21 OCT 2011 - Vinod Subramaniam received visiting professorship at University of Konstanz

The University of Konstanz is able to award a Zukunftskolleg visiting professorship for the first time through the cooperation of the Zukunftskolleg and the Graduate School of Chemical Biology. Prof. Vinod Subramaniam (NBP, MESA+) will begin his three-year visiting professorship at the University of Konstanz on October 1, 2011, cooperating with scientists from the Zukunftskolleg. In particular, he will work with Dr. Malte Drescher, Research Fellow of the Zukunftskolleg.

This was the second time the graduate school was able to attract funds from the „Visiting Professorship“ programme of the Baden-Württemberg Ministry of Science, Research and Arts (MWK): The programme is used to strengthen an expertise that already exists on site through the participation of prominent cooperation partners, facilitating international cooperation as well as strengthening scientific relations. In the current case, the MWK has provided funds for a three-year period – with the option of continued funding for another two years.

Vinod Subramaniam has received numerous prestigious awards during his scientific career and has been published in prestigious journals. His scientific interest is broadly based. He has earned two Master’s degrees, one in engineering and one in applied physics. His doctoral studies at the University of Michigan, USA focused on protein folding.

Vinod Subramaniam is now researching and teaching at the Dutch University of Twente. His current research focuses on biophysical and biochemical foundations of protein folding, as they are being studied with complementary methods in the work group of the Malte Drescher, head of the junior research group. „This is an ideal situation for joint research projects that can also be treated in a doctoral thesis“, says Malte Drescher about the visiting professorship.

As Senior Fellow of the Zukunftskolleg, Vinod Subramaniam will supervise a doctoral candidate from the Graduate School together with the Research Fellow Malte Drescher. In addition, there are also thematic relationships to projects of Fellows Dr. Marilena Manea and Dr. Dominik Wöll from the Zukunftskolleg. With his extensive experience in the North American and Asian research system he is also enrichment in strategic issues in science for Research Fellows of the Zukunftskolleg who are at a key point in their career. Vinod Subramaniam will also contribute to the interdisciplinary, intercultural and intergenerational community of the Zukunftskolleg.

Prof. Dr. Andreas Marx, coordinator of the Graduate School, commented on the grant: „The fact that we were able to win Prof. Subramaniam, an internationally renowned expert, also distinguishes our own research and will strengthen it further. We are already looking forward to the most interesting research results at the interface of biophysics and biochemistry.”

The Graduate School of Chemical Biology was already successful last year in attaining funds from the same state programme. In September 2010, Prof. Craig Crews from Yale University, also a renowned scientist, was able to be won. Prof. Crews cooperates with the chair of Prof. Dr. Thomas U. Mayer in the Department of Biology and has been also supervising a doctoral candidate of the Graduate School since January 1, 2011.

The Graduate School of Chemical Biology as well as the Zukunftskolleg as an element of the institutional strategy of the University of Konstanz have been funded by the Excellence Initiative of the German federal and state governments since 2007.