Dresdner Wissenschaftler im Interview

Prof. Dr. Michael Baumann,  Onkologe

• Director of the Clinic for Radiation Therapy and Oncology at the Carl Gustav Carus University Hospital
• Director of OncoRay – National Center for Radiation Research in Oncology
• Director of the University Cancer Center Dresden (UCC)

Professor Baumann, you have worked in Hamburg, Harvard and Dresden. Could I start by asking you to list these cities in order of preference and to tell me which of them you like best?

Dresden of course comes top of my list, otherwise I wouldn’t be here. Followed by Harvard, by which I mean Boston.

What in particular do you like about Dresden?

Over the past twenty years Dresden has developed a great momentum of its own. It is a quite outstanding city, both scientifically and culturally, including by international standards. At the present moment Boston is certainly more important as a scientific location, but Dresden is catching up. And I believe the dynamic which is to be found here is quite unique even internationally.

Why do you think that is?

Saxony is a region that for centuries has been grappling with questions relating to the future. Many inventions with great significance for the whole world come from Saxony. We are still feeling the effects to this day. In addition, it is no coincidence that Dresden is also culturally a particularly attractive city. There are many links between culture and science, a kind of cross-fertilisation.

Can this development be attributed to Dresden’s post 1989 rebirth alone, or does Dresden’s remote location – when seen from a German perspective – also play a role?

I don’t know whether that is the reason for the dynamic in this city, but its remote location raises an interesting point. The major university cities in Western Europe have long forged close links, and these were intensified after the Second World War. Dresden on the other hand had to reorientate itself completely. It often teamed up with partners who were in a similar situation, that is to say those who were not well represented in international networks, but are nevertheless very dynamic. It is often precisely these scientific establishments that will be very important in the future. There are such partners in Eastern Europe and for them Dresden is perfectly situated. But they are also to be found in Asia and elsewhere. Naturally there are in addition numerous links with North America, Australia and university cities in Europe. Dresden has in the nature of things had to think outside the box a little more than other cities.

You are not only Director of the Clinic for Radiation Therapy and Oncology, you have also been involved in establishing a network of associations and centres including the University Cancer Center Dresden (UCC) and of course the well-known OncoRay Center, now the National Center for Radiation Research in Oncology, as well as the brand-new Institute of Radiooncology at the Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf (HZDR).
Can major medical challenges now be solved only by pooling expertise in this way?

This is the roadmap for the future. It is the only way forward. It is true for today, but it is certainly true for tomorrow. Speaking for my own field of research, oncology, it is one of the great advantages of Dresden. Here there are no fiefdoms competing with each other, surrounded by high walls and separated from one another. Quite the opposite, here you find team-oriented, multi-disciplinary structures. If nothing else, this can be attributed to the fact that everything has had to be rebuilt.

In other respects, it would appear that there is still a high degree of segregation in the different approaches to cancer research. Indeed scientific careers depend on it.

I was until the end of 2011 President of the European CanCer Organisation (ECCO), and it too has multidisciplinarity as its main objective. And this is how cancer research must look today: bringing together various options and selecting the best possible treatment for each individual patient. But of course this is still not the case everywhere in Europe. Outstanding centres provide this, and some progressive countries have already partly implemented it across the board. Dresden however is way ahead of many others.

I have a fundamental question for you as an oncologist: when you are so intensively involved with a phenomenon like cancer, how does that change your view of the phenomenon itself? Is cancer for you simply a disease, or is it a deadly opponent?

I am a doctor as well and I know what it means for patients and relatives when someone is diagnosed with cancer. Cancer is really a very significant disease. It is almost always 3 associated with the fear of dying. So for this reason a diagnosis of cancer is one with serious consequences, which I regard with a great deal of respect.

But one that must often be given.

Yes, cases of cancer are common and they are becoming more common, not because our environment is getting more dangerous but because we are all living longer. And the risk of cancer increases with age.

In this respect does cancer have an almost natural dimension?

I made the decision to go into research in the field of oncology because I want to help ensure that this disease becomes more treatable. But I never think that I can cure every case of cancer, even if this may become possible sometime in the future. I am sure the fact that I work as both a researcher and a doctor is what makes me realistic about this. I still think it is the perfect combination. And in my medical role I treat many patients whom I can never hope to cure. In these cases it is all about giving the patient the best possible quality of life despite their cancer. And ultimately I accompany many of my patients on their final journey. That is part of the job.

You are much in demand as a science manager and you are still working as a doctor, where do you actually find the time to do your research as well?

It’s all about good time management. And of course in all areas an excellent team of staff and colleagues. As a researcher I must constantly decide what I can do myself and what I can delegate, either to an experienced colleague in my working group or hand over completely to different working groups with their own boss. As time goes on, I find this coordinating role has become more and more important. As a complete beginner thirty years ago, I naturally spent much more time sitting in front of scientific research apparatus myself.

It is different as regards my medical role. There I certainly also have many supervisory duties, for example I check that the relevant senior house officer has done everything correctly. I naturally have to give them guidance so they can learn. But in addition to this I also treat patients completely on my own.

The OncoRay centre is dedicated to the further optimisation of radiotherapy. What in your opinion is the significance of radiotherapy for cancer treatment, both today and in the future? Is it the leading treatment for cancer?

Today’s figures are quite clear. In terms of a patient’s chances of being cured of cancer, surgery is the most important step, closely followed by radiation treatment. Chemotherapy and drugs lag behind, but they can nevertheless play an important part in healing tumours when used in conjunction with the other treatments. Only very few cancer cases can be cured by drugs alone.

Radiotherapy plays a significant part within multidisciplinary oncology, indeed one that is becoming more and more important. We are seeing a significant increase in the number of patients being treated with radiotherapy. The reason for this is that patients are getting older and in many cases radiotherapy is well tolerated. Reduced function and the loss of organs can often be prevented. And of course everyone wants to be able to function as well as possible after undergoing treatment for cancer. It is often better to combine surgery with radiotherapy than to carry out a much more aggressive surgical procedure. So a wide range of combinations have emerged with a view to preserving function – and this will also be the route we follow in the future.

What are you currently working on at OncoRay? What could find its way into treatments in the near future?

We are working on two major topics of great importance to the next few decades. One is the further individualisation of radiotherapy. Already today every patient is given their own radiation treatment plan, usually based on information gathered from CT scans. After all, the anatomy of every patient and every tumour is different. Now we also know that two tumours that appear very similar will behave quite differently in different people. A tumour in one person, for example, responds excellently to radiotherapy, whereas a tumour in another patient does not. The biological characteristics of each tumour are the reason for this. We want to be able to recognise them, and we are increasingly in a position to do so. One can, for example, gain critical information using genetic testing, but also using new biological imaging techniques such as PET. The discoveries we are making here will undoubtedly find their way into radiation treatment plans.

The second major topic at OncoRay is increasing the precision of radiotherapy treatment still further. It is all about precise targeting of the tumour. Tumour cells which perhaps are present around the tumour need to be precisely identified and targeted, but healthy tissue should be fully protected. We are in the process of learning how to cope with the movement of a tumour during treatment. Breathing, normal movement of tissue and the beating of the heart mean that something is always moving in the body, even during treatment. It is a matter despite this of targeting just the tumour and not any surrounding healthy tissue. There are a number of options. Proton therapy is a very promising approach. Here, the patient is not treated with harsh X-rays, i.e. photons, but with particles, i.e. protons.

A powerful proton therapy facility is being built here in Dresden; one of only a handful in the world. Here, a particle beam accelerated by electromagnetic fields will be used. Can patients be treated with this already?

Particle therapy is a highly advanced procedure: either as proton radiation, which is what we envisage, or as ion radiation, which they are using in Heidelberg. It is an absolutely cutting-edge high-tech method. We are currently evaluating the potential clinical use of this technology, in other words which tumours it is suitable for. The technology has yet to be evaluated for many tumours, and it needs to be defined further both technologically and in terms of radiation biology. In other words, there is still much to be developed in the basic science. A number of centres throughout the world are involved in this and Dresden is one of them. From 2014 onwards, our plan in Dresden is not only to use this beam for research but to treat patients, too.

But there are also much more far reaching plans for a brand-new proton beam facility. Does this herald the end of traditional photon irradiation?

You are quite right; we do want to go a step further. In parallel to our medical research into the proton treatment currently available, we are developing and testing a completely new treatment. The background to it is this: all the experts estimate that for up to twenty percent of all radiotherapy patients, particle therapy really does produce better results than traditional photon therapy using a linear accelerator. But this also means that eighty percent of patients can continue to be optimally treated with photons generated in traditional linear accelerators, and they will continue to receive this treatment. We are not yet calling time on traditional radiotherapy.

But if the evaluation comes back positive, particle therapy must be made available for the remaining twenty percent of patients I mentioned above. But today’s extremely expensive technology, which requires a complex infrastructure and a large number of specialist personnel, means that even in rich countries it is financially hardly affordable. And it is certainly not possible in poor countries. For this reason we want to develop a more affordable technology.

So you are focusing on laser-accelerated proton beams. Are there already other similar projects? And how far have you got with this development?

Our attempt here in Dresden to develop an economical, laser-based proton accelerator is the only one of its kind in the world. How far have we got? At the Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf we can currently produce a beam that has the necessary quality and stability for us to be able to carry out clinically relevant radiobiological experiments. We have to assess whether the therapy it provides really has the effect on cancer cells that we would expect from particle therapy. Laser-accelerated proton beams have quite different characteristics. The particles travel very much faster, for example. So one must first be able to measure them accurately. This is as far as we have got. We have also been able to plot the dose-response relationship, the first time in the world this has been done under controlled conditions. So far all our expectations have been met. We have a lot of evidence to suggest that we are going in the right direction.

How far away do you think is the application of this technology?

The beam I mentioned is not yet suitable for clinical applications as it is not powerful enough. In the next few years we must generate greater energy in order to be able to treat more than just cells and very small tumours. The objective is to make these laser-accelerated beams just as powerful as the proton beams available today that are only possible using expensive infrastructure.

How long will that take? We estimate that we still have five to seven years of basic scientific work to do on this technology. If everything goes as well as we expect in the areas of physics and technology, then we would build a prototype. Space has already been provided for this equipment in the new OncoRay building. We can then make direct comparisons between the new proton beam therapy and that available today. The electro-magnetic-accelerated proton beam also provides us with the reference beam.

Of course the prototype will have to be tested first. I would envisage about ten years as the timeline until it is first used on patients. It will of course take even longer until this technology has reached the point where it can be marketed and used at other centres without the team of experts that built the equipment itself. This step can of course only be taken in partnership with industry.

