Prof. Dr. Eckhard Elsen is the new Scientific Director of the Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies (FIAS) as of May 1, 2022. He thus replaces the previous five-member board including the executive and an administrative director. The basis for this new structure is an amendment to the statutes. With a single executive director at the helm processes and decisions in the institute will be rendered more efficient and coordination simplified.

Research Cluster ELEMENTS at FIAS

On 28.04.2022 Prof. Dr. Gašper Tkačik from Institute of Science and Technology Austria (IST) starts the new talks series "CMMS Talks" with his presentation about "Statistical analysis and optimality of biological systems". The talks series will take place on a regular basis during the semester times within the frame of the LOEWE Project "CMMS" at FIAS.

The brain's ability to store and generalize information is incredibly complex and diverse. But what happens at the level of neuronal networks in the process? In a new study, scientists at Johannes Gutenberg University-Mainz (JGU) and the Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies (FIAS) have found that activity patterns in the brain, especially the auditory cortex, are not as stable as previously thought. This instability is crucial for the linking of sensory impressions.

Ukraine has been subjected to a war of aggression by Russia. This action, for which Vladimir Putin is solely responsible, is a blatant violation of international law and in no way justified. Our thoughts are with the Ukrainian people - with the people who are being injured and are dying in these minutes as a result of the war of aggression. There are many civilian casualties, among them children.

Scientific experiments on the fundamental constituents of matter and their interactions generate an increasing amount of data that must be processed and analyzed. Scientists from particle, astroparticle, hadron and nuclear physics have therefore joined forces to form a consortium. Its goal is to organize the huge data sets from many experiments in a "sustainable" way so that all data become easily findable, readily accessible, linkable as well as reusable. The participation of FIAS in the consortium PUNCH4NFDI ( Particles, Universe, NuClei, and Hadrons for the NFDI) is funded within the framework of the National Research Data Infrastructure (NFDI) for an initial period of five years with a total of almost 280,000 €.

It is almost always assumed in cosmological calculations that there is a even distribution of matter in the universe. This is because the calculations would be much too complicated if the position of every single star were to be included. In reality, the universe is not uniform: in some places there are stars and planets, in others there is just a void. Physicists Michael te Vrugt and Prof. Raphael Wittkowski from the Institute of Theoretical Physics and the Center for Soft Nanoscience (SoN) at the University of Münster have, together with physicist Dr. Sabine Hossenfelder from the Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies (FIAS), developed a new model for this problem. Their starting point was the Mori-Zwanzig formalism, a method for describing systems consisting of a large number of particles with a small number of measurands. The results of the study have now been published in the journal “Physical Review Letters”.

Earthquakes regularly cause devastating destruction in many regions around the world. Even though analysis and measurement methods have steadily evolved over the past decades, reliable prediction is still not possible. The occurrence of earthquakes within the stable interiors of tectonic plates is still an enigma. Gujarat, in northwest India, is one such region that witnessed two devastating earthquakes in a span of 200 years. FIAS and the Institute of Seismological Research (ISR) in Gandhinagar have now agreed on long-term research cooperation using novel artificial intelligence methods to understand the earthquake occurrence in the region.

Starting next year, Goethe University and the Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies (FIAS) will intensify and expand joint research projects and the exchange of scientific knowledge. A new cooperation agreement has laid the legal foundations for this. The contract was signed yesterday, on November 11th.

In his new book, Luciano Rezzolla takes us on a voyage of discovery to black holes. In doing so, he manages to reach readers of all knowledge levels and to draw a fascinating arc from the basic principles of gravity to the modern research results of relativistic astrophysics. The popular science book is published in German by C. H. Beck, the English version by Cambridge University Press is available since March 2023.

Discovering new things in nature, making models, solving puzzles, or making estimates - all this is waiting for for children and teens aged 10 and up and their families during the 21 stages of the ProLOEWE science rally. It starts on August 2 at ProLOEWE.de. FIAS and the LOEWE focus CMMS are also taking part in the event.

Volker Mosbrugger, the current president of the Polytechnic Society and former director of the Senckenberg Gesellschaft für Naturforschung (until December 2020), will support the work of the Foundation Board with immediate effect. The Foundation Board oversees the work of the Board of Directors and appoints its members. It decides on the FIAS budget and advises the Board on all matters of strategic importance. In recent years, for example, it has made a significant contribution to the successful restructuring of the research areas at FIAS and provided support in this process.

Magarete Puschmann was an indispensable member of the FIAS family for over 15. years. In addition to her generous donations, she participated in FIAS social activities, scientific lectures, award ceremonies, and summer parties, despite her advanced age, until the beginning of the pandemic. She has now passed away in Bad Homburg on the morning of June 8, 2021.

How does our brain work? Several international institutions in Frankfurt are trying to find answers to this question: The Max Planck Institute for Empirical Aesthetics, the Max Planck Institute for Brain Research, the Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies, the Ernst Strüngmann Institute and the Goethe University Frankfurt have been researching the brain - in some cases for decades - while the non-profit Hertie Foundation has been funding neuroscience research since the early 1970s.

We congratulate our long-time supporter and friend Margarete Puschmann on her 100th birthday, which she celebrates today in Oberursel on March 15, 2021.

Researchers from FIAS and other Frankfurt research institutions will give an insight into their research as part of the "Insights to..." YouTube series.

To gain a more comprehensive understanding of both simple molecular processes, such as the mode of action of an enzyme, and the complex behavior of organisms, the collaboration of scientists from a wide range of disciplines is necessary. In our public lecture series from February 22 to March 4, 2021, interested parties can experience exciting insights into the diverse world of modern cell biology. Renowned experts from academia and industry will provide insights into their research work and visions of future developments. The topics come from artificial intelligence, microscopy, modeling but also the practical application of research will be addressed.

As announced today, the cluster project ENABLE will be funded by the State of Hesse for the next four years. The project, led by Goethe University, aims to identify key sites relevant for diseases and to enable innovative therapeutic strategies.

Almost one year after the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, Germany is in its third lockdown, having emerged as an extension and tightening of the lockdown light measures introduced in November 2020. Many wonder about the efficacy and duration of the current stricter measures and we use here a simple mathematical model to illustrate that for the successful control of the pandemic it is important that as many people as possible reduce their contacts. To this end a simple mathematical model is used, assuming that only part of the population adheres to specified contact restrictions.

In order to make better use of the amount of data generated by high-energy experiments, scientists at FIAS have developed a new Deep Learning (DL) analysis method. The models based on the PointNet architecture enable a fast online analysis of collision events at event rates of several million collisions per second. For this purpose, the determination of the centrality of heavy ion collisions at the Compressed Baryonic Matter Experiment (CBM) of the FAIR facility, which is currently under construction at the GSI Helmoltzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt, was exemplarily investigated.