DFG approves additional six research training groups

Following the meeting of the Grants Committee for Research Training Groups on 22 April 2005, the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (German Research Foundation, DFG) has approved funding for an additional six new Research Training Groups. This was in accordance with the recommendation made by the Grants Committee, which, in light of the exceptionally high number of proposals received at it spring session, had requested that additional funding be made available by restructuring existing funds. Thus, additional projects that had been reviewed favourably were able to be included in the programme. The number of newly approved projects thus rises to 20. The DFG is currently funding 269 Research Training Groups, 38 of which are International Research Training Groups. The DFG Senate welcomed this decision at its meeting on 12 May.

The six new Research Training Groups:

University of Heidelberg:
"Quantitative Analysis of Dynamic Processes in Membrane Transport and Translocation"

University of Munich:
"Formen von Prestige in Kulturen des Altertums" (title available only in German)

University of Bayreuth:
"Intellectual Property and the Public Domain"

European University Viadrina, Frankfurt (Oder) and University of Potsdam:
"Forms of Life and the Know How of Living"

Charité University Hospital (Humboldt University of Berlin and the Free University of Berlin):
"Hormonal Regulation of Energy Metabolism, Body Weight and Growth"

University of Bonn, University of Bochum and University of Düsseldorf:
"Homotopy and Cohomology"

The DFG has funded Research Training Groups for particularly highly qualified doctoral students from all scientific disciplines since 1990. Between 15 and 25 researchers per Research Training Group work in a research and study programme that is usually interdisciplinary, under the supervision of professors who are distinguished in research and teaching. Students who complete a Research Training Group generally have a more rounded qualification than others, and complete their doctorate two years earlier on average. At 28 percent, the proportion of foreign students participating in Research Training Groups is almost three times higher than the German national average.

For further information contact Dr. Jörg Schneider, Research Training Groups and Research Careers Division, Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft, Kennedyallee 40, D-53175 Bonn, Germany. Tel.: +49(0)228 885-2424, e-mail: joerg.schneider@dfg.de.

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