Thank you for the interview.

Prof. Dr. Gerhard Fettweis

• Owner of the Vodafone endowed Chair of Mobile Communication Systems at the TU Dresden
• Coordinator of the TUD Center for Advancing Electronics Dresden (cfAE D) Cluster of Excellence

Professor Fettweis, in 1994 you moved to Dresden from Silicon Valley, the Mecca of electronic communication. Were you perhaps looking for adventure in the sticks? And did this turn into a love affair?

I can answer that relatively simply. I came here 18 years ago, and that is the longest I have ever lived in one place. So yes, you could say that it has become a love affair. I like the city and its surroundings very much. When I first arrived here, it was of course... So in retrospect I have to say I was totally crazy, but it has been worth it.

Was it a bit like the first settlers reclaiming America? Only in the opposite direction?

You could say that. I had to find out whether I could survive in this environment. Just how crazy this environment was, I only discovered after I had arrived. But it's nearly always the case that a job turns out to be bigger than you first thought. I arrived at a university where the buildings looked as though they ought to be torn down or at least refurbished from the ground up. One was assailed by a very typical odour, which came from the formaldehyde that seeped out of the pressed wood panels.

Was there also a clash between two academic cultures?

I had colleagues for whom international publications meant something completely different to my own experience. They did indeed publish internationally, but only within Eastern Europe. Over time the two regions have grown together, and in this the West has clearly been dominant. We have to be totally honest about that. My East German colleagues had to catch up with researchers from the West. Building up that relationship required a little help. I was 32 years old and I had to help 40-year-olds write proposals.

But you still have to do that. You have a reputation for being the best writer of funding proposals in Dresden, your most recent success being the Excellence Initiative.

Yes, that may be the case, but I'm now fifty years old.

How is it that Dresden in particular has made such an advance?

It's a combination of different things. We had an extremely clever State government that developed the ‘Dresden Spirit' as it is known today. And it's something that really does exist. It is very similar to Silicon Valley, where you find the ‘Silicon Valley Spirit'. There, just as here, people rarely meet without raving about both the region and the academic culture. People are thrilled to live and work here. And of course the city has lots of history to offer, much of which has now been brilliantly restored. The population of Dresden is still growing by several thousand a year. Economic growth attracts new residents and they in turn generate further growth, so we have an upward spiral.

What is at the heart of this Dresden Spirit?

An important part of the Dresden Spirit is working together instead of defending your own little kingdom. In all my projects I have tried to bring in various other colleagues. And in Dresden this works exceptionally well. I'd be the first to admit we've fought some hard battles, for example with the Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft. That came about because the University decided to go down a different route than the one the Fraunhofer had in mind. The result of these confrontations is that today we work very well together on an equal footing.

You are very active in developing spin-offs and bringing one company after another to the market. What about this do you find so exciting?

I lived in Silicon Valley, and there everyone is infected with the start-up bug. When I first arrived here there were very few companies in the mobile communications sector I could work with. So I just set them up myself. Establishing such new ventures was one of my demands when I arrived, both as regards the university and the sponsors of my Chair. And I never encountered any opposition; on the contrary, it was warmly welcomed! If nothing else it is all about stimulating the local economy. We are in the business of educating postgraduates and undergraduates, and they shouldn't have to go fifty kilometres away to find a job.

You also encourage colleagues and students to start up their own companies, and you have established the HighTech Startbahn incubation project that provides support for start-ups. How successful is it and at what point did you realise that there was a need for something like this?

We are currently raising our own venture capital fund. Specific plans for this initiative were drawn up a couple of years ago, but the idea had been there for a long time. But first of all we needed sufficient start-up experience and entrepreneurs who were willing to have another go. And despite its initial success, it will take a while before we can say that the incubation project has generated scores of start-ups.

The TU Dresden has been successful in the Excellence Initiative, thanks in no small part to your involvement. What will change now it is an ‘elite university'?

Everything will be optimised. And there are now things that we couldn't have done without this initiative. You mustn't forget that even though we have a very strong micro-electronics industry here, up to now we have not had a concerted, leading-edge research programme on the part of the State government that relates to all aspects of electronics. This is a political blunder on the part of the Free State of Saxony that can now be rectified.

Does it mean that it will be predominantly those university departments that are already strong that will be the ones to benefit?

In order to answer this question I need to provide you with some background information. Electrical Engineering, which is one of the most important faculties here, particularly with regard to industry, has over the past few years been cut by more than a third. Of the original 36 professorships, only 24 remain. With the Excellence Initiative we are able to reverse this trend. The cluster has given us a very solid starting point. For a start there will be nine new professorships and up to twelve research team leaders. We hope to attract up to twenty talented new researchers to Dresden, to form new teams. This is a great opportunity for all the faculties involved.

You are talking about the new Cluster of Excellence for Advancing Electronics that you are coordinating. Will you be able to make use of the experience you gained from the Leading-Edge Cluster "Cool Silicon" in this project?

Several years ago I was successful in getting the industry to join forces in the Leading-Edge Cluster Cool Silicon. It was my trial run, so to speak, to see how good I was at putting together huge teams and motivating them to work towards a common goal. At Cool Silicon, however, where my colleague Thomas Mikolajick eventually took over my role of coordinator so that I could concentrate fully on the Excellence Initiative, we are talking about an application-oriented affiliation. This new Cluster of Excellence is all about cutting-edge research. There is a lot we want to do, we want to pursue new topics and extraordinary new ideas. Whenever the subject of the electronics of tomorrow crops up, we want everyone in the world to say, there's that cluster in Dresden! We want to be one of the five leading sites in the world in this field.

The name ‘Center for Advancing Electronics Dresden' already has this vision in its title. Are you going to revolutionise information technology?

In this cluster we indeed want to revolutionise electronics. In ten or twenty years time, today's technology of complementary metal-oxide semiconductors (CMOS) will reach its saturation stage because we'll eventually come up against atomistic limits as we continually reduce the size of the structures. Then we want to be able to present approaches which encourage progress. Now we have that window of opportunity. The industry must of course continue to focus on CMOS. This is completely understandable and correct as industry is not concerned with what happens way in the distant future. But as a university we have the task of looking ten, twenty years ahead. And that's really exciting.

What sort of approaches are these?

We are pursuing several different ‘research paths'. I will give you just two examples: today we have electronic systems in which electrons move either two or three-dimensionally within the material. But in both carbon nanotubes and silicon nanowires, electrons flow in just one direction, either forwards or backwards. Here electronic systems behave completely differently. Within this one dimensional electronic system we want to develop solutions that go beyond anything we know today. We are exploring how we can re-programme these electronic systems, how biomolecules can be attached, how we can make sensors from them and so on. Another example of our visionary approach is that we have taken a look at nature, at how ‘electronic systems', in other words information processing in biological cells, work there. Molecules arrive at the outer walls of a cell and the cell responds to this great mix of information. It is highly complex. This information processing is highly energy-efficient and non-linear. In electronics, we currently always work with linear systems as we have problems building stable non-linear ones. Nature, however, builds extremely stable systems that are non-linear. Can this lead to a completely new way of constructing systems? This is something we are currently exploring with systems biologists from the TUD and the MPI.

You are the coordinator of the “Highly Adaptive Energy-Efficient Computing” (HAEC) Collaborative Research Centre. This is also part of the cluster. Is the CRC to be merged in it or will it remain independent?

It remains independent, but it is fully integrated as one of the research paths.

Don't all these management responsibilities keep you from your research?

Frankly, I rarely have time to get into the lab anymore, but I do have time for research in my office through discussions with postgraduates and colleagues. You need a fairly structured timetable to be able to do that. Apart from anything else, I like to delegate responsibility to team members. It gives my team the chance to put themselves to the test. It also teaches my students to take on responsibility and management roles. It means they get to discuss things with eminent professors themselves. Every now and then things go wrong and then I have to step in and act as coach. But all in all it makes us much more effective.

Thank you for the interview.

Prof. Dr. Jochen Guck, Biophysiker

Alexander von Humboldt professor for cellular machines at the Biotechnology Center of the TU Dresden (BIOTEC)

Professor Guck, it wasn't so long ago that you moved to Dresden from the Nobel Prize-winning Cavendish Laboratory in Cambridge. How are you settling in?

I've been here for a little while now. I took up my new post here in January 2012 and very quickly felt completely at home in this scientific landscape. I knew some colleagues from before, but also got to know many new ones.

No culture shock, then?

Well, what made the transition easier is that I worked in Leipzig for five years, so I was already familiar with the way things work at German universities. I knew, for instance, that somewhat more paperwork would be required here than in Cambridge, known for being one of the least regulated universities in the world - and that's certainly true. In Cambridge we had flat hierarchies, but that's not necessarily the case here in Dresden. Student support is also more individualised in Cambridge. In terms of research in this field, Dresden doesn't operate in Cambridge's shadow, however, quite the opposite, in fact.

How does Dresden's interdepartmental research compare to that of Cambridge?

Cambridge is truly outstanding in a number of areas, but interdepartmental cooperation is not one of them. Cambridge is almost notorious for the fact that it's virtually impossible to launch joint projects with other departments at the institution. I've experienced this first-hand, because I joined the institution with an aim to bring the physics department closer to the biology and medicine departments... but disappointingly, my attempts were unsuccessful.
This failure is fatal, because cooperation like this led to the birth of molecular biology at the Cavendish Laboratory. James Watson and Francis Crick, who discovered the structure of the DNA double helix in 1953, were both physicists. But after that discovery, the physics department was very much segregated from other fields at Cambridge.

And in Dresden?

Things are quite different. The academic standards in Dresden are comparable to those at Cambridge, but a general attitude prevails that you can achieve incredible things through cooperation. The most interesting things always happen at the point where disciplines converge - and identifying and exploiting these intersections is Dresden's speciality. In fact, this is already very apparent to me here; when you talk to Dresden researchers, you see this instant enthusiasm bubble up for your work, and then a concrete plan is formulated regarding what can be achieved by working together. There are more opportunities here for joint projects and cooperation than anyone could possibly realise.

You were lured from Cambridge to Dresden with an Alexander von Humboldt professorship, bringing the five million euro international research promotion prize with you to Germany. This prize, the largest of its kind in Germany, will enable you to largely avoid bothersome scientific funding applications for five years. However, you're also familiar with the normal conditions at German universities; do you think that cutting-edge research is also possible at our other institutions?

