We provide an overview of current and completed research projects conducted by researchers at the Centre, addressing sustainability-related questions from a range of disciplinary perspectives. Information on research groups, working groups, and other groups can be found here. In addition to bringing together the sustainability-related research activities of ZIN researchers, ZIN also actively advances interdisciplinary sustainability research, for example through formats such as the "ZIN-Salons".

Ongoing Projects

• CIRCUBAIT - Circular economcy innovations for resilient, competitive and sustainable battery technologies

  The project relies on smart recycling processes and the reuse of individual cell components to reduce environmental impact and at the same time decrease Europe’s dependence on other countries for scarce raw materials essential for battery cell production.

  • Project members from ZIN: Prof. Martin Winter, MEET (Münster Electrochemical Energy Technology)
  • Duration: 2025 – 2027
  • Keywords: Battery recycling, Battery cycles,Reuse
  • Link to the project.

• FRUGALL - Fertilizing Rural-Urban Grids through Agroecology Living Labs to enhance sustainable food system transitions

  The project examines how regional agroecological transitions in European food systems can be fostered through strengthened rural–urban exchange relations, Agroecological Living Labs, participatory innovation processes, and analyses of food systems, policy barriers and sustainability impacts.

  • Project members from ZIN: Prof. Tillmann Buttschardt, Dr. Tobias Gumbert, Dr. Cornelia Steinhäuser
  • Duration: 2025 – 2029
  • Keywords: Agroecological transitions, rural-urban exchange relations, agroecological living labs, innovations in the agri-food system
  • Link to the project.

• FULL-MAP - FULLy integrated, autonomous & chemistry agnostic Materials Acceleration Platform for sustainable batteries

  FULL-MAP will establish a platform designed to speed up the development of advanced materials. By leveraging automation, AI-driven modeling, and high-throughput testing, it aims to enable faster and smarter discovery of next-generation materials and interfaces, significantly advancing sustainable battery technology.

  • Project members from ZIN: Prof. Martin Winter, MEET
  • Duration: 2025 – 2029
  • Keywords: Battery innovation, Artificial Intelligence
  • Link to the project.

• IT out of the Box

  The 'IT out of the Box' project creates a network between schools, youth centers, and sports clubs to increase access to STEM subjects for disadvantaged groups and to spark interest in STEM teaching careers. The project is based on a peer-education approach: senior high school students develop their own workshops focusing on STEM and Education for Sustainable Development (ESD), which they then implement at extracurricular learning sites. Using the programmable 'senseBox,' the project enables inquiry-based learning in the students' immediate environment, allowing participants to gain practical skills in programming, sustainability, and knowledge transfer.

  • Project members from ZIN: MExLab ExperiMINTe (Dr. Dörthe Masemann)
  • Duration: 2025 – 2028
  • Keywords: STEM Education, Peer Education, Education for Sustainable Development, Programming
  • Link to the project.

• AI and Sustainability

  The project examines negative social, economic, ecological, and political effects of the production and use of generative AI as well as practices relating to and imagining AI that are relevant for sustainability.

  • Project members from ZIN: Prof. Dr. Sigrid Kannengießer; Dr. Anne Mollen
  • Duration: since 2022
  • Keywords: Artifical Intelligence, sustainability, social practices, socio-technological imaginaries, ethics
  • Link to the project.

• KlimaXperience

  The three-year “KlimaXperience” project is developing an interactive 3D model of the sponge city of Copenhagen as a virtual excursion for geography lessons. Based on this, teacher training courses are being designed to support the didactically reflective use of virtual learning environments for climate change education. The aim is to make complex adaptation strategies such as the sponge city concept easy to understand and teach in a practical way.

  • Project members from ZIN: Dr. Nadine Rosendahl
  • Duration: 2025 – 2028
  • Keywords: Environmental communication, education for sustainable development
  • Link to the project.

• MODEMA

  The University of Münster contributes to Work Package 8 “Knowledge Transfer” of the MODEMA joint project through a participatory Citizen Science approach, thereby strengthening long-term knowledge generation and exchange between science and practice in agroforestry.

  • Project members from ZIN: Prof. Tillmann Buttschard
  • Duration: 2024 – 2027
  • Keywords: Agroforestry, Climate Adaptation, Biodiversity, Knowledge Transfer
  • Link to the project.

