Nurturing outstanding international research personalities

The University of Bayreuth Centre of International Excellence “Alexander von Humboldt” – or Bayreuth Humboldt Centre, for short – has selected its first international researchers - contingent on the development of the pandemic - to come to Bayreuth for research stays. "The worldwide coronavirus crisis with its effects on almost all areas of life shows how important it is to nurture international and interdisciplinary research collaboration even more intensively. At the University of Bayreuth, we are very pleased to welcome the first outstanding award winners to our campus. The planned research projects promise highly interesting contributions to areas of research that have been established at the University of Bayreuth most successfully and to great international acclaim," explains University President Prof. Dr. Stefan Leible.

The selection of the first six Senior and Junior Fellowships was made by an External Advisory Board consisting of renowned experts from Germany and abroad. All those involved were impressed by the extraordinarily high quality of applications received, meaning deciding was very difficult. "With their research collaborations, the award-winning Fellows reflect the breadth of disciplines in Bayreuth, and the University has already demonstrated its attractiveness for excellent international researchers in its first selection of prize-winners," said Prof. Dr. Julika Griem, Director of the KWI (Institute for Advanced Study in the Humanities in Essen) and Vice President of the DFG, who is a member of the selection committee. The Board is supported by independent German and international peer reviewers who evaluate the proposals in a specially instituted peer review process.

"With their projects, the six prize winners impressively demonstrate what real international research cooperation can achieve. It will be interesting to see how the projects develop, and we look forward to new and strengthened links with the various home universities and international research institutions," says Prof. Dr. Anna Köhler, Founding Executive  Director of the Bayreuth Humboldt Centre and Chair of Optoelectronics of Soft Matter at the University of Bayreuth.

Prof. Dr. Sarah Colvin from the University of Cambridge is one of the first Senior Fellows and is looking forward to her research cooperation with her host, PD Dr. Kyung-Ho Cha: "Mr. Cha and I are already preparing our collaboration, via e-mail and video conference. Due to the global situation, part of the international cooperation will take place online, however at the same time, it is an exciting learning process - we are keeping up to date with rapidly developing best practice and look forward to a fruitful exchange of ideas. Of course, I am particularly excited about getting to know the campus and my colleagues personally." Junior Fellow Dr. Celia Rodríguez Domínguez from Seville, was able to complete the first part of her research stay at UBT in September. Together with post-doctoral fellow Dr. Mutez Ahmed, she did important preparatory work for a subsequent experiment at the SOLEIL electron synchrotron in Paris - "without the generous support of the Bayreuth Humboldt Centre, we would not have been able to carry out our cooperation with Celia as an expert in plant hydraulics," says Dr. Ahmed.

Short Term Grants

For the second sponsorship programme, the Short Term Grants (travel grants), another five international academics have been selected after the first ten fellows in January. Subject to the pandemic situation, the grantees from Canada, India and Colombia, among other places, will spend between one and three weeks at the University of Bayreuth attending conferences or planning joint publications and projects:

• Dr. Aleksandra Drizo, Chief Scientific Officer at NPower Clean Tech, Bedford, Canada, with host Prof. Dr. Stefan Peiffer, Professor for Hydrology and Director of the Bayreuth Centre for Ecology & Environmental Research (BayCEER)
  
  
• Dr. Eranezhuth Wasan Awin, post-doctoral researcher at the Indian Institute of Technology, Madras, India, with host PD Dr. Günter Motz, head of the working group “Precursor Ceramics” at the Ceramic Material research group, and Prof. Dr. Rhett Kempe, Inorganic Chemistry II
  
  
• Dr. María Josefina Irurzun, post-doctoral researcher at the National Scientific and Technical Research Council of the Universidad Nacional del Centro de la Provincia de Buenos Aires, Argentina, with host Prof. Dr. Kordula Knaus, Professor of Musicology
  
  
• Dr. Felipe Reinoso Carvalho, Research Associate at the Marketing research group of the Universidad de los Andes, Bogotá, Colombia, with host Prof. Dr. Claas Christian Germelmann, Marketing and Consumer Behaviour
  
  
• Dr. Maxim Vlasov, researcher at the Institute of High Temperature Electrochemistry of the Ural Branch of Russian Academy of Sciences and research associate at the Ural Federal University, Yekaterinburg, Russia, with host Prof. Dr. Mirijam Zobel, Solid State Chemistry – Mesostructured Materials (AC)
  

Strategic Scientific Workshops

Finally, under the third sponsorship programme, Strategic Scientific Workshops, the Bayreuth Humboldt Centre is funding the first event, the workshop "Embodied Futurities" led by Prof. Dr. Wolf-Dieter Ernst (Theatre Studies) with Prof. Dr. Paulina Aroch Fugellie of the Universidad Autónoma Metropolitana in Mexico City.

"Even though global mobility is changing as a result of climate change, the Covid 19 pandemic and, of course, digitisation, it remains an important prerequisite for scientific exchange. Personal contact creates trust and sustainably strengthens our international networks," explains Dr. Mirjam Horn-Schott, Managing Director of the Bayreuth Humboldt Centre. "When circumstances permit, our Fellows and Grantees will come to Bayreuth, and many are preparing their stays with their hosts from a distance and look forward to real, productive encounters on our campus". The aim is to then network these outstanding research personalities with other international guests at the University and with the general public.