I would say so. But in any case, huge sums of money aren't usually required in my field to make progress. I don't need a billion-dollar particle accelerator or the like. In my field, the most exciting things happen in the mind. Of course, we do need some not-so-expensive devices such as lasers and microscopes in order to test our results. We can normally obtain these through a simple application for third-party funding. A source of funding like the Alexander von Humboldt professorship is naturally always going to be useful, but even without it I would still probably have had better funding opportunities in Germany than in the United Kingdom. As far as I can see, there's probably no country in the world with a better research environment than Germany. At the moment there are cutbacks even in the USA, and many researchers are having to retire from academia.

You've previously worked as a business consultant, and in Dresden there is a strong entrepreneurial spirit. Are you also interested in university start-ups?

Oh yes, I'm definitely interested in them. The reasons for this are founded in the history of research. Those who develop new methods of measurement want to be able to distribute these to as many people as possible, and in order for new methods of diagnosis and prognosis to be implemented, they have to be given up to the private sector. One advantage of setting up your own company is that it enables you to retain control.

You don't have any concrete plans to do this at the moment, then?

Yes and no. I'm still working on commercialising the optical stretcher with my doctoral supervisor in Leipzig. This is a laser-based instrument with which we can study a number of cell characteristics. I first stretched cells with light in 1997, but the process was very much an improvised one at the time. The so-called ‘stretcher' has been a machine in its own right since around 2005. We're currently working on improving the technology further... what's the minimum number of cells required to start the process, for example? But I also have plans to move things forward now and am subsequently in touch with elements of the local biotechnology industry at the moment.

Why has the physical dimension of cells been researched so little in recent years compared with their biochemical and molecular dimensions?

I don't want to diminish what my colleagues in biology have achieved over the last few decades. Our main concern is understanding the genetic code; indeed, it's truly fantastic and terribly important work. And there are still so many important questions that have been left unanswered. The reason our research has been mainly focused on biochemistry is simply that this field successfully unravelled the all-important encryption of our DNA. All of a sudden, we had the opportunity to completely revolutionise our understanding of cells on the molecular level. We became fixated with genes and proteins. At this point, other aspects got pushed into the background a little - even the physical, that is, the study of cells as “physical lumps” with certain characteristics.

Was a biologist's view too detailed?

There's a very apt saying here: we couldn't see the forest for the trees. Anyone who studies the roughly thirty thousand different molecules in a cell, which are each also present in great numbers, will only succeed in isolating and examining a few of these and their interactions. We therefore lost sight of the bigger picture. But it can't hurt to forget all of these details and study the nature of cells on a different level.

Here's an example: Does someone watching a rubber ball bounce up and down look at the ball and see what the enormous number of atoms inside it are doing? It's possible, but so complex that they will have trouble describing the bouncing of the ball in this way. It's more meaningful to say: I know that atoms are there, but they don't interest me right now. I can, however, describe the object formed by all of these atoms together, and I can determine its spring rate - its elastic modulus - which can, in turn, help me to explain quite simply how the ball bounces up and down.

As a professor in cellular machines, you are therefore now applying this perspective to other fields. What could biologists learn from you?

Not all of the ideas we're pursuing are new. Indeed, many of them existed as early as the beginning of the 20th century, but back then we didn't have adequate measuring instruments. We're talking about cells here, after all. Even when looking at them en bloc, they are extremely small. Indeed, the diameter of one cell measures about a tenth of a human hair across. Consequently, the first problem we had to solve was how to examine cells' mechanical characteristics. We asked ourselves: how can we squeeze a cell in controlled conditions? Now - thanks in part to the optical stretcher - we know how to do this. The fact that I'm a physicist helped me a great deal in this endeavour. Indeed, you have to be able to sufficiently empathise with biologists to know what could be of interest to them, but as a physicist, you don't have this glut of specialised biology crowding your mind, which enables you to look at the subject with fresh eyes.

For you then, it's a question of the mechanical and optical characteristics of cells and tissues. Are these not also determined genetically?

Cells are physical objects which move in space and time. If a cell wants to crawl from A to B - where there may be little room - its deformability is important. This deformability is, indeed, partly determined through the presence of certain genes and proteins, but the most important description for us in this case is the one which indicates how rigid or deformable the cell is.

It's a sort of ontology then, to a point? A return from pure theoretical models to the perceptible reality?

It helps me to think in these terms, at least in dealing with this issue, because I cannot think in proteins. The movement of cells, for instance, is always caused by forces, though proteins also influence this. Without forces, nothing moves. And it generally holds true in physics that a theory is correct if it is simple and beautiful. It's all about simplicity.

Let's discuss some specific research in this area - you've studied cancer cells in this way, for example.

Yes. Here, too, we had to answer the basic question of how mechanics are connected to cellular function. Do these cells have an elastic modulus which they can adjust themselves, or is the process pretty arbitrary? All cancer cells - with the exception of the leukaemias - are softer than normal cells. And here we can use the simplification process once again. There are over 200 different genetically defined types of cancer. If you look at cancer on the genetic level, you therefore have to observe 200 different processes. However, if you look at cancer cells from a physical point of view, there is this one group of cells that all become softer. Now you can ask why they do that. Is this a key characteristic? In my opinion, yes, because cells must be soft if they want to move. They have to be able to squeeze through other cells in the group.

As such, what we have here is an easily measurable physical parameter - cellular deformability - through which we may be able to diagnose cancer. This knowledge may even enable us to predict ahead of time which cancer cells might spread, because the cells which metastasise are, once again, softer than other cancer cells. Depending on the number of very soft cells in a tumour, we could therefore be able to determine the probability that metastasis will occur in the future. This was not even conceivable before now. All of this could enable us to respond quicker to metastatic developments when treating the disease, which could, in turn, lead to the development of new cancer treatments. It might then be worth investigating whether cells in tumours can be fortified, and if so, how this can be done. If you fortify the potentially dangerous cells, they will be unable to move or disperse elsewhere. The cancer would then not be able to spread throughout the body.

This is a really exciting development. Is this a major project of yours here in Dresden?

Oddly enough, this is an area in which we aren't really working anymore. We are researchers and we are interested in those things which we have not yet discovered. In this case, we feel we have sufficiently understood and publicised the phenomenon. Now, the medical community needs to take ownership of the matter and carry out further research into this potential new treatment.

What are your main projects in Dresden, then?

There are two key projects that I can talk to you about today. In addition to the Humboldt professorship, I have secured a 1.5 million euro starting grant from the European Research Council for five years. I'm using this grant money for a project regarding the diagnosis of blood poisoning. Inflammatory diseases are usually combated by our white blood cells. As such, it seemed appropriate to examine whether the white blood cells of people who are ill are softer or more rigid than normal white blood cells when inflammation is present in the body. We wanted to investigate whether it is possible to use this knowledge to infer the severity of the inflammation and thus make an earlier diagnosis of blood poisoning. As a result, we're using a method we've got down to a fine art in a new field, with this work requiring the use of the optical stretcher. Alongside this project, however, is another truly visionary research project on the central nervous system which I would like to fund using my Humboldt professorship grant.

Are you breaking new ground with this research?

The project deals with how cells respond to the mechanics of their environment, and the foundations for this work were actually laid some years ago by a colleague in the USA. In his experiments, he showed that when cells - stem cells, for example - are placed on a very soft substrate, they spontaneously differentiate towards nerve cells, which are found in very soft tissues in the brain. When applied to a somewhat more rigid substrate, the same cells would spontaneously differentiate towards muscle cells - and muscle tissues are more rigid than nervous tissues. On a more rigid substrate again, the stem cells would differentiate towards bone cells. This therefore means that cells react to the rigidity of their environment. We're drawing heavily on these results for our own research.

Can you briefly outline your key research questions?

Firstly, we need to know whether nerve endings are predisposed to grow in soft tissue, that is, if they generally stay away from more rigid areas. If you have a damaged central nervous system, if you have paraplegia caused by injury to the spinal cord, for example, then an inflammatory reaction takes place almost immediately, since blood cells make their way into the affected area and orchestrate an immunological response to the injury. Consequently, material is distributed which reinforces the injured area, so-called fibrosis. It is well-known that no nerve endings can grow through this scar tissue, which is formed by the supporting glial cells.

A biologist will look at this process and say that this scar tissue must exhibit certain biochemical factors which signal to the surrounding cells ‘I shouldn't grow here anymore'. Without a doubt, this is partially correct, but it's not the whole truth. The hypothesis on which we are currently working is that the mechanics of this scar tissue also play a role in the process. We are working from the premise that scar tissue is more rigid. This is actually pretty obvious, but has never been scientifically proven, so we're now measuring this rigidity.

We believe that nerves do not grow in scar tissue simply because it is more rigid than the surrounding tissues. We also believe that the glial cells remain in the scar tissue and continue to provoke an inflammatory reaction. Finally, we are hoping that we can modify the mechanical characteristics of the scar tissue so that the glial cells are less reactive and thus cause less inflammation, meaning that nerve endings are more likely to grow into this area. We think that these mechanical components could, alongside biochemical processes, play a vital role in healing paraplegia. If we are able to prove this within the next five years, it would be, well...

... revolutionary! That leads me to completely different question. I detected a prevailing sense of release when reading articles about your research. Is it not a sometimes a great burden to represent such a beacon of hope - particularly for those affected, cancer patients and paraplegics, for example? It's quite possible that your research won't throw up the expected results.

It can be. It would surely be presumptuous to say that within the next five years, I can make a vital contribution to this area of research which has puzzled scientists for so many years. At best, I can say that I have an interesting approach to the problem and that I am going to study it exhaustively. This implies that mine is perhaps not the right approach. Indeed, it is the scientific method to formulate a hypothesis and then try to disprove it. The longer you fail to do this, the more likely it becomes that the hypothesis is correct.

However, your point about giving hope is an interesting one. For example, a few years ago I received a call from a sheikh in Saudi Arabia who said that his brother had cancer and that he would fly him out to me immediately - he would be in Leipzig in two days. The sheikh asked me to fetch his brother from the airport and then do everything in my power to heal the cancer. At this point, I had to tell him that he'd unfortunately misunderstood something; that I'm a researcher, not a physician. I told him that his brother would be best treated in a hospital. This is a scenario which we academics face time and time again.

Perhaps we sometimes get carried away with enthusiasm for our own work and thus awaken these hopes. What do you think? Should we researchers be more careful?