• PerPlacsBio - Perspectives of biobased and decomposable plastics in agriculture and forestry

  The two-year joint project explores how to use plastics more responsibly in agriculture and forestry, develops the necessary decision-making knowledge, gathers practical data, analyzes the feasibility of proposed measures together with stakeholders, and ultimately makes the results available in a user-friendly public database.

  • Project members from ZIN: Dr. Friederike Gabel; Dr. Cornelia Steinhäuser
  • Duration: 2025-2027
  • Key words: Microplastics, Plastics, Agriculture, Forestry
  • Link to the project. 

   

• Changing Polar Regions 1: SQUEEZE – Protecting the Vanishing Arctic Tundra – Potential, Planning and Communication; Project: Development and Dissemination of System-Based Teaching/Learning Units

  The subproject D2 of the project “Protecting the Vanishing Arctic Tundra” creates teaching and learning materials to communicate tundra conservation planning to both the public and geography students, tests and refines them through design cycles, and shares them nationwide through online teacher training programs.

  • Project members from ZIN: Prof. Rainer Mehren
  • Duration: 2023-2026
  • Key words: Geography didactics, tundra conservation planning, teaching and learning arrangements
  • Link to the project. 

• PREWAPHARM (Prevention of Water Pollution by Pharmaceuticals)

  PREWAPHARM aims to reduce pharmaceutical pollution in water throughout Northwest Europe by developing coordinated policies, strengthening cross-border governance, piloting preventive solutions at the source, creating scalable models, and promoting awareness and behavior change in line with EU zero-pollution goals.

  • Project members from ZIN: Prof. Dr. Bodo Philipp; Dr. Johannes Holert
  • Duration: 2024 – 2028
  • Keywords: Water conservation; water treatment
  • Link to the project.

• REVITALISE 

  The REVITALISE project develops innovative, environmentally friendly, and cost-effective recycling processes for end-of-life batteries, using advanced pre-treatment technologies to achieve particularly high purity of the recovered materials. 

  • Project members from ZIN: Prof. Martin Winter, MEET
  • Duration: 2022 – 2026
  • Keywords: Battery recycling, circular economy, ressource effiency
  • Link to the project.

• SABIO - Transformation and Sustainability Governance in South American Bioeconomies

  The SABIO project investigates the development of bioeconomies in Argentina, Brazil and Uruguay at the interface of agricultural economies (University of Bonn) and political science (University of Münster) with the aim of providing systematic and knowledge-based support for the political and economic governance of bioeconomic transformation processes in South America.

  • Project members from ZIN: Dr. Karen Siegel
  • Duration: 2020 – 2026
  • Keywords: Bioeconomy, transformation processes, South America, governance
  • Link to the project.

• SIB-DE_Forschung - Sodium-lon-Battery Deutschland (SIB:DE Initiative)

  The SIB:DE initiative aims to develop scalable, high-performance sodium-ion battery materials and cells through close collaboration between research and industry, preparing them for industrial use and paving the way for a sustainable, competitive battery ecosystem in Europe.

  • Project members from ZIN: Prof. Martin Winter, MEET
  • Duration: 2025 – 2027
  • Keywords: sodium-ion accumulator, sodium-ion battery
  • Link to the project.

• Sustainability in the Age of Digital Transformation

  At the heart of the project is the question of how researchers and political activists collaborate in transdisciplinary–transformative research processes to generate knowledge for shaping digitalization and AI in socially, ecologically, and economically sustainable ways, while also actively contributing to these developments themselves.

  • Project members from ZIN: Prof. Dr. Sigrid Kannengießer
  • Duration: 2025-2026
  • Keywords: Sustainable Digitalization, Transformative Research, Artificial Intelligence
  • Link to the project.

• Sustainable Synthesis and Recycling of Phosphorus-containing Materials in Lithium Ion Batteries (SuSyPhos)

  The SIB:DE initiative aims to develop scalable, high-performance sodium-ion battery materials and cells through close collaboration between research and industry, preparing them for industrial use and paving the way for a sustainable, competitive battery ecosystem in Europe.

  • Project members from ZIN: Prof. Martin Winter, MEET
  • Duration: 2024 – 2027
  • Keywords: Battery research; recycling; electrode material; critical raw materials
  • Link to the project.

• Taking a stance? Corporate communications on sociopolitical topics in the context of diverging and changing expectations

  The objective of this project is to explore  the extent and manner in which large-scale enterprises in Germany and the USA communicate regarding socially contested topics, specifically the ESG framework, as well as to identify the underlying strategic frameworks and decision-making processes.

