Germany extends research links abroad

Hyderabad, the high-tech centre where the DFG is to set up an International Research Training Group.

The groups enable doctoral researchers to cooperate closely with foreign universities. “We are particularly pleased about the first International Research Training Group involving an Indian university. This means that our young researchers will come into even closer contact with this fast developing scientific country,” said DFG President Professor Matthias Kleiner.

The other new groups build upon existing cooperation arrangements with the US, Japan, Russia, Spain and South Korea.

Each group will each receive funding of €344,000 to €1.1 million a year. They cover topics as novel connections between quantum and gravitational field theories, new ideas for the bionic implants and work on better treatments for ischemic heart disease. The DFG now funds a total of 64 International Research Training Groups.

In the first ever German–Indian International Research Training Group, scientists from the University of Münster and the University of Hyderabad are carrying out joint research in the field of glycoscience in a project called Molecular and Cellular GlycoSciences.

Carbohydrate biomolecules are increasingly being recognised as information bearing molecules, which perform important signalling and regulatory functions within and between cells and organisms. The important interaction of carbohydrates and proteins is to be studied in the cell for its molecular and biochemical aspects.