I don't think you can have any real influence on the matter. It's almost an unwritten rule of the media to hype up anything potentially sensational.
Perhaps we scientists should provide clearer explanations regarding the nature of our research. It may well be that the general population does not always truly understand that we can't carry out targeted research. A researcher simply cannot guarantee, even for five million euros, that he or she will be able to reveal a finished product after five years. All you can do with this kind of funding is create the possibility of trying things out which you would otherwise be unable to try. Indeed, all of the great leaps made in medicine - like penicillin - were the result not of targeted research, but of experimentation and play in a laboratory.

Do you feel that Dresden is a good playground?

Yes, especially given that prominent local cell and developmental biologists are trying to answer similar questions and are open to cooperation. This is something that makes Dresden incredibly attractive to me as a researcher. Simply put, there is currently no better place in the world for my kind of research than Dresden.

Thank you for the interview.

Prof. Dr.-Ing. habil. Prof. E.h. Dr. h.c. Werner A. Hufenbach

Director of the Institute of Lightweight Engineering and Polymer Technology (ILK) at the TU Dresden

Professor Hufenbach, you first came to Dresden in 1993. What was it like then?

There was still a lot of initial work to be done. We practically started with nothing. But the main thing was that I encountered intelligent and committed staff with an impressive talent for improvisation. In addition, I was lucky enough that the highly motivated team I had built up at TU Clausthal - people who shared my vision of resource-efficient lightweight construction - were able to join me in my move to Dresden. This was made possible because the funding from the German Research Foundation (DFG) was also transferred to Dresden.

Working together, the Dresden and Clausthal contingents invested considerable passion in driving forward the development of the newly established Institute. This was the start of an exciting and difficult time for all of us, but a period of my career that I would not have missed for anything. During the daytime, we would be busy with our research work, then we would come back in the evenings to adapt and update the facility to our own specification. It was also not unusual for us to commute between the university sites at the weekend - a return journey by car of more than 15 hours.

Did you encounter any opposition when you founded ILK in 1994?

Not in Dresden; we were welcomed with open arms. But of course, you also have a fight on your hands if you want to promote new ideas in established structures. That's part of the job. At TU Clausthal, I was engaged in research into the field of fibre-reinforced composites and continued this at TU Dresden. At that time, it was generally thought that such textiles were suitable only for pullovers. But we were on the right track: technical textiles are today an indispensable component in modern lightweight construction. However, the scope of our work extended beyond just one new material. We were interested in the intelligent combination of materials for different types of structures. The term I coined to sum this up was ‘Function-Integrating Lightweight Engineering in Multi-Material Design'.

And Dresden is now at the forefront of lightweight construction. Why Dresden of all places?

Under the communist regime, Dresden already had a strong reputation for a high level of expertise in materials and was seen as the hub of a high-powered regional and international scientific network. Even in those times, the location was considered special. That's why the place was populated by all these clever people that I mentioned earlier, all highly motivated, well-qualified scientists who had been working away without any of the necessary resources or modern research facilities.

Would you go so far as to say that the GDR could teach the rest of the world a thing or two about lightweight construction? I'm thinking of the body of the Trabant car which was famously made out of cotton-reinforced phenolic resin.

Yes, certainly. In those days they often clad rigid frame structures with lightweight materials that appealed to the taste buds of passing horses. By which I mean that the laminates used contained natural fibres. They had made a virtue out of necessity - and it worked. The composite materials used in the manufacture of the Trabant had already been developed in the 1920s. Today, we are once again looking closely at the possibilities for such materials.

Even before German reunification, Dresden had a large research facility for lightweight construction near the airport. When aviation research came to an abrupt halt in the sixties, many of the engineers who had previously worked on aircraft development went over to designing sports equipment. For example, they built the famous Dresden bob and luge sleds. It would be fair to say that the GDR was on a par with the West in terms of lightweight construction, although the procurement of precious carbon fibre was a different story.

So that would account for the rapid return to prominence?

There was already a well-versed team in place of highly innovative scientists and engineers skilled in the practical applications. Furthermore, the scientific community in and around Dresden has a long tradition of partnership and efficient collaboration. And if you have a harmonious atmosphere, good things are bound to emerge from it.

So there is a strong collaborative spirit around here?

Yes, it was important then, and is even more so now. We realised early on that we can achieve a lot if we all pull together - and obviously in the same direction. Having a network in place is good for innovation and good for visibility. Materials Research Network Dresden (MFD) was founded back in 1993. This organisation is open to everyone interested in research, development and industry. We were among the first to join, and it is still bearing fruit.

Under your leadership, ILK developed into a large and highly esteemed institution with 240 employees specialising in complete solutions from a single source. You were recently awarded the Order of Merit of the Free State of Saxony by the Minister President himself for the work you have done to promote this region as a centre of innovation...

I was delighted to receive the highest award that the state can confer and feel very proud as an adopted son of Saxony to have been honoured in this way.

Were you ever tempted to leave Dresden for pastures new?

It's true that I have received a number of lucrative offers over the years. But for anyone who has come to know and love the strengths and beauty of Dresden - and I'm also speaking for my family here - it's a difficult place to leave. Dresden has the potential to one day claim the title of most attractive city in Germany. In addition to my academic and research activities in Dresden, I also teach modern lightweight construction in Shanghai which is an extremely dynamic environment. Nevertheless, I feel right at home here in Dresden and see no reason to leave the place.
The city with its University of Excellence and numerous high-calibre extramural research institutions exerts a similar magical attraction for students, as evidenced by the increasing numbers of new enrolments. Once they arrive here, they are hooked and would not even consider switching location.

Aren't there any disadvantages?

One drawback is that none of the relevant players in the industry have set up a major development centre in East Germany. Consequently, you have to travel far every time to acquire new projects. Actually, the Dresden region is a fantastic breeding ground for innovative ideas, as is shown by the large number of spin-offs. After all, we have the most modern factory facilities in the world, for example the BMW and Porsche factories in Leipzig and the Volkswagen works in Zwickau.

Is lightweight the manufacturing technology of the future? Is this the end of the Iron Age and the start of the Carbon Era?

That's a slight exaggeration, as the classic materials are also innovative and up to date. New alloys are constantly being developed. It is this competition between the different materials in the value-added chain that is driving progress, at the same time consolidating Germany's position on the world market in terms of products, processes and services. I am convinced by the concept of multi-material design, which is to say intelligent composite construction: the right material in the right place at the right price with the right ecological credentials. Price is still a strong argument. It's no good just creating something new; you actually need to sell it.

So carbon-fibre reinforced plastics (CFRP) are not the one and only material of the future?

CFRP is certainly part of the picture. But that does not mean we have now arrived in the black Carbon Age, as if there were nothing else. Let's put this in perspective: approximately 1.5 billion tonnes of steel are produced annually worldwide, but only around 40,000 tonnes of carbon fibre. This relatively small amount is mainly consumed by the aerospace and automotive industries; in addition, you have all the golf clubs and tennis rackets as well as lightweight bikes that have to be made... So it is immediately apparent that availability is quickly becoming a problem. At the moment, we just about have enough CFRP, but only because the aerospace and automotive industry is still tentative in its use. If the new models from Airbus and Boeing are a big success, we could see scarcities.

But if demand increases, we should see a response?

Yes, once this new material is used on a wider front, CFRP production will be stepped up and mass production will cause prices to fall. Prime candidates for lightweight construction amongst new vehicles are electric models; they will certainly benefit, because there is no sign at the moment of any significant advance in battery design.

Do you think that lightweight construction can help e-mobility make a breakthrough?

Electric mobility is definitely coming, but we cannot yet accurately forecast when that will be. It is imperative that vehicles get lighter. It's a matter of every last ounce or gram. BMW are leading the way. We still do not know what their future electric car will cost or when it will appear on the market. It is an ambitious project acting as a pilot for other vehicles and for other manufacturers who are already in the starting blocks.

Your institute leads the way in electromobility. Together with ThyssenKrupp, you have developed the ultra-lightweight InEco, a pioneering prototype of the electric car.

We're not talking about a ‘prototype' here but rather a ‘generic demonstration vehicle', because it is all at a decidedly pre-competitive stage. This is also reflected in our commercialisation strategy. The relevant parts suppliers and major car manufacturers should be able to look at it and say: "We want to take on the manufacture of these particular components, use this specific material for a particular purpose or adopt this specific bonding technology for the composite."

Our ultra-lightweight four-seater InEco, weighing in at under 900 kilos, has not been realised as a monocoque design but as an ‘integral CFRP/steel composite construction'. Instead of the conventional prepreg and autoclave processes, we are now seeing high-pressure RTM and thermoplastic hot-pressing in conjunction with adapted textile techniques being introduced as cost-effective manufacturing processes for CFRP components. Furthermore, with the right construction technique, the number of car body components can be reduced from approximately 300 to around 60. In this way, you save on weight and on costs. We have also developed lightweight carbon wheels that fully comply with industry standards. Not every institution can offer anything similar! And there are many other refined innovations of this kind. Expert opinion is that the InEco contains many features that will be commonplace in the future.

You have been to a number of trade fairs with this car. What sort of reception is it receiving?

People are queuing up to see this model, and we have just been visited by a number of auto manufacturers and parts suppliers. The eTRUST generic demonstration vehicle - a CFRP/aluminium composite construction that we developed as part of another project and successfully road-tested - continues to attract favourable comment.

When will such vehicles leave the development phase behind and be seen on our roads?

The German federal government has set a target of one million electric cars on the road by 2020. BMW have taken a bold strategic decision and are now building in Leipzig. The launch of the i3 - their first series-production electric vehicle - is scheduled for late 2013, and the i8 sports car with its plug-in hybrid drive is set to follow. In 2014, the market should be quite varied, with the Smart from Daimler and the Golf and Up! from VW. If things go well at BMW, it can be assumed that the others will follow suit - and on a massive scale. I can assure you that everyone here in the Dresden science and research community is well aware of the potential of e-mobility and that we will be generating a lot of momentum towards establishing Germany as a global lead market and lead provider.

Recycling is more complicated, though, isn't it?

In multi-material design, recycling always presents a problem. That's why, at the concept stage, you already have to factor in the eventual safe disposal of the materials. This is a general principle in composite construction and is crucial for successful recycling. The holistic approach of our institute makes the re-use of materials a priority. I personally have a wealth of experience in this area from the many years I was director of the department for environmentally friendly dismantling and recycling of residual materials at the Clausthal Institute for Environmental Technologies (CUTEC).

What other visions for the future are you currently researching and implementing at ILK?

Ultra-lightweight vehicle structures will dominate mobility in the future. For urban mobility in particular, electric vehicles in their various manifestations will play a central role and will therefore continue to be a focus of research and development at ILK.

