University Stuttgart with Graduate School “Advanced Condensed Matter Science” Successful

March 3, 2011, Nr. 17

Second Phase of the Excellence Initiative

The German Research Association and the Science Council have allowed a graduate school of the University of Stuttgart the full proposal in their current decision on the second phase of the initiative for excellence of the Federal Republic and the States. For the project titled "Advanced Condensed Matter Science" (Moderne Festkörperwissenschaften), the University will develop a full proposal by 1 September 2011. "We are pleased that we could score with one project in view of the huge competition of a total of 227 new applications", said the university dean, Prof. Wolfram Ressel. “If the full proposal will be successful, too, in the final decision in June 2012, approximately 45 professors at the University of Stuttgart will be awarded the predicate ‘ Excellent’, together with the existing cluster of excellence 'Simtech' and the graduate school of 'Gsame'; with that, we are very well positioned in the national and international standards.” From now on, we will work on the full proposal with great commitment and hope to be successful with it as well as the follow-up applications for the final decision in June 2012.”


Graduate School “Advanced Condensed Matter Science”, Speaker: Prof. Harald Gießen

The graduate school for “Advanced Condensed Matter Science” deals with modern materials science and is located at the interface of physics, chemistry and biology. Examples of highly topical research themes include meta-materials for optical magic hoods, unconventional superconductors, quantum computing, and innovative, bio-inspired nano-materials. The graduate school connects the University with the two Max Planck institutes of Stuttgart. Also involved are the new research centres in SCoPE (Stuttgart Centre of Optics and Photonics Engineering).
 
The fact that the future-orientated concept with the title “Co-operative Research Campus, Stuttgart - Science for the People” has not been allowed to the full proposal, the University bears with fortitude in the light of the 22 competitors, alone in this one support line: “The preparation of the concept for the future was, independently of the outcome of the competition, a guidance for the University of Stuttgart. We will still implement many of the topics therein in a phased plan”, said the dean.
With that, the regional integration of this location’s unique grouping of one of Germany’s universities with the strongest focus on research, non-university research institutions, businesses and the public to form a vibrant regional network will be further developed. For example, the cooperation with Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt (DLR) which started with the “ DLR@UniST” initiative in January 2011 and the University of Stuttgart will be strengthened. The Ministry of Science has provided €1.4 million for these cooperation projects. In addition to that, the University of Stuttgart will intensify the dialogue with businesses and the public with the aim to create a platform for the inter-institutional exchange in all relevant areas. Exemplary character in this respect has, for example, the lecture series, “Wind, water, desert - where does the power of the future come from?” at the University of Stuttgart which, in 2010, formed a framework for discussing the various aspects of energy supply of the future.
 
In addition to the graduate school which was granted full application today, the University of Stuttgart has also filed applications for the continuation of their excellence projects already in progress, the Excellence Simulation Technology (SimTech), as well as the Graduate School Advanced Manufacturing Engineering (GSaME). They have made very good progress since the beginning of the promotion in November 2007, and have established themselves as important structure-building facilities at the University.
 
Excellence Cluster “SimTech”
To strengthen their focus in the field of simulation technologies, and as a basis for the cluster of excellence “SimTech”, the University of Stuttgart has established the "SRC SimTech" (Stuttgart Research Centre for Simulation Technology) already in April 2007. Ever since, SimTech has proved to be a central research institute that influenced also many other projects of the University such as, for example, the special research area 716 “Dynamic simulation of systems with large numbers of particles” which’s second funding period was granted on 16 November 2010. The training of young academics in this key technology for many areas of science and technology was significantly strengthened with the establishment of the SimTech graduate school in the winter semester 2008/2009, which meanwhile counts more than 80 doctoral students are members.
Furthermore, the capacity in high-performance computing at the University of Stuttgart was further developed as the essential resource to perform complex simulations: EUR 133 million for the extension of the high-performance data centre were approved in June 2010, which means that the University is to receive the most powerful computer in Germany to catch up with the world's leading universities. In December 2010, a new building was inaugurated, which in future will provide SimTech with a central point of contact on the campus.
 
Graduate School "Advanced Manufacturing Engineering" (GSaME)
The dynamics of global markets is growing. This requires a tremendous amount of flexibility and adaptability of the manufacturing sector, in particular for the automotive, machine and plant engineering, and electrical engineering industries. Constantly, there are newly emerging specific requirements for products, production organisation and technology, working conditions and innovation skills. How science and industry can contribute to a future-oriented, sustainable production and what innovative solutions and methods there are, is the subject of the graduate school "Advanced Manufacturing Engineering" (GSaME). This programme, with which the University of Stuttgart has entered new territory, combines cooperative and interdisciplinary research with targeted training opportunities for the young scientists.
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