Photo: UHH/Denstorf

Four of the University's research clusters have been selected for the final round in the national Excellence Initiative.

Prof. Dr. Dieter Lenzen, the University’s president, stated: “We closely followed today’s announcement, together and in great anticipation. We are delighted that four of the five research cluster projects that we submitted have reached the final round! This means that we have cleared a major hurdle in the first funding line of the Excellence Strategy. Now a phase of hard work awaits us and particularly our researchers, but it is one we are happy to shoulder. And then we will have to patiently wait for the results.”

The researchers have until February 2018 to complete and submit their applications to the DFG.

Next steps in the Excellence Competition

A committee of experts comprising primarily international researchers with the DFG chose the cluster applications for the next round. The clusters to receive funding as of 1 January 2019 will be announced in September 2018. The number of cluster applications is also important for the next phase of the competition. In the second funding line of the Excellence Strategy, entire universities will be deemed “excellent”. . Universities must have at least two clusters of excellence to apply for recognition as a “University of Excellence.”

In the past Excellence Initiative, the DFG - funded two clusters of excellence at Universität Hamburg: Integrated Climate System Analysis and Prediction (CliSAP) and the Hamburg Center for Ultrafast Imaging (CUI), the latter of which is dedicated to the observation of atoms in real time. 

Cluster initiatives in the final round of the Excellence Competition

Climate research: Climate, Climatic Change, and Society (CliCCS)
Research questions such as: How can we limit global warming to 2 degrees Celsius or, even better, 1.5 degrees Celsius?
More information (PDF, in German)

Photon- and Nanosciences Advanced Imaging of Matter: Structure, Dynamics and Control on the Atomic Scale
Research questions such as: What makes atoms move the way they do, leading them to create new structures with specific functions?
More information (PDF, in German)

Quantum physics: Quantum Universe
Research questions such as: What are the physics of the Big Bang?
More information (PDF, in German)

Manuscript Research: Understanding Written Artefacts: Material, Interaction and Transmission in Manuscript Cultures
Research questions such as: How come we have to sign contracts?
More information (PDF, in German)

Press release as PDF