Also featuring strongly will be aerospace projects ranging from the fuselage and cabin to the engines. This is an area in which lightweight materials are essential. For example, we are collaborating with Rolls-Royce to develop engines with CFRP blades that are much quieter in operation than the ones currently in use. Incidentally, ILK is a member of the strong university network that Rolls-Royce has built up. Worldwide, there are 28 UTCs (University Technology Centers) working hand in hand on nationally and internationally based R&D projects. For aerospace applications, we are also developing lightweight actuators using innovative fibre-composite/metal hybrid construction. A fair number of these hydraulic actuators are being installed in aircraft, so that means a lot of weight reduction. After all, you don't want to be flying deadweight around instead of actual payload.

Electric bicycles are also a big issue with us, either in pure CFRP or composite construction. For example, we have built a sturdy CFRP delivery bike. Another field is classic engineering which is still largely dominated by metals, although it is precisely here where high feed rates and accelerations are required that a great deal of energy could be saved through the use of ultra-lightweight CFRP components. In addition, we are busy with high-performance shafts, rollers, transmission housings and springs with a high CFRP content. The shipbuilding industry is also using new fibre-reinforced stabiliser fins designed by us, and these have already proved themselves on the high seas. Furthermore, we are developing CFRP extreme pressure vessels for storing energy, in which the safety electronics are integrated into the material.

We are also researching biomaterials, because I am convinced that, as resources grow scarcer, we will have to resort more and more to natural materials. There are a few more areas I could list here such as medical and rehabilitation technology.

But the important thing is that we remain constantly aware of the system as a whole. We are developing not only the component, but also the relevant technological process. Any gains you make by changing individual components will be limited if you fail to take into account the way they interact with the overall system. It is a hallmark of ILK that we offer lightweight solutions from a single source. This starts with the material selection, includes the simulation, design, prototype manufacturing, quality assurance and testing phases and culminates in the recycling. This ability to see the big picture is what makes the Dresden approach so special.

Tell us how research networking operates at ILK in Dresden.

ILK is the founder of and partner in numerous DFG-funded basic research collaborative projects (SFB, Transregio, priority programmes etc) as well as AiF, BMBF, BMWi and EU projects. We are a longstanding member of Materials Research Network Dresden (MFD) and a founding member of Automotive Cluster Eastern Germany (ACOD). Furthermore, ILK is a member of the Competence Center for Aerospace and Space Technology Saxony/Thuringia (LRT) and of Carbon Composites e.V. (CCeV). In the field of plastics technology, the Institute is a member of the Scientific Alliance of Polymer Technology (WAK).

ILK fulfils a spokesman role for the European Centre for Emerging Materials and Processes Dresden (ECEMP), the high-technology cluster which was founded in 2007 and, since 2008, has been funded by the Saxon State Excellence Initiative. No fewer than 40 professors are involved. If you add it all up, you find that there are over 2,000 materials researchers in the network. That's what I call high-powered! We are the envy of our colleagues everywhere for this cluster in which scientists interact intensively with engineers. One of the tasks of the cluster is to combine different materials so that we can generate multi-component materials with new properties. Again, the focus is especially on efficient processes. Developing new products is something almost any company can do, but it is only those who successfully master the most efficient and reproducible manufacturing processes who will ultimately succeed in the market.

Here in Dresden, we also take particular care to cultivate regional and Eastern European networks. ILK is not only well connected in Saxony and Germany but also with selected universities in Poland, Romania, the Czech Republic, the Ukraine and Russia. This is a huge opportunity for Dresden as a science hub. We can draw on the expertise of old contacts and networks because many Dresdeners have studied in one of these countries or vice versa. This is future potential for which the Dresden area is ideally suited. And let's not forget, these are also the markets of the future; Poland has progressed by leaps and bounds while Russia is not far behind.

And the teaching side...

That's vitally important to us, of course. Very early on, we involve our students in basic research projects as well as in application-oriented industrial projects in which they can often experience at first hand the pressures under which industry has to work. And it also helps them to gain valuable experience for their future careers. The increasing number of young women enrolling for our courses shows that lightweight construction is also a highly attractive area of study for female undergraduate engineers. We have no worries for our students and graduates - they are snapped up by employers. No-one here needs to be anxious about finding a job after graduating. And we all benefit from this, because the students of today become part of tomorrow's network.

Thank you for the interview.

Dr. Oliver Jost
Projektleiter am Fraunhofer-Institut für Werkstoff- und Strahltechnik (IWS)

Herr Jost, Dresden und Kohlenstoff-Nanoröhren, das gehört für Sie zusammen, oder? Wie kam es dazu?

Beides hat Zukunftspotential. Und beides hat in den letzten zwei Jahrzehnten einen enormen Aufschwung erfahren. Wie kam ich dazu und wie kam ich dort hin? Ich bin geboren in Nordrhein-Westfalen und habe im Harz studiert, quasi auf halbem Weg nach Dresden. Im Dresdener Fraunhofer-Institut für Keramische Technologien und Systeme (IKTS) habe ich dann ab 1993 promoviert, bevor ich als Postdoc 1999 an die TU wechselte. In einem Gemeinschaftsprojekt mit dem Leibniz-Institut für Festkörper- und Werkstoffforschung Dresden (IFW) habe ich als einer der ersten Forscher in Dresden mit Kohlenstoff-Nanoröhren gearbeitet. Das war damals noch ein neues Material, das jede Menge Weltrekorde aufwies und die Materialwissenschaftler sofort fasziniert hat. Mit diesen winzigen Röhrchen habe ich später wieder im Rahmen der Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft weitergearbeitet, diesmal am Institut für Werkstoff- und Strahltechnik (IWS). Da ging es dann um die Anwendung.

Wie war es, Anfang der Neunziger in den Wissenschaftskosmos Dresdens einzutauchen?

Oh, das war ein regelrechter Schock. Eine ziemlich harte Zeit, das muss ich sagen. Wenn man als frischgebackener Diplomingenieur aus dem Westen hierher kam, wurde man doch schief angesehen. Man musste da schon gegen die Besserwessi-Vorurteile ankämpfen. Aber ab etwa 2002 war das kein Thema mehr. Da wurde es auch sehr international. Die Hauptsprache ist an vielen Instituten seither auch eher Englisch als Deutsch.

Ist die TU heute das Bindeglied zwischen all den Forschungseinrichtungen Dresdens?

Die TU Dresden ist zentral. Wir bei Fraunhofer zum Beispiel nutzen unter anderem das, was die TU-Forscher sich in der Grundlagenforschung erdacht haben, und versuchen, es zur Marktreife zu entwickeln. Auch Max Planck-, Leibniz- und Helmholtz-Institute sind wichtig, die ebenfalls Grundlagenforschung betreiben. Aber das findet sich alles irgendwo in der TU wieder. Sie ist wie ein Pool, in dem alles zusammenkommt. Und sie hat ja jetzt auch in der Exzellenzinitiative erfolgreich abgeschnitten.

Gibt es in der Materialforschung einen speziellen Dresden-Ansatz?

Da sind in Dresden die Fraunhofer-Einrichtungen, die in diesem Feld sehr gut positionierte TU, das interessante Leibniz-Institut IFW sowie das Institut für Polymerforschung (IPF) führend tätig. Und sie alle arbeiten sehr stark auf der Kohlenstoffstrecke. Auch durch die Exzellenz der TU Dresden und das hier existierende ‚Center for Advancing Electronics Dresden' wird unter anderem versucht, die Zukunft der Elektronik auf Kohlenstoff aufzubauen. Dieser hat große Vorteile gegenüber Silizium. Neben der Elektronik ist der Leichtbau ganz stark in Dresden. Hier ist die Kohlenstoff-Faser sehr bedeutend. Ich behaupte, das 21. Jahrhundert wird das Kohlenstoff-Jahrhundert. Und Dresden ist ganz vorne dabei.

Dann bleiben wir doch beim Kohlenstoff. Sie haben ein Verfahren zur kostengünstigen Herstellung einwandiger Kohlenstoff-Nanoröhren entwickelt. Wie ging es mit Ihren Forschungen weiter?

Zunächst war die Skalierung wichtig. Die Herstellung von wenigen Gramm musste zu Kilogramm gesteigert werden. Das haben wir geschafft. Dann ging es um die Anwendung selbst. Transparente Elektroden machten wir eines der zentralen Forschungsfelder aus. Biegsame, ziehbare Touchscreens schienen möglich. So etwas wollten wir entwickeln. Dafür muss man die elektrisch leitenden Röhrchen in winzigen Mengen in andere Materialien einbringen. Da sind wir immer noch dabei. Das erste aber, was wir hier gemacht haben, war die Anwendung in Aktoren, also Geräten, die elektronische Signale in mechanische Bewegung umsetzen und umgekehrt.

Die Kunstmuskeln, bei denen Sie jüngst einen wissenschaftlichen Durchbruch erreicht haben...

Ja, die sogenannten Kunstmuskeln. Technisch handelt es sich um dielektrische Elastomer-Aktoren aus biegsamen Materialien. Das Prinzip ist einfach. Man legt dabei viele dünne Schichten übereinander, immer abwechselnd aus leitenden und isolierenden Materialien. Wenn man dann unterschiedliche Ladungen aufbringt, lässt sich elektrostatischer Druck erzeugen und das Material verformt sich. Diese Grundidee wurde vor etwa zehn Jahren erstmals propagiert, es gab zum Beispiel einen wichtigen „Science"-Artikel dazu. Es hat bei den Kollegen auch alles so weit funktioniert. Aber es blieb doch ein grundlegendes Problem bestehen: Man hatte keine vernünftige leitfähige Elektrode. Die Schichtbereiche müssen nämlich dehnbar sein, richtig dehnbar, so wie ein Muskel sich kontrahiert und ausdehnt. Es gab aber keine elektrisch leitende Schicht, die diese Bewegung Tausende Male mitmachte, ohne zu reißen.

Man hatte dabei immer Metalle benutzt.

Genau. Und das war dann der große Durchbruch unseres Projekts. Wir haben die Kohlenstoff-Nanoröhren mit dem biegsamen Material selbst, also Gummi, Kautschuk oder Silicon, verbunden. Unsere elektrischen Leiter können Sie deshalb biegen und ziehen. Die Länge ist verdoppelbar. Das war die Grundlage für unsere Aktoren.

Damit haben Sie die Konkurrenz abgehängt?

