Sustainability at the University of Bonn now has a name: Bonn Program for Sustainable Transformation (BOOST) encapsulates the wide-ranging knowledge, projects and commitment of University members for responsibility in how we treat our fellow human beings, our natural world and its resources.

It’s now official: the examination regulations for the “German Language Proficiency Test for Admission to Higher Education (DSH)” at the University of Bonn has been successfully accredited by the German Rectors’ Conference (HRK) in accordance with the provisions of the framework regulations for German language examinations (Rahmenordnung über deutsche Sprachprüfungen, RO-DT). This was preceded by a process that included review and approval by the Fachverband Deutsch als Fremdsprache (FaDaF), the specialist association for German as a foreign language. This means that the University can now use the “DSH-Zeugnis®” seal, which is protected by law.

Why have some plant species changed pollinators in their evolution? An international team of researchers from the Universities of Bonn and Xi'an Jiaotong-Liverpool University Suzhou (China) studied the reproductive systems of three sister species pairs, where one species is pollinated by insects and the other by hummingbirds. Mechanisms were discovered that explain the switch from insect to bird pollination. The study has now appeared in the journal Ecology and Evolution.

The Center for Development Research (ZEF) at the University of Bonn will receive around eight million Euros in funding over the next eight years from the International Climate Initiative of the German Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation, Nuclear Safety and Consumer Protection. The new CABES (Capacities on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services) project aims to strengthen the interfaces between science, policy and practice in Africa and support networking with the international activities of the World Biodiversity Council (IPBES). Another goal of the project is to train early career scientists as intermediaries. To this end, new Master degree programs are being established in Côte d'Ivoire, Ethiopia and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).

The University of Bonn has again recruited high-ranking personalities. Prof. Dr. Carmen Ruiz de Almodóvar and Prof. Dr. Martin Keßler are now taking up so-called Schlegel Professorships, which are financed by excellence funds. The internationally recognized researchers will open up new fields of research at the University of Bonn and provide important impulses in the life sciences and Protestant theology.

Whether nectar-sucking butterflies or blood-sucking mosquitoes - the ingestion of liquid food has long been known for many insects and other arthropods. A research team from Germany and Switzerland, led by the Leibniz Institute for the Analysis of Biodiversity Change (LIB) and the University of Bonn, now shows that millipedes also use a sucking pump to ingest liquid food. A sucking pump has thus evolved independently in different groups of organisms over several 100 million years. In the process, astonishingly similar biomechanical solutions for ingesting liquid food have evolved in widely distant animal groups. The study results have now been published in the journal Science Advances.

Residential real estate in major cities is considered to be particularly profitable. However, the returns over the past 150 years have been lower on average than for properties in smaller cities. This is shown in a study by the team of economist Prof. Dr. Moritz Schularick, member of the Cluster of Excellence ECONtribute: Markets & Public Policy at the University of Bonn. The study is the first of its kind to provide historical comparisons of long-term total returns on residential portfolios, linking house price data and rental yields. It was published in advance as "ECONtribute Discussion Paper".

How can a customized chemotherapy be found for cancer, for example? Machine learning methods can help with this and also improve patient treatment for other diseases. The start-up project aimed analytics at the University of Bonn has developed a modular analysis system that precisely groups patients on the basis of medical Big Data. The team of Dr. Kevin Baßler, Dr. Patrick Günther and Karsten Waltemathe has now received a coveted EXIST start-up grant of 130,000 euros from the German Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy for one year.