The Romanian Academy of Sciences (Academia Română) has appointed Prof. Dr. Dr. h.c. mult. Horst Stöcker as honorary member in recognition of his work on hot, dense elementary matter in heavy ion research and astrophysics, as well as his many years of commitment to the international scientific community. He is thus one of 91 foreign scientists who are entitled to bear this title.

Using a new model, scientists from the Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies (FIAS) and Goethe University can explain the development of binocular vision, which is the joint vision of the right and left eye. In doing so, they show how amblyopic visual impairment can occur.

In connection with the novel coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2), the Goethe University provides information on mobility and health care. We refer to recommendations of the Robert Koch Institute and the Federal Foreign Office.

​In October 2019, during the Sino-German Conference for Science, Technology, Innovation and Cooperation in Berlin, representatives of Xidian University and FIAS signed the founding documents of the XF-IJRC.

Numerous working groups at FIAS work with methods of machine learning. In order to intensify the scientific exchange between the many scientists involved, the FIAS PhD students and Postdocs have created an exchange platform on their own initiative with the installation of the Journal Club.

The FIAS and the Chinese Xidian University have confirmed the idea to establish a 'Joint Research Center' in AI research during a visit of the FIAS delegation under the leadership of the chairman of the FIAS board of directors, Prof. Dr. Enrico Schleiff.

With his article "Model Brain - Boundary Conditions for a Cognitive Architecture" FIAS Senior Fellow Christoph von der Malsburg has contributed a chapter to the book "Cognitive Computing - Theory, Technology and Practice" recently published by Springer Verlag.

Efficient power grids are an essential prerequisite for a successful conversion of the energy system. In order to support work on the power grids of the future, the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) is extending the funding of an interdisciplinary research project by three years, in which seven institutes, including the Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies with Professor Stefan Schramm, are involved. The joint project is funded by the BMBF with a total of 2.5 million euros.

FRANKFURT. How do neighboring synapses interact during learning? Frankfurt scientists have proposed a new mathematical model describing a competition of neighboring synapses for limited resources during learning. The scientists report their findings in the current issue of eLife.

How large is a neutron star? Previous estimates varied from eight to sixteen kilometres. Astrophysicists at the Goethe University Frankfurt and the FIAS have now succeeded in determining the size of neutron stars to within 1.5 kilometres by using an elaborate statistical approach supported by data from the measurement of gravitational waves. The researchers’ report appears in the current issue of Physical Review Letters.

Every year, the Friends of the University award prizes for the best PhD theses from various fields. The prize for the best scientific dissertation was awarded this year to former FIAS doctoral student Volodymyr Vovchenko.

FIAS Fellow Hannah Petersen has been awarded the Zimanyi Medal of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences. The award recognizes her work in the field of relativistic heavy ion collisions. The theoretical physicist has been a Fellow at FIAS since 2013, heads a Helmholtz junior research group at the GSI Helmholtz Centre for Heavy Ion Research and teaches as a professor at Goethe University in Frankfurt.

On 2 and 3 May 2018, the FIAS hosted the kick-off meeting of the DFG priority programme "SPP 2041 - Computational Connectomics". The goal of SPP 2041 is to better understand the interconnection and function of our brain and nervous system. Under the term "computational connectomics", the scientists involved use computer science and mathematics methods to better understand the structure of the connections between individual nerve cells or entire brain regions.

Born in 1927, the former General Director of Nestlé and holder of the Federal Cross of Merit, he has been committed for years to science and FIAS in particular. Since the founding days of FIAS, he has been a member of the Presidium of the Board of Trustees and was its first chairman. Helmut Maucher has accompanied and shaped the development of our institute with prudence and an eye for the essentials.

The present study is a proof of principle study where Long-Gang Pang, Kai Zhou, Nan Su, Hannah Petersen, Horst Stöcker and Xin-Nian Wang (University of California in Berkeley, USA) used more than 20.000 pictures from relativistic hydrodynamic simulations of heavy ion collisions in a convolution neural network (CNN) to classify two regions in the phase diagram.

The Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies (FIAS)'s project "hands-on science" was awarded second place in the 2017 Award of the Anneliese and Heinz Frisch Foundation on Thursday, 16 November 2017.