Professor of Chemistry, Lutz Ackermann from Göttingen University has received an Advanced Grant from the European Research Council (ERC). The ERC will fund his project "Electrochemical Bond Functionalization (ElectroFun)" for five years with an award of around 2.5 million euros. The development of environmentally friendly production methods is one of the greatest challenges facing society today. This is where the ElectroFun project excels: it…

The biophysicist at the Max Planck Institute (MPI) for Biophysical Chemistry in Göttingen receives about 1.1 million euros funding for the next three years, together with his colleagues Tiago Costa from Delft University of Technology (The Netherlands) and Andreas Hartel at Columbia University (United States). With the grant’s help, the researchers will investigate the physiological effects of ultrasound waves on ion channel signaling. Applying…

The Hanseatic League was a confederation of merchant guilds and market towns in Northwestern and Central Europe, which came to dominate trade in the region for three hundred years. A digital platform has now been built which reveals the long-distance trade routes in Northern Europe between 1350 and 1650. The Research Center for Hanse and Baltic History, the Universities of Magdeburg, Aarhus and Nijmegen, and a team from the University of…

Solutions that conduct electricity, ‘electrolytes’, are ubiquitous not only in batteries and capacitors but also in biofluids including blood plasma; of great practical importance is thus to understand how electrolytes can be utilised to control living cells or other objects that are immersed in them. In a new study published in Physical Review Letters, researchers from the Max Planck Institute for Dynamics and Self-Organization (MPIDS) in…

While the first vaccines against SARS-CoV-2 have now been approved in Europe and other countries, drugs for specific and efficient treatment of COVID-19 have as yet only limited availability – but are urgently needed. Because of the typical long drug development timelines, the approach of iCAIR® researchers is based on drug repurposing – the use of drugs that have already been approved for other therapeutic purposes. To begin with, researchers…

The almost 15-million-year-old Nördlinger Ries is an asteroid impact crater filled with lake sediments. Its structure is comparable to the craters currently being explored on Mars. In addition to various other deposits on the rim of the basin, the crater fill is mainly formed by stratified clay deposits. Unexpectedly, a research team led by the University of Göttingen has now discovered a volcanic ash layer in the asteroid crater. In addition,…

A team of researchers, including scientists from the Max Planck Institute (MPI) for Biophysical Chemistry in Göttingen, has identified several candidates for drugs against the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus using the PETRA III X-ray light source at the German Electron Synchrotron (DESY). Among them are two promising compounds that are currently being investigated in preclinical studies. This drug screening – probably the largest of its kind – also…

Testing and vaccination - these are the pillars on which humanity is trying to get a grip on the Coronavirus pandemic. Although it is taking longer than many had expected, it is believed that it is only a matter of time before we are all vaccinated and thus protected. However, time is also working for the virus, which has now mutated several times, with variants B.1.1.7 from the United Kingdom, B.1.351 from South Africa and P.1 from Brazil…

The use of artificial intelligence (AI) is becoming more common in many branches of industry and online retailing. Traditional lines of work, such as transport logistics and driving, are developing in a similar direction although mainly out of public view. Scientists at the University of Göttingen have now investigated how efficient the use of AI can be in the commercial management of trucks. Their answer: the best option is an intelligent…

The question is considered one of the great mysteries of biology: How is the activity of genes controlled? The cell only copies active genes in the form of long RNA molecules, which then serve as building instructions for proteins. This copying process – called transcription – is carried out by biological nanomachines known as RNA polymerases. These are the focus of Cramer´s research in the Department of Molecular Biology.   “With his findings,…