Many drug addicts take not only one substance but rather several. Scientists at the Max Planck Institute of Experimental Medicine in Göttingen have investigated the role that genes and the environment play in the development of such multiple substance consumption or polytoxicomania. Their results show that, in addition to genetic factors, the accumulation of several unfavourable environmental factors causes people to slip into such an extreme…

For the third time during the pandemic, researchers at the University of Göttingen have surveyed consumers in Germany. Participants filled in questionnaires about their shopping, eating and cooking behaviour, as well as their perception of the resilience of food systems during the coronavirus pandemic. The results confirm the main findings of the first two surveys: sustainability is increasingly important to many people when buying food, and they…

The research group leader at the Max Planck Institute (MPI) for Biophysical Chemistry receives 2.4 million euros of funding from the European Research Council (ERC) for the next five years. With the help of this funding, the physical chemist and her team want to combine two methods: nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) and electron paramagnetic resonance (EPR) spectroscopy. By doing this, the researchers aim to develop more sensitive techniques with…

Understanding spoken words, developing normal speech - cochlear implants enable people with profound hearing impairment to gain a great deal in terms of quality of life. However, background noises are problematic, they significantly compromise the comprehension of speech of people with cochlear implants. The team led by Tobias Moser from the Institute for Auditory Neuroscience and InnerEarLab at the University Medical Center Göttingen and from…

Among the most exciting discoveries made by ESA's Solar Orbiter spacecraft are small, bright regions in the hot solar corona that had previously eluded other spacecraft. The tiny flares are found in measurement data from the Extreme-Ultraviolet Imager (EUI) taken during the instrument's commissioning in space last year. At the General Assembly of the European Geosciences Union (EGU), the EUI team including researchers from the Max Planck…

The marine worm Ramisyllis multicaudata, which lives within the internal canals of a sponge, is one of only two such species possessing a branching body, with one head and multiple posterior ends. An international research team led by the Universities of Göttingen and Madrid is the first to describe the internal anatomy of this intriguing animal. The researchers discovered that the complex body of this worm spreads extensively in the canals of…

With a rating that was overall outstanding, the German Council of Science and Humanities has recommended that funding be given for the planned Human Cognition and Behavior (HuCaB) research building at Göttingen University. The new building will be home to an interdisciplinary centre for research into human social cognition. In addition, the funding will enable the purchase of several large pieces of equipment. This includes a…

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…