Es forschen schon noch einige andere Wissenschaftler an dieser Technik, nicht unbedingt in Deutschland - hier etwa die TU Darmstadt -, aber international doch schon. Meist werden jedoch nach wie vor Metallschichten und Gummischichten verwendet. Und da entsteht eben das Problem, dass die leitende Schicht reißt oder bricht. Man hat es auch mit transparenten Keramiken oder Graphit- und Silberflocken versucht, aber da entstehen neue Probleme. Wenn es beweglich und doch fest verbunden sein soll, müssen die beiden Schichten im wesentlichen aus demselben Material bestehen. Bei uns ist das so, weil wir die Röhrchen in winzigen Mengen in das Grundmaterial eingebracht haben. So haben Sie am Ende einen einzigen gummiartigen Elastomer-Körper, bei dem Sie gar nicht merken, dass er schichtartig aufgebaut ist. Unsere Aktoren haben ohne Einbußen zehn Millionen Zyklen durchgestanden. Dann haben wir einfach nicht weitergeschaut. Vielleicht wären auch zehn Milliarden Zyklen möglich. Zehn Millionen Zyklen ist in der Industrie eine wichtige Größe, die Automobilindustrie etwa gibt diese vor. Was auch wichtig ist: Man kann bei der Beschichtung von Rolle zu Rolle arbeiten, weil nur ein Grundmaterial benutzt wird. Das ermöglicht es, das Ganze hinterher aufzurollen. Die einzelnen Schichten sind ja nur ca. 100 Mikrometer dick.

Wie ist diese Technologie einsetzbar?

Da haben wir uns viele Gedanken gemacht. Man kann sie tatsächlich für künstliche Muskeln nutzen, also etwa in der Robotik, aber auch bei Prothesen. Auch Vibrationsdämpfung ist möglich. Eingebracht in den Himmel von Automobilen etwa könnten Schwingungen weggenullt werden, wodurch es im Inneren des Fahrzeugs sehr leise würde. Es ließe sich auch im Außenbereich anwenden, um PKW-Geräusche zu reduzieren. Die Technik eignet sich weiter für Ventile oder Industrieaktoren. Wenn Sie das Material nicht aufrollen, sondern flächig ausbreiten und viele Schichten übereinander aufbringen, kann damit eine riesige Kraft erzeugt werden. Das ermöglicht Flächenpressungen. Taktile Bildschirme sind denkbar, Braille-Terminals für Blinde etwa, auch Lautsprecher oder haptische Pads. Eine weitere Anwendungsmöglichkeit stellen Mikrosystemtechniken dar, beispielsweise winzige Pumpen, die in Schläuche oder in den Körper eingebaut sind. Und schließlich kann man auch das Prinzip umdrehen, was Generatorik und Energy-Harvesting ermöglicht. So lassen sich diese Schichtsysteme etwa in einen Zylinder einbauen und als Wellenkraftwerk nutzen.

Und für all dies haben Sie das Patent?

Wir haben das Grundlagenpatent für diese Technik. Wir haben uns die flexiblen Materialien in Verbindung mit Elastomeren für die Aktorentechnik patentieren lassen. Da es das einzige Material ist, das in diesen sensiblen Bereichen Sinn macht, handelt es sich um ein Flaschenhals-Patent. Um uns kommt eigentlich niemand herum, wo immer es um beständige Aktoren geht.

Wie ist der Energieverbrauch?

Unsere Aktoren leisten generell einen Beitrag zur Energieeffizienz, schon allein dadurch, dass unser Material leicht ist. Es hat etwa das Gewicht von Wasser. Dazu haben die Aktoren eine hohe Energieeffizienz.

Gibt es denn noch Probleme bei Ihrer Technologie?

Das Hauptproblem ist gelöst. Ein kleineres Problem besteht noch darin, dass man die Spannungen reduzieren muss. Derzeit bewegt man sich im Bereich von 1000 Volt. In der Robotik ist das vielleicht noch möglich, aber bei der Prothetik so nicht einsetzbar. Wir müssen dazu die Schichtdicken reduzieren. Wenn wir sie auf 10 Mikrometer Dicke reduziert bekommen, braucht man nur noch 100 Volt. Und irgendwann lässt sich ein Aktor mit einer simplen Batterie betreiben. Man braucht dann natürlich sehr viele Schichten übereinander. Wenn wir es schaffen, zu zeigen, dass man zum Beispiel zehntausend Schichten gleichzeitig herstellen kann, dann hat man es geschafft. Dann ist unser Material drin im Markt.

Gibt es schon Interessenten aus der Industrie?

Wir haben soeben das erste Industrieprojekt aus dem Bereich Elektrotechnik hereingeholt.

Wollen Sie die Umsetzung nicht selbst in die Hand nehmen? Eine Ausgründung also?

Daran haben wir schon gedacht. Es hängt noch ein wenig von den Kohlenstoff-Nanoröhren-Entwicklungen ab, aber später vielleicht.

Der Durchbruch wurde erreicht im CANDELA-Projekt des Bundesbildungsministeriums. Wie wichtig war dieses für Ihre Entwicklung?

Wir hatten grundlegende Ideen schon zuvor, aber keine Förderung. Erst mit dieser Ausschreibung konnten wir richtig und sehr erfolgreich anfangen. Das Projekt wurde Mitte 2008 beantragt und begonnen hat es 2009. Das CANDELA-Projekt war ein gemeinsames von Fraunhofer und TU Dresden, insgesamt waren etwa 10 Personen beteiligt. Inzwischen ist es beendet.

Gibt es Anschlussprojekte?

Es erreichen uns Fragen, ob man das nicht hier oder dort weiterführen kann. Es läuft bereits ein kleines Anschlussprojekt, es werden wohl bald mehrere Anschlussprojekte hinzukommen. Aber dazu kann ich noch wenig sagen.

Vielen Dank für das Gespräch.

Prof. Dr. Karl Leo

• Director of the Institute for Applied Photophysics at TU Dresden (IAPP)
• Director of the Fraunhofer Research Institution for Organics, Materials and Electronic Devices (COMEDD)

Professor Leo, you've been in Dresden since 1993. Was the city a science hub when you first arrived?

I came to Dresden in 1993 following my appointment at TU Dresden. I had previously worked at the RWTH Aachen, and in America before that. For me, Dresden was completely new territory. Before I submitted my application, I came to visit the institution for a day and I saw that there was still much to be done here. It was still a time of great flux after the fall of the Berlin wall, and the city was just one big construction site. The university infrastructure had also suffered; the roof of the building leaked, for instance, and so many laboratories had to be abandoned. But I also met people who wanted to make waves; I saw the gleam in their eyes. And despite such difficult conditions, they did good work. It was then that I knew we could make something of this - and over the next twenty years, Dresden evolved into an incredible technological hub.

You also previously spent some time at the legendary AT&T Bell Laboratories in Holmdel, New Jersey, so you're in a position to make comparisons. Would you say that when it comes to high technology, Dresden has replaced the large and often privately run research institutes of the twentieth century - like the Bell Labs?

That thought has actually never occurred to me, but there's some truth to it, particularly regarding the once famous Bell Labs. When I left the Labs in 1991, the problems that had always been apparent there were looming ever larger. Their downfall ended up being so complete that there is virtually nothing left of the Bell Labs' legacy today.

What do you need in order to nurture a flourishing science hub?

You always need two things: adequate basic conditions and people. And don't forget: the people were already in Dresden. After all, Dresden was the centre of the East German microelectronics industry. They had terrible equipment and leaky roofs, but the Dresden scientists were extremely competent, nonetheless. When they got better opportunities later on - all thanks to the state of Saxony's clever manoeuvring - there was no stopping them. That's why everything developed so quickly here.

Was it plain sailing from there on or were there also setbacks?

There were actually very few out-and-out failures. Qimonda's insolvency was, of course, unfortunate, but it is nevertheless quite astounding just how quickly the industry bounced back. Indeed, Qimonda's employees were absorbed by the growing private market and this failure by no means had any lasting effect.

For a few months now, TU Dresden has been officially dubbed an “elite university” following its recognition as an outstanding institution under the German Excellence Initiative. How does that make you feel and what consequences has it had for your work?

First of all, this is a very significant achievement. We really worked hard for this, and have a fair few failed attempts behind us in trying to earn this mark of excellence for the university as a whole. Now, of course, this is prompting us on to finally move into the fast lane. It has to be said that this success is especially important for us now that the Solidarity Pact is now coming to an end and funding for the new German states is drying up. However, with this elite status we can adopt a totally different stance in negotiations.

You're referring to the underfunding of TU Dresden, about which the university rector Hans Müller-Steinhagen complained some months ago?

I agree with the rector of TU Dresden in that this university is structurally underfunded; we rank poorly in terms of the amount of state funding we receive per graduate. On the other hand, we do very well in securing private funding, so I can't really complain about my department's funding - but the disparity between what we receive from the state and what we have to secure in private funding exists nonetheless.

Dresden prides itself on the cooperative nature of its scientific landscape. Does this culture of collaboration really work in practice? And what other benefits are there to moving to this city?

Yes, I would say that networking and interdepartmental cooperation are particularly successful here. I'm also still Director of the Fraunhofer Research Institution. I know from other locations that there is this constant friction between research institutes, but that isn't the case here in Dresden. The university's links with the industry are also very strong. This is probably because of the size of this location, where virtually everyone knows everyone. What's more, Dresden is probably the most attractive city in Germany if you can overlook its poor transport links. Indeed, it's hard to beat the city's cost and quality of living, and it has excellent schools and universities.

Back to the cooperation between the university, non-university research institutes and the industry - you could be considered the very personification of this reciprocity; after all, you are a TU Dresden professor, Director of the Fraunhofer Research Institution (COMEDD) and the co-founder of a number of companies and initiatives such as Novaled AG and Heliatek GmbH.

This is the perfect description of my situation. I research and teach at the university. Meanwhile, the Fraunhofer Research Institution acts as a bridge between science and industry. There, applied research goes hand in hand with the kinds of facilities that you would never be able to operate as a university for financial reasons. This cooperation is highly successful, and indeed, many employees at the Fraunhofer Institutes are, themselves, formerly of the TU Dresden. There are also joint working groups, which enable students to have an early introduction to these research institutes. The same can be said of the various start-ups with which I'm involved. Many of the start-up employees - right up to members of the board - were previously linked with the university, which makes cooperation very easy. But we also maintain a very close working relationship with companies created externally.

The success of this cooperation is clear; just a year ago, you - together with company founders Jan Blochwitz-Nimoth (Novaled) and Martin Pfeiffer (Heliatek) - were awarded the German Future Prize. Why exactly did you win this award?

