Asbrand sits in a red armchair and looks into the camera with a smile.
Image: Jens Meyer (University of Jena)Thuringia has taken an important step forward in improving mental healthcare services for its children and young people: the state’s first Psychotherapeutic Outpatient Clinic for Children, Adolescents and Families de has now opened at the University of Jena.
In addition to providing patient care, the clinic also serves to train psychotherapists. And, in an effort to improve the quality of psychotherapeutic treatment, the clinic’s healthcare services will be coupled with intensive research with the aim of developing innovative preventive and therapeutic concepts.
This research will focus on topics such as anxiety, depression and growing up in times of global crisis. »We want to understand the impacts of global crises on young people’s mental health and thereby derive preventive strategies for dealing with crisis,« says Prof. Dr Julia Asbrand (pictured), the new clinic’s director and founder. [abu]