  • Project members from ZIN: Prof. Dr. Helena Stehle
  • Duration: 2026 – 2027
  • Keywords: ESG, strategic communication, large-scale corporations, Germany, USA
  • Link to the project.

• Teach4Sustainability - Virtual Exchange Model for Climate Change and Sustainability Education in Intercultural Teacher Training

  Teach4Sustainability is an Erasmus+ Virtual Exchange project designed to strengthen Climate Change and Sustainability Education (CCSE) in teacher training through intercultural, digitally facilitated collaboration between Europe and Sub-Saharan Africa. The project connects teacher trainees, educators, and institutions across Germany, Spain, Ethiopia, Nigeria, Rwanda, and The Gambia through structured virtual exchanges that promote shared learning, critical reflection, and action-oriented sustainability education.

  • Project members from ZIN: Prof. Dr. Rainer Mehren 
  • Duration: 2026 – 2029
  • Keywords: Education, intercultural learning, digital geomedia
  • Link to the project.

• Making the future appealing! Utopias for inclusive implementation of the sustainability strategy in the Tecklenburg real-world laboratory

  The project establishes a real-world laboratory in Tecklenburg and explores ways to implement the municipal sustainability strategy, in which citizens imagine desirable futures and take an active role in shaping them.

  • Project members from ZIN: Prof. Dr. Asmaa El Maaroufi; Dr. Daniela Pastoors
  • Duration: April 2025 – March 2028 
  • Keywords: Real-world laboratory, utopia, transformative education, socio-ecological transformation
  • Link to the project.

• DiGrus - Digital primary school Schauenstein

  In the DiGrus project, the green roof of the elementary school in Schauenstein and its effects on the water management of the elementary school are accompanied digitally and made learnable and tangible for the primary school pupils, so that the effects of climate change can be experienced in school lessons.

  • Project members from ZIN: Dr. Rapahel Fehrmann
  • Duration: 2024-2026
  • Key words: Extreme weather, climate change, education
  • Link to the project.

• Energy projects in the Münsterland. Strategies of legitimation communication and their impact

  This research project in communication studies examines the extent to which strategic communication influences the attribution of legitimacy to renewable energy projects and therefore investigates how organisations involved in energy projects communicate with the aim of establishing legitimacy, how this communication is perceived, and what expectations are directed towards this communication.

  • Project members from ZIN: Prof. Dr. Helena Stehle
  • Duration: 2023-2025
  • Key words: Strategic communication, renewable energy, legitimitation, public acceptance
  • Link to the project.

• Corporate stance communication

  The study examines the significance of corporate stance communication, the motives behind it, and how it is strategically planned and implemented, by analyzing the perceptions and experiences of communication professionals to draw insights for effective strategic communication.

  • Project members from ZIN: Prof. Dr. Helena Stehle
  • Duration: 2024-2025
  • Key words: Corporate communication, corporate advocacy, strategic communication
  • Link to the project.

• iCODE_MS

  The iCODE_MS project combines basic computer science education with Education for Sustainable Development (ESD). The design and implementation of the various iCODE_MS educational formats aim to inspire lower secondary school students across all school types to engage with IT topics and to demonstrate how digital solutions can contribute to climate and environmental protection in the spirit of sustainable development. 

  • Project members from ZIN: MExLab ExperiMINTe (Dr. Dörthe Masemann)
  • Duration: 2024 – 2025
  • Keywords: Computer Science Education · Education for Sustainable Development · Digitalisation · Climate Protection
  • Link to the project.

• INCITE-DEM - Inclusive Citizenship in a World in Transformation: Co-Designing for Democracy

  The INCITE-DEM project aims to promote inclusive participation and civic engagement, while also advancing democratic innovation and dynamic feedback mechanisms between citizens and institutional actors in representative democracies, by testing inclusive design processes for democratic innovation through democracy labs in six countries and translating the results into policy guidelines.

  • Project members from ZIN: Prof. Doris Fuchs, PhD
  • Duration: 2023-2026
  • Key words: Inclusive participation, civic engagement, democratic innovation, democracy labs
  • Link to the project. 

• LATERNE - Universities in the Anthropocene: Lighthouse Adoption and Transfer for Sustainable Development

  In the project “Universities in the Anthropocene: Lighthouse Adoption and Transfer for Sustainable Development (LATERNE)”, the universities of Siegen, Münster and Osnabrück are analyzing how lighthouse projects for more sustainability and global justice can be more widely disseminated at universities and they will initiate so called sustainability workshops in cooperation with non-university institutions in order to create new lighthouse projects where broad impact and scalability is considered from the beginning of the conception.

