Münster (upm), 12. Januar 2007
WWU Münster successfully completed the second round of the so-called excellence initiative of the German Ministry of Science. A joint commission of the German Research Foundation (Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft, DFG) and the Science Council (Wissenschaftsrat, WR) shortlisted three outline applications from WWU and called on the University to draw up and submit detailed applications to by the middle of April. The final decision on which universities and projects will receive financial assistance totalling _1.9 billion in the second round of the excellence initiative will be taken in the autumn.
The aim of the excellence initiative is to promote top-level research and to raise the broad quality of universities and science in Germany, thus leading to a sustained strengthening of science in Germany, to an improvement of its international competitiveness and to a higher visibility for high-level achievements in universities and science.
The international jury gave positive assessments to Münster's applications for excellence clusters in the fields of "Religion and Politics" (coordinated by Prof. Barbara Stollberg-Rilinger) and "Cell Dynamics and Disease" (Prof. Volker Gerke) and to one application for a graduate school in the field of "Chemistry in Complex Systems" (Prof. Hellmut Eckert).
The rector of WWU Münster, Prof. Ursula Nelles, was delighted at the University's performance. The University owed its success to the commitment shown by the "excellence initiative task force" set up by the management, said Prof. Nelles, who thanked both the task force and all the academics involved.
As delighted as everyone was, Prof. Nelles nevertheless warned against "premature victory celebrations". What was now needed, she said, was for people to roll up their sleeves and, within just a few weeks, draw up and send off convincing full applications in order to succeed in the decisive final round of the competition and thus secure financial assistance for WWU amounting to around _10 million.
The rector also sees good chances for those projects and concepts not directly featured in this excellence initiative to be put into practice, referring for example to the European Union's 7th Research Framework Programme for 2007 to 2013, in which the University of Münster would be participating actively and with changes to its organisational forms. In particular, she said, WWU Münster would certainly be implementing its plans for advancing top-level university research, even without assistance through the excellence initiative, although they would be adapted and spread over a longer period of time. The management had worked intensively on these plans for two years, she added, and today believed in them more than ever.
WWU Münster's project appplications which made the final round are:
Excellence cluster "Cell Dynamics and Disease: From Cellular Plasticity to Inflammatory and Vascular Pathologies"
Inflammation and vascular pathologies are the causes of many different medically challenging and often debilitating chronic diseases. The excellence cluster "Cell Dynamics and Disease: From Cellular Plasticity to Inflammatory and Vascular Pathologies" aims both at explaining the molecular and cellular processes which underlie these disorders and affect the cells of the immune and vasculature systems and at developing specific strategies for diagnosis, prevention and therapy.
Excellence cluster "Religion and Politics in Pre-Modern and Modern Cultures"
In the "post-secular age", the relationship between politics and religion appears in a completely new light. The excellence cluster "Religion and Politics in Pre-Modern and Modern Cultures", in which numerous departments from the humanities - under the historians' leadership - will be involved, will be presenting new cultural approaches in their research and thus making a contribution to clarifying, and finding solutions for, current problems.
Graduate school "Chemistry in Complex Systems: From Molecules to Function"
The international gaduate school "Chemistry in Complex Systems: From Molecules to Function" aims to build up innovative structures with new chemical functions for applications in chemical catalysis, biochemistry and material sciences and to thoroughly understand the mechanisms by which they act. Although these fields of work pursue different interests, they are linked by common principles of design and these will be used to build up functional structures.