Collaborative research in Bavaria
Strong research collaborations with experts from politics and industry
Bavarian Research Associations
Bavarian Research Associations (Bayerische Forschungsverbünde) are research projects which involve researchers at several locations in Bavaria and usually last for three or six years. Research Associations are set up in response to contemporary affairs or as a direct investment in the future to secure Bavaria’s strength in research and industry. They also involve partners from industry who are actively involved in research in addition to providing funding. The private public partnership ensures that the results of the research are quickly put into practice. Public funding is provided by the Bavarian Research Foundation and the Bavarian Ministries, in particular the Bavarian State Ministry of Science and the Arts.
Climate change is one of the most significant challenges faced by the human race – a global phenomenon with consequences on a regional level. Successful and sustainable climate policy is based on scientific findings and applied research relevant to issues currently facing our climate. The Department of Biology and the Chair of Biochemistry at FAU are contributing their own research in this area.
From 2016 to 2019, the BayKlimaFit 1 project investigated how crop plants in Bavaria can adapt to climate change. The project focused on breeding plants that have improved tolerance against changing environmental conditions. The research is now being continued in the BayKlimaFit 2 project to develop solutions from the initial project.
BayKlimaFit 2 – “Strong plants mitigating the impact of climate change” is conducting research in 10 projects on the following topics:
- High-quality and climate-resilient plants
- Healthy plants during climate change
- Efficient plant cultivation despite climate stress
The Bavarian State Ministry of the Environment and Consumer Protection is funding the research project for a period of three years.
ForDaySec is an interdisciplinary research association aimed at improving IT security in everyday digital life. The focus is on the development of technologies and solutions suitable for everyday use that can be used to safely exploit the opportunities of digitization in various areas of life and work. To this end, researchers from computer science, sociology and law from five Bavarian universities are working closely together – with the common goal of providing orientation for people in today’s world.
The research is guided by the living and working realities of people and companies. Technical, social and legal expertise is pooled in four network-wide topics, pursuing the aim of gaining a comprehensive understanding and developing feasible approaches for solutions for digital security. The specific research questions in the sub-projects include:
- Is data protection guaranteed in the case of app-controlled devices in the Internet of Things (IoT)? Who is liable for IT security loopholes in IoT devices? The purchaser or the manufacturer?
- How are IoT devices used in daily life and how competent are users? How are users integrated into their organizations and institutions when using these devices?
- How can IoT devices be safely integrated into existing systems and secure company networks (e.g. by using encryption)? How can insecure devices be encapsulated into these systems and monitored?
- How can software developers use software components and training environments to establish data protection skills with a focus on usability and explainability?
The introduction of assistive robot systems into clinical workflows leads to a considerable increase in the technical, social and organizational complexity in the operating room. Providing and installing the systems leads to significant delays, even when using the latest models, which limits the extent to which surgical robots are used, especially for short procedures. Placing the robotic system or its individual modules on the human body has a significant influence on its subsequent performance and must be undertaken in consideration of the patient’s anatomy and the available working space. In order to be able to use the robot’s advantages effectively, it is crucial that humans and technology work together hand in hand and carefully attuned with each other. This can only be achieved by interlinking the various processes of individual operation planning as closely as possible, taking into account the parameters of the individual patients, imaging, documentation and integration into the surgery surroundings.
The ForNeRo research association therefore aims to facilitate considerable improvements in the efficiency, usability and ergonomics of surgical robots thanks to the outstanding expertise available in the association concerning the implementation of ergonomic principles and clinically-centered implementation of user-centered simulations, AR applications and UI technology. These approaches will be key technologies for the future of robotic surgery and digital medicine. Achieving this objective hinges on nurturing close links between this expertise and users at the clinic and involving competent industrial partners from Bavaria.
The SARS-CoV-2 pandemic brought entirely new challenges for society, politics and academia not only across the world but also in Germany and Bavaria, challenges that can only be solved by working in close collaboration. Bavaria has internationally renowned researchers with outstanding expertise in the diagnosis of viral infections, in developing vaccines, and in evaluating virus-specific immunity and virus-cell interaction as well as in related research into pathogenesis and therapy, and they contribute their expertise to the joint work of the research association FOR-COVID.
The family is a central institution in society. At the same time, social, economic, demographic and technological change are affecting the lives and situations of families in a variety of ways. In order for us to shape policy making for this social development in a sustainable way, we must recognize and understand the complex realities of life and developments as well as the concerns and needs of families.
Ten research projects are investigating the complex aspects of the everyday lives and living conditions of families in the ForFamily interdisciplinary research consortium. The aim of the consortium is to make a contemporary and evidence-based contribution to knowledge about the status quo and the transformation of families in Bavaria and to develop suggestions for political action.
The vision of the FORSocialRobots consortium is one where humans and robots work together in flexible teams in all areas of everyday life and where new applications for robotics can be developed in a very short time. The aim of the FORSocialRobots is therefore to make a decisive contribution to improving the social capabilities of robots in six relevant fields of robotics (inspection, logistics, production, service, retirement home and dementia center) and in five scientific sub-projects (architecture of social capabilities, social situational communication, socially adaptive and proactive interaction, simulation and validation of socially-cognitive robots in the digital twin and human-robot interaction in the context of work), thereby increasing their effectiveness and acceptance among potential users and supporting completely new technical developments.
