Bonn is Germany’s Preeminent University of Excellence

We have been one of eleven German Universities of Excellence since the summer of 2019. And we are the only German university in the Excellence Contest conducted by the federal government and German states¹ (as part of their Excellence Strategy—ExStra) to receive funding for six Clusters of Excellence. This makes us the most successful University of Excellence in their Excellence Strategy. Find out more about the planning for our future as a University of Excellence.

News from the Excellence Strategy

Starting points for the control of protein synthesis²

The research field of "cellular IRESes" lay dormant for decades, as there was no uniform standard of reliable methods for the clear characterization of these starting points for the ribosome-mediated control of gene expression. Researchers at the University Hospital Bonn (UKB) and the University of Bonn, in collaboration with Stanford University in California (USA), have now developed a toolbox as a new gold standard for this field. They hope to discover strong IRES elements that are directly relevant for synthetic biology and for application in emerging mRNA therapeutics. The results of their work have been published in The EMBO Journal.

Domestic Robots from Bonn Win the German Open³

The University of Bonn’s NimbRo team masterfully defended its title at the German Open household robot competition, held March 13-16 in Nuremberg. University of Bonn’s robots for assistance with day-to-day tasks were developed by the Autonomous Intelligent Systems working group at the Institute of Computer Science. Capable of grasping and dropping objects and navigating everyday environments, they interact with human beings via voice dialogue system.

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Creating Personalized Cancer Treatments Using “Mini-Tumors” and a Digital Twin⁴

Funded by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF), a collaborative project involving the University of Bonn, the company ESQlabs and the University Hospital Bonn is seeking to refine the therapy recommendations given to colon cancer patients. To this end, “ISPOT-K” is merging organoids taken from patients with the power of digital twin technology.

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Potential target for MS therapy discovered⁵

Multiple sclerosis (MS) is a chronic inflammatory disease of the central nervous system caused by the immune system. B cells, which are a type of white blood cell, play a role in the development of MS and are thus a target for therapies. Researchers at the University Hospital Bonn (UKB), the University of Bonn and the FAU Erlangen-Nuremberg identified the membrane protein MLC1 as a potential target antigen in MS. To do this, the team used a novel combination of modern techniques. The results of the work have now been published in the renowned journal “Neurology Neuroimmunology & Neuroinflammation”.

News from our Clusters and TRAs ⁶

This is what the "Excellence Strategy" is all about

The Excellence Strategy of the Federal Government and German States was adopted in 2016 with the long-term aim of enhancing Germany’s standing and international competitiveness as a location for science and scholarship; implementation commenced in 2018. The associated grant program successfully rolled out in the earlier Excellence Initiative (of 2005-2017) forms the funding basis for the process of ongoing development at German universities. Roughly half a billion euros in funding is budgeted annually, three-quarters of which are put up by the federal government and one quarter by the German states. The goal: promoting research excellence by heightening the profile of the national higher education system and strengthening collaboration between its member institutions. The Excellence Strategy provides for two grant programs for which universities can apply:

What is a “Cluster of Excellence”?

Clusters of Excellence are formed as an instrument for providing project-specific funding to universities and university consortia for research in fields of importance in a context of international competition. In September 2018 the decision was made to allocate funding for applications connected to the University of Bonn for the current grant period, out of a total of 57 approved projects. The annual funding budgeted for Clusters of Excellence ranges between three and ten million euros, granted for an initial seven-year period. Both new and follow-on applications may be approved at the end of this period, subject to the limit of two funding periods for Clusters of Excellence.

What is a “University of Excellence”?

The grant program for Universities of Excellence is in place as a means to empower individual institutions and university alliances or consortia to make further gains as international research leaders. Annual funding of between 10 and 15 million euros is available for individual universities, and up to 28 million euros for university consortia.
A new aspect to this grant program now is that universities of supra-regional stature are eligible for joint funding from both the federal and state governments on a non-temporary basis. For Universities of Excellence the condition applies that they must successfully pass a research evaluation every seven years. Decisions regarding funding for new and ongoing projects are to be made in 2026.

The University of Bonn's Future Concept

The Future Concept outlined by the University of Bonn was effective in convincing the evaluating judges to select the institution as one of eleven Universities (and university alliances) of Excellence. At the heart of this Future Concep⁷t lies a set of fundamental objectives: promoting transdisciplinary research, through the formation of Transdisciplinary Research Areas (TRAs)⁸; “We invest in people”—creating high-profile professorships to attract scholars of excellence across the range of qualification levels⁹; “We foster networks”—forming and strengthening research alliances; and “We create impact” by furthering knowledge transfer and communication within the research community.

Eine Wissenschaftlerin und ein Wissenschaftler arbeiten hinter einer Glasfassade und mischen Chemikalien mit Großgeräten.

Transdisciplinary Research Areas

The six existing Transdisciplinary Research Areas (TRAs) have touchpoints across the entire spectrum of academic inquiry at the University.

Explore TRAs ⁸

The ‘Future Concept’

Our strategy to deliver excellence in research and teaching is summarily expressed in the slogan: “We invest in people, we foster networks, we create impact.

Learn more ⁷