  • Project members from ZIN: Prof. Doris Fuchs, PhD; Julia Wiethüchter, M.A.; Dr. Pia Mamut; Fynn Schmidt, M.A.
  • Duration: 2022-205
  • Key words: Whole Institution Approach, flagship projects, sustainability in higher education
  • Link to the project.

• Religion as a Resource in European and International Climate Governance

  The research project addresses the research issue if and under which circumstances religion can serve as a resource for communication by analysing the role of religious actors and their engagement in European and international climate policy.

  • Project members from ZIN: 
  • Duration: 2019-2025
  • Key words: Religion, international and European climate policy, discourse research
  • Link to the project.

• Resilient Healthcare in Times of Multiple Crises (RE-CARE)

  The international research network RE-CARE addresses one of the key questions of our time: how societies perceive crises that overlap rather than follow one another, demographic, ecological and technological upheavals as well as geopolitical tensions, how they interpret, communicate and cope with them and what their convergence means for health and health systems.

  • Project members from ZIN: PD Dr. Dennis Krämer
  • Duration: 2024 – 2026
  • Keywords: Crisis, Resilience, Health, Technology
  • Link to the project.

• SKILLED – For the Sustainable Use of Antibiotics: Evolutionary Biology Approaches, Clinical Translation, Ethical Evaluation, and Economic Benefits

  The SKILLED research project aims to establish the AMR-S2 and ASuS classifications developed as a basis for decision-making in medical recommendations for the diagnosis and treatment of infections with AMR bacteria and to investigate their long-term benefits for the sustainable use of antibiotics, taking into account biomedical, ethical, and economic evaluation approaches.

  • Project members from ZIN: Prof. Dr. Claudia Bozzaro
  • Duration: 2022-2026
  • Keywords: Antibiotic resistance, medical ethics, health
  • Link to the project.

• SUNRISE LAB - Sustainable University Landscape Münster - Living Labs as Drivers of Transformation to Sustainable Universities

  In the project "Sustainable University Landscape Münster - Living Labs as Drivers of Transformation to Sustainable Universities" (SUNRISE LAB), Münster's three major universities (University of Münster, Münster University of Applied Sciences, and katho Münster) have joined forces to explore how higher education institutions can foster sustainability within their own organization and the city and its surrounding areas, by generating practical knowledge together with various stakeholders and transferring it to institutional and social contexts.

  • Project members from ZIN: Prof. Doris Fuchs; Dr. Rebecca Froese
  • Laufzeit: 2022-2025
  • Schlagworte: Sustainability transformation, university cooperation, sustainable development
  • Link to the project. 

• Initiating transformations together in the Münsterland

  The project “Initiating transformations together in the Münsterland” addresses the importance of urban gardens for community building and accompanies the institutional transformation process of the production and residency centre for international artists of the Schöppingen Artists’ Village Foundation and examines the contribution of the artists’ village as a socio-ecologically oriented actor for sustainable regional development.

  • Project members from ZIN: Dr. Cornelia Steinhäuser
  • Duration: 2023-2024
  • Key words: Urban gardens, Schöppingen artists’ village, sustainable regional development, community building
  • Link to the project.

• Traffic Transition in Essen – Young People Use Digital Geomedia to Develop Concepts for Cycling in the Ruhr Metropolis

  As part of project-based learning, young people use the senseBox:bike to study the cycling infrastructure in their neighborhood, collect environmental and traffic data, identify potential hazards, and actively participate in urban planning processes with support from local policymakers and the University of Münster.

  • Project members from ZIN: Prof. Rainer Mehren
  • Duration: 2022-2025
  • Key words: Transportation/ mobility transition; digital geomedia; participation; education for sustainable development
  • Link to the project. 

• Networking strategies and communication practices of actors in the hydrogen industry, policy and science

  The project analyses the networking strategies and communication practices of actors in the hydrogen industry, policy and science, as well as the role of media and online platforms in this regard and their significance for socio-ecological transformation and sustainability.

  • Project members from ZIN: Prof. Dr. Sigrid Kannengießer
  • Duration: 2023-2026
  • Keywords: Hydrogen industry, networking strategies, socio-ecological transformation, media
  • Link to the project.