News & Events

Stefanie Grosswendt develops new methods to analyse cell interaction in embryos and neuroblastoma, an early childhood cancer, at the level of the individual cell. The group leader has received the BSIO Female Independence Award for her research.

The Helmholtz Association, which consists of 18 centers, including the MDC, is setting high international standards through its research. This is reflected in the latest Nature Index rankings, in which Helmholtz took the No. 2 spot among the world’s fastest-rising research institutions.

Two events, three days: researchers, industry, policymakers and the public are invited to attend the LifeTime Conference 2.0 on June 16 and 17 and the Berlin Summer Meeting 2021 on June 18 to discuss the latest technologies, tools and methods to tackle disease. Both virtual events are free.

It’s nice that virtual events are now second nature to us. So this year, too, science enthusiasts won’t have to miss out on the “smartest night of the year.” On June 5, 2021, the MDC will offer a glimpse into its research – completely digitally.

Every year in Germany, around seven boys are born with an incompletely formed urethra and urethral sphincter. These children often remain incontinent. ECRC researchers want to find out whether a stem cell transplant could help them. The trial has been awarded approximately €4.3 million in funding from the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) and the Berlin Institute of Health (BIH) at Charité.

Nikolaus Rajewsky is deputy director of the MDC and director of the Berlin Institute of Medical Systems Biology (BIMSB) at the MDC in Berlin-Mitte. He researches right down to the level of single cells how and why genes are switched on or off in healthy and diseased cells. Nikolaus Rajewsky recommends humankind’s oldest written myth – the Epic of Gilgamesh, as well as a text by Walter Benjamin (philosopher, writer, cultural critic; born 1892 in Berlin, died 1940 in Portbou, Spain) – together with a picture by Paul Klee ("Angelus Novus", painted in 1920).

In the anniversary year of its namesake, the Helmholtz Association is seeking to build bridges between science and art. A joint fellowship scheme with Dortmund’s Academy for Theater and Digitality is supporting two projects that bring data science to life through art. The MDC is also involved.

Researchers from the ECRC in Berlin, together with scientists from the United States and Canada, have discovered a sugar molecule whose levels are reduced in the blood of patients with particularly severe multiple sclerosis. Their discovery could pave the way for a new therapeutic approach, the team reports in medical journal JAMA Neurology.

Dr Sebastian Diecke, who leads the stem cells technology platform at the MDC and BIH, doesn't just do science – he also combines it with art. A project by two Australian artists in which he was involved won an Award of Excellence at this year's Japan Media Arts Festival.