Other research projects “Made in Bavaria”
The Bavarian government provides support to the State of Bavaria as a key location for research in several specific fields. On the one hand, project applications are selected and approved in multi-stage procedures on the basis of specific calls for applications (for example in the Bavarian Collaborative Research Program) and ideas for projects on current issues are proactively supported by Bavarian ministries on the other.
Some of the most significant projects are listed and described briefly below:
Geothermal energy is an important domestic source of energy suitable for covering base load demand. However, its potential has been largely overlooked until now. If we are to continue increasing the acceptance, economic viability and safety of this technology, an interdisciplinary approach to research is required with which the potential of geothermal energy can be exploited as efficiently and intelligently as possible, across all regions and throughout the seasons. Secure long-term funding is also required if we are to continue benefiting from these resources in the future.
Bavaria is a pioneer within Germany when it comes to using deep geothermal energy. However, until now its application has been restricted to the Munich area and parts of Upper and Lower Bavaria, where information was already available on the properties of the deep geological substratum after seismic and drilling data were collected for the purpose of exploring hydrocarbon deposits. The potential of the crystalline areas of Northern Bavaria as a source of deep geothermal energy has not yet been exploited at all. Little has been done to investigate the substratum and its properties in Northern Bavaria, and no deep exploratory drilling has been conducted for geothermal pilot projects. The situation is compounded by the fact that different methods are required to use deep geothermal energy from crystalline layers, and this technology is still at the early stages of development.
The metropolitan area of Munich clearly demonstrates the benefits of deep geothermal energy sources, especially when it comes to providing heating to large urban areas. One way of making a greater contribution to reducing the dependence of district heating on fossil fuels at the same time as increasing the utilization of existing geothermal plants would be to coordinate heat sources and heat sinks better and connect them over larger distances. To date, it has not always been possible to make accurate predictions about the chances of finding heat sources and their potential productivity in certain areas of Bavaria. We must continue to find and raise awareness of feasible ways for incorporating this new technology into the existing energy system.
Geothermal Alliance Bavaria (Geothermie-Allianz Bayern – GAB) is a collaborative research project between Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg (FAU), Technische Universität München (TUM) and Universität Bayreuth (UBT) which was formed in 2016, and which welcomed two new members Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München (LMU) and Hochschule München (HSM) when the second phase of funding was launched in 2020. The Munich School of Engineering (MSE) at TUM coordinates the project. It is responsible for centralized administrative tasks, as well as liaising between the various partner universities and operators of geothermal power plants and the general public.
The overriding goal of the Geothermal Alliance Bavaria is to bolster deep geothermal energy as a domestic source of energy and to significantly improve the climate footprint of the heating and electricity sectors. With its interdisciplinary research focus, GAB hopes to spotlight the opportunities and risks of the technology, as well as to find solutions to obstacles hindering the expansion of deep geothermal energy as a renewable energy source. At the same time, it hopes to expand the extent to which deep geothermal energy is used, make it more cost-effective, manage the reservoir sustainably and ensure that operations are safe. Geothermal resources ought to be explored and used as far as possible in all areas and tailored to meet the needs in each specific instance, taking the potential above and below ground into account. For this purpose, the deeper substratum and the geothermal resources of Northern Bavaria which have until now only been investigated sporadically will be analyzed systematically. The Geothermal Alliance Bavaria is pursuing its aims in the following sub-projects:
- Sub-project: “efficient. Heat transition through the intelligent use of deep geothermal energy” (TUM, UBT, HSM)
- Sub-project: “regional. Systematic exploration of new potentials” (FAU, UBT, TUM)
- Sub-project: “social. Climate protection through a safe technology” (TUM, LMU, UBT)
- Sub-project: “long-term. Sustainable thermal water production” (TUM, FAU)
- Sub-project: Joint Master’s degree program in GeoThermics/GeoEnergy (FAU, TUM, LMU)
In all areas of breast cancer care, it makes sense to combine digital and real-world care structures that cover prevention, screening, therapy, and follow-up. In the process, we need to protect digital sovereignty and focus on benefits to the individual.
The aim of the digiOnko project, which is funded by the Bavarian State Ministry of Health and Care, is to optimize all areas of breast cancer care through new, digital concepts. The project will establish inpatient and outpatient early detection programs that support individualized information and access to innovative screening measures and biomarker examinations. Patients undergoing breast cancer therapy have the opportunity to use a digital home healthcare center (an app developed as part of the project) and can independently record ECG, blood counts or blood glucose measurements from the comfort of their home, as well as independently documenting any side effects and impact of therapy on their quality of life. Using the app, patients can access 24-hour monitoring and communication in a private and secure environment. Large clinical data sets based on image data, histological or even genetic data are also used to establish new personalized risk assessments and therapy decisions by means of artificial intelligence (AI) improving individualized prevention, therapy and relapse prevention in the long term.
Quantum computers open up a whole range of completely new opportunities in data and information processing, since their computing power significantly exceeds conventional computer architectures. The Munich Quantum Valley Project develops quantum computers using two complimentary technologies: superconducting quantum circuits and trapped-ion systems with the aim of making these quantum computers accessible to users via a shared cloud environment. The Department of Physics and the Department of Electrical Engineering at FAU are contributing to the project in the areas of algorithm development, processor design, control strategies and control electronics for quantum computers.
The Munich Quantum Valley Project is being funded by the Bavarian State Ministry of Science and the Arts from October 1, 2021 to December 31, 2024.