We were awarded this prize for the development of efficient organic components, or more precisely, for the development of efficient organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs) and solar cells. Over the past few years, we have proved that it is possible to manufacture organic light-emitting diodes which are more efficient than fluorescent tubes and around six times more efficient than light bulbs. On top of this, we've manufactured organic solar cells, which are not yet as efficient as their silicone-based competition, but which are nonetheless very well-designed and have an efficiency factor of approximately 10 percent. To achieve this, we had to prove that the conductivity of organic semiconductors can be increased by a factor of one million through the addition of a certain special molecule.

Have your findings already been integrated into the manufacturing process?

Yes, all Samsung devices equipped with OLED displays use our technology. This is Novaled's business.

How is your competition shaping up?

In terms of industrial application, our strongest international competitor is South Korea. Of course, we also supply our competitors, since the display technology industry is concentrated in Asia at the moment, so we make money as suppliers, too. South Korea is also a leading competitor in the OLED lighting sector. Competition in the solar cell sector is more diffuse; there are very active companies based in the USA, for instance. Of course, these technologies are being researched around the globe. However, with over one thousand employees, the Dresden organics cluster is the largest of its kind in Europe.

What could your technology be used for in the future?

Thin organic semiconductors have the advantage that you can apply them like a dye to virtually any surface, from glass and plastic to metal foil and paper - or even fabrics. As a result, it is very easy to manufacture flexible components; roll-up displays or roll-up solar panels are now quite feasible. But transparency will also have a greater role to play in future developments. Indeed, we can now manufacture solar panels and light-emitting diodes which are virtually see-through.

When do you think that these products will hit the market?

The flexible solar cells are almost ready for use. Heliatek will have its first products on the market very soon. Flexible displays, on the other hand, are quite complex, and I would therefore think that it will be a few more years before they're ready for mass consumption. There are already prototypes, though.

Do you have a favourite concept for the future of organic components?

Yes. In the future, we might cover windows with transparent OLEDs through which you can see during the day, but which would transform into luminous surfaces at night with the simple push of a button. We've actually already built a small-scale model. The effect is truly beautiful: almost as if it were daylight. If this installation could be combined with transparent solar cells, then energy generated throughout the day could be consumed at night.

Organic electronics is the main competitor for conventional, silicone-based microelectronics, but do the two fields ever work together sometimes?

Of course! I have good friends and colleagues in silicone microelectronics, Thomas Mikolajick and Johann Bartha, for instance. We are currently working on a joint project for the study of new sequestration methods. Under this project, we're using a wafer-thin coating technology used in silicone microelectronics to encase organic components and protect them against oxygen and water vapour. This quite neatly demonstrates how synergies are created; simply through knowing the right people.

A final prediction: how will Dresden evolve as a science hub in the near future?

Today, we are already spearheading developments in Europe's high tech and information technology industries. Grenoble is also an important centre, but Dresden outstrips the French city in terms of sheer numbers, and has a much more diverse scientific landscape. I think that Dresden is likely to continue reinforcing this strong position. The biotechnology industry is also gaining in importance, and we are currently working on combining this discipline with microelectronics. We do, however, have two challenges to face. Firstly, we will fall on hard times if TU Dresden has to survive on its current - or an even further reduced - level of funding. Secondly, Dresden, like all cities in the former East German states, has failed to attract large corporations, and the topic arises time and time again in conversation: how can we lure a large corporation to the city?

So, how would you go about it?

In my view, we have to create one ourselves. However, this is not easy in Germany, whereas in China a new large corporation is founded every few weeks. I sometimes wonder why we can't get something like Google off the ground. Dresden would be the ideal location for a venture like that.

Perhaps you've already founded a large corporation and you just don't know it yet?

That really would be something!

Thank you for the interview.

Prof. Dr. Thomas Mikolajick

• Professor of nanoelectronic materials at the Institute for Semiconductor and Microsystems Technology at TUD
• Managing Director of the Nanoelectronic Materials Laboratory (NaMLab) at TUD
• Director of the leading-edge cluster Cool Silicon supported by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research

Professor Mikolajick, did you ever think you would settle in Dresden?

If you'd asked me 25 years ago, I would have said no! In 1996, I entered employment in the semiconductor industry, initially at Siemens in Regensburg. With the establishment of Infineon Technologies, I then transferred from Regensburg to Munich. In 2001, my work at Infineon pointed me clearly in Dresden's direction. More precisely, Infineon's memory company (which was later broken up and declared insolvent as Qimonda) moved its technology development division to Dresden. Those like me who don't design chips at the computer, but instead work in technology itself, are dependent on having access to billion-dollar high-tech equipment. As such, in order to be able to spearhead the very latest developments, I moved to Dresden - again, with Infineon.

You mention Qimonda's insolvency... it wasn't the only company to go bust in this industry. Are such insolvencies simply par for the course or were people a bit too blasé in Qimonda's case?

When it comes to insolvencies, you have to differentiate between two factors, namely competitive conditions and funding requirements. As regards the former, the semiconductor industry is one that demands considerable investment. When the market is strong, all manufacturers rush to invest in new capabilities, and this then inevitably leads to significant overproduction which must then be purged from the market once more. However, despite these cycles, the semiconductor market has achieved two-digit growth over a period of several decades. The companies which manage to hold out stand to make a very healthy profit in the long run.

But it's already becoming apparent that there is less chance of securing funding today.

Indeed, the second factor is more unfortunate. As the semiconductor industry is so cost-intensive, it can't succeed anywhere in the world without subsidies. That isn't a bad thing in itself, because these investments pay off in the long term. There is, however, real competition for subsidies and every site has its own unique advantages. In Germany, for example, research projects are important factors to be taken into consideration in the funding of risky developments. As such, academic partners are paired with companies and contribute to corporate research projects. Even the Dresden success story of the 1990s would not have been possible without financial support from the state of Saxony and the German government. Indeed, it was thanks to this funding that Siemens and AMD, two big players in the industry, were able to establish operations here and thus attract a number of other companies to the area. The region's high-tech industry employs 50,000 people today, with 20,000 working in microelectronics alone. In the USA and Asia, however, this line of business is often regarded as very much a part of society and is therefore much better funded. This causes many European companies to fall behind their foreign competitors, move their operations abroad or be taken over by their North American or Asian counterparts.

What support do you have in Dresden to help avoid the application of your innovations being siphoned off by the USA or Asia?

Fortunately, things are still looking pretty good in Dresden, because we have the support of the city and the state of Saxony. That said, we rarely receive any support on a national level at the moment. On the EU level, the Key Enabling Technologies (KET) initiative has gradually set the funding ball rolling again.

You are Managing Director of the TUD's Nanoelectronic Materials Laboratory (NaMLab), a professor at the TU Institute for Semiconductors and Microsystems Technology, and also Director of the leading-edge cluster Cool Silicon, supported by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research - so you have three full-time jobs! Are you able to compartmentalise these different roles in your mind?

Each role necessarily feeds into the others; otherwise they would have no meaning at all. The two positions that really go hand in hand are the ones at the NaMLab and university. At the NaMLab, application is the central focus of our work, and it therefore often touches upon what's being researched at the institute where I teach. However, a company can cooperate much more flexibly and in a more structured way with the industry. As such, this approach is extremely successful. My role at Cool Silicon is a little different to what I do in my other jobs, despite the fact that the NaMLab is a key Cool Silicon project partner. Indeed, at Cool Silicon, where science and the local microelectronics industry converge, I'm also involved in site politics as a project coordinator. But that's a concern for me, anyway.

What's your opinion of Dresden as a science hub? Does this cooperation between academia and industry function more successfully here than in other places you've come to know?

Absolutely, at least compared with the other places that I know. The Cool Silicon cluster also contributed directly to the intensification of this collaboration. The people involved now know each other much better, understand in which areas they can work together and can also see where cooperation is not meaningful. As a result, expectations are clear to each of the partners and group projects can be started very quickly here. It is important to note that all parties gain something from the venture. After all, the companies involved are not participating out of the kindness of their hearts; they have their own interests in mind. This cooperation with research establishments is therefore ideally suited to semiconductor companies like Infineon and GlobalFoundries, because semiconductor technology is by its very nature innovative. The number of transistors on a chip doubles every one and a half years, and each time this happens, we have to push the boundaries of physics to the limit. You can't sit on your laurels; you must always remain committed to research.

Are there any other advantages to working in Dresden?

The dynamic environment created here by the many local companies operating at the forefront of the semiconductor industry is extremely exciting; that's the main advantage. But, of course, Dresden's appeal doesn't stop there. The city itself is just fantastic - just look at the Elbe skyline! From Dresden it's also not far to Saxon Switzerland and the Erzgebirge mountains, which increases the city's recreational value significantly. In addition, the city is just the right size; it is compact, but still a large city. And then there's childcare; it's much better here than in West Germany. I always bring that up when I want to convince someone to move to Dresden.

So it would be difficult to lure you away from Dresden?

There's always the possibility that an opportunity will present itself which is so good that it has to be genuinely considered. But if you want my prediction, I would say that I will stay faithful to Dresden for many years to come.

In your industry cluster you network with other clusters. In such cases, approaches such as "science speed dating" are also used. What is that exactly and how did you come up with this idea?

It was actually a rather spontaneous idea from a member of the board of Cool Silicon, but it was a real success. Our buzzword in the spring was ‘networking', and so we chose this very personal approach whereby two researchers would introduce themselves and their research - it is therefore essentially another form of brainstorming. We are always keen to try new and innovative approaches. Last year we also did an art project...

...the Cool Silicon Art Award. Was that a publicity stunt? Or do you really feel that there are profound relationships between these two creative outlets, art and high technology?

If I'm honest, opinions are divided on that within the cluster. Originally, we wanted to use this channel predominantly to present our research to the general population, but in doing so, you also begin a dialogue with a world which is initially completely foreign to you. For me, that was extremely exciting. Indeed, it opened me up to entirely new ways of thinking. We plan to continue doing it, at any rate.

As a research coordinator, do you ever still get to conduct your own research?

Not as much as I'd like. I rarely enter the lab these days. However, the support available to PhD students through the NaMLab is very structured, so I still manage to get involved in research. Of course, research coordination takes priority over research itself in that role. It's all about striking a balance, but for the moment, I am quite happy.

So that our readers can get an idea of what you do in the NaMLab, would you mind outlining one of your application-orientated projects?

One interesting project (of many) from the NaMLab world is ‘Cool Memory'. Under this project, we have taken a well-known material from the semiconductor industry - hafnium oxide - and modified it in such a way that it is ferroelectric. This process results in a material with two potential stable states of electrical polarisation which can then be used to store data. The process is not actually anything new, but has so far only been implemented with extremely complex materials. Together with GlobalFoundries, we're integrating the material into 28-nanometre technology. This has attracted a lot of attention internationally.

What is the advantage of modified hafnium oxide, exactly?

Every semiconductor chip contains a few bits of non-volatile memory. A variety of technologies are used for this today, but they each have a number of limitations, including the fact that they all work at rather high voltages. This affects the size and energy requirements of the components. However, this is not the case with our material. That's why we named the project ‘Cool Memory'. So, it may well be that GlobalFoundries will soon own the most cost-effective and energy-efficient semiconductor module in the world. This would represent an enormous competitive advantage and a huge success for us in our work.

Why are you cooperating with the industry on this project?

The semiconductor industry is hugely interested in this research, and each attempt to implement this solution into 28-nanometre technology costs more than a small car. Why GlobalFoundries? The innovation is particularly promising for this company because it's a foundry; it's a company which has grown off the back of working exclusively on behalf of other companies. As such, we're not talking about developing an individual product, but a basic technology which can then be used by customers in their own products. A familiar material which has been newly modified, and which can be developed according to a variety of specifications, is therefore highly attractive.

How close are you?

We've successfully proved that the technology works at the 28-nanometre scale. This is no small achievement. Even though everything worked perfectly in the lab - in large structures - these results can often not be integrated directly into a scaled semiconductor process. However, we have demonstrated that this is possible in principle. We have so far only manufactured individual bits for storage technologies, which is naturally not enough for any real-world application of this technology. Now we have to develop a storage matrix and activation system. That's the next step.

How long does this process normally take?

From the point we're at now, it would normally take three to ten years to reach the manufacturing stage of a project. In this case, I would say it will take three to five years, because the material is already being used in manufacturing; we only modified it.

How does this project relate to other Cool Silicon undertakings?

In Cool Silicon's ‘Area 1', which deals with micro- and nanotechnology, there was once a project called ‘Cool Computing'. Under this project, basic transistor technology was developed which we're now using in our Cool Memory work. Likewise, ‘Area 2' projects (information electronics) quite naturally draw upon these basic technologies, even though these projects focus more on system and chip design.

Do you find that your work is more interdisciplinary now than it once was?

Yes. Once upon a time, work in semiconductor technology was much more strongly segregated, into technology on the one hand and systems and design on the other. Today, however, you need an understanding of each of these three areas in order to develop something which will succeed in the market.

Can you give us an example?

We once thought, at least from a technical point of view, that storage technology had to function almost perfectly, else it would be unsalable. Today, however, USB memory sticks no longer work perfectly, but are delivered with errors and defects - and nobody notices this at all, because modern data storage devices contain powerful correction algorithms which ultimately display the data that should have been saved in the first place. In order to gain technical control, a developer must also understand systems; he or she must know what errors can and cannot be remedied. The cross-pollination of both of these areas is therefore essential.

Thank you for the interview.

Prof. Dr. Hans Müller-Steinhagen

• Rector of the Technische Universität Dresden (TUD)
• Chairman of the Desertec Industrial Initiative (Dii) advisory committee

Professor Müller-Steinhagen, where did your career take you before you arrived in Dresden?

My route to Dresden has taken me all around the world. I studied in Karlsruhe, where I also took my doctorate, and then worked at various universities: two years in Vancouver (Canada), eight years in Auckland (New Zealand) and seven years based near London, then ten years as Director of the Institute of Technical Thermodynamics at the German Aerospace Center and also as Institute Director at the University of Stuttgart. I then came to Dresden, so did not come directly here but arrived nevertheless via a very logical route, from science to science management and now to this executive role in Dresden, and I cannot imagine anything better than being Rector of TU Dresden!

TU Dresden has made a strong impression in the Excellence Initiative. Not only is there now a second cluster of excellence, but also and very importantly, you have been awarded the cachet of University of Excellence, which means an additional influx of over 135 million euros for the university over the next five years. Does that compensate to some extent for the underfunding by the state of Saxony that you mentioned nine months ago?

No, funds stemming from the Excellence Initiative are clearly defined and are earmarked for promoting research, particularly in the two clusters and in the Graduate School. The monies will enable the University to move to a higher level, both operationally and structurally. But more specifically, these funds are not intended to support teaching, nor can they be used for infrastructure projects such as building renovation. By no stretch of the imagination are we sitting on a pot of gold that is there for the taking, despite what some people might think. All funds have to be accounted for, right down to the last part-time appointment, and have been approved by the Senate and the University Council. In the final analysis, we made an application for specific projects in the usual way and now have to bring these to fruition.

So you're not home and dry yet?

I said in my statement last year that all universities in Germany are poorly funded by comparison with our overseas competitors. On average, a German university receives 8,000 euros per student per year in public funds. The figure is four times higher at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology ETH in Zurich, and in the UK too. Even in China, as I have just discovered, good universities get twice as much state funding per student. Added to which, funding in Saxony is well below the national average.

But surely this new status should open doors?

Our excellence status will help us make progress, of course; there is no doubt about that. To give you an example, immediately after achieving success in the Excellence Initiative, the Minister President of Saxony promised us an accelerated programme of construction and refurbishment worth at least 250 million euros over the next six years. That's twice as much as we would otherwise have had. So our excellence status benefits everyone at TU Dresden. In addition, structures and processes are to be introduced that will facilitate ongoing improvement in the running of the university. Foreign researchers and students have already shown considerably more interest in the TU Dresden, and, as an Excellence Uni, we can probably be more successful than ever before in bids for external funding.

What direction should the university's development take over the next five years?

In the future, I see TU Dresden, which bears the ‘Technical University' label for historical reasons, very much as a full-blown university, having the complete range of faculties. We are actually one of the few genuine fully diversified universities in Germany, as we have excellent faculties in the natural sciences, engineering, medicine, the humanities, social sciences and cultural studies. Future exciting areas of interaction will probably encompass technology and life sciences on the one hand and the social sciences and humanities on the other. My vision is that, within five to ten years time, we will have at least one beacon of excellence in each of the four above-mentioned departments, as we already have in biomedicine and will soon have in semiconductor technology.

But will the development of the strong faculties be at the expense of the others?

We will further strengthen academic performance in those areas that have not yet reached world-class level, as in the social and cultural sciences, where a third of our students are enrolled. So it is not at all the case that we now intend to make cuts in those areas that were not successful this time; on the contrary, we will strategically consolidate existing provision.

You have designated your concept for the future ‘The Synergetic University'. What does that mean in concise terms?

A synergetic university aims to make best use of synergies between the various disciplines and also of synergies with extramural research institutions. That makes sense from a content point of view, because the big scientific issues are no respecters of interdisciplinary boundaries. One example of many that I could give: if you are engaged in stem cell research, then you also have a lot of ethical questions to resolve.

Many universities have synergies in their sights, but it is just empty words for the most part. Interdisciplinary collaboration and networking actually seem to be very much alive in Dresden. How did that come about?

There is an enormous concentration of extramural research in Dresden. We are the largest Fraunhofer location and have three Max Planck Institutes, three Leibniz Institutes, the Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf, plus a number of cultural institutions actively engaged in research - the State Art Collections, the German Hygiene Museum, the Military History Museum and the Saxon State and University Library (SLUB). We have established a close relationship with them, setting up a registered society with clear governance where we collaborate in making wide-ranging decisions on staffing and major equipment acquisitions. Cooperation between all these facilities works marvellously well, because we all had to start again from scratch twenty years ago - just like the TUD. From that point onwards, we have grown together and also grown tall together, but we have come a long way in institutional terms as well. The same applies to local industry, especially small and medium-sized companies. However, it is unfortunately the case that very few large businesses in the new federal states carry out their own research.

We have heard a great deal about the ‘Dresden Spirit' recently. What is it exactly?

That term was coined during the Excellence Initiative assessment process. The assessors were of the opinion that a special spirit prevails here, hence ‘Dresden Spirit'. It means that, as a team, there is the willingness to address new issues and new structures across institutional boundaries, a certain pioneering spirit. One of the assessors even said that he had never considered it possible that this ethos could exist to such a high degree at a German university. It is a question of mutual appreciation in the first instance. At the same time, we know too that if we approach things together, then we have every chance in the world. If we were to compete against each other, we would all be the losers, because historically there are still handicaps arising from our location.

Desertec, a visionary European project that aims to produce solar and wind energy for the whole of Europe in the North African desert, also demonstrates that cooperation is paramount when seeking to achieve great things. You were a key figure during the planning phase of this project. What is your role in its implementation?

I have been closely involved with Desertec for a number of years. Before my time as rector here in Dresden, I had approximately 250 employees at the German Aerospace Center (DLR) and at the University of Stuttgart working on sustainable energy. All the ideas relating to Desertec stem from the DLR Institute where I was previously. Today, I am still Chairman of the International Advisory Board for the Desertec Industrial Initiative (dii).

How is the project progressing? Has the Arab Spring put everything out of kilter?

Yes, the Arab Spring and, even more, the global financial crisis and recession in the eurozone have caused the project to lose momentum. Spain especially has said it now needs to return to the negotiating table in view of its current difficult economic situation. It is understandable that Spain has problems with feed-in tariff subsidies these days, but of course, the issues surrounding future energy policy remain very pressing.

Have all the political hurdles been removed?

We were keen to create the right political and economic conditions in the first phase and a great deal of progress was made. At the moment, there is a minor hiccup with financing construction of the first reference power plants in Morocco. However, they will most definitely be built, since there is already a power line to Spain.

So, the great vision remains intact?

Well, of course. I am still very optimistic that we will succeed in bringing the project to fruition. After all, many individual countries, the EU itself and plenty of large companies too are involved. Construction in Morocco was originally scheduled to begin this year, but that is perhaps looking unlikely now.

Is TU Dresden still involved in Desertec?

We are now a member of the Desertec University Network and are consequently involved in exchange programmes and joint activities. This network is comprised of nearly twenty universities, many of them from the North African region. Our main aim is to train those engineers and business management specialists who will later be responsible for keeping Desertec running. Desertec is more than just a power plant project at the end of the day. The idea is that the entire region should benefit from it, which is why sea water desalination is one of the items also on the agenda. We have some other ongoing research projects at TU Dresden concerning solar thermal power plants. We intend to establish a professorship in the production of hydrogen using solar energy in conjunction with DLR. The energy supply of the future has in any case long been a focus of research in Dresden. I am referring, of course, to the work of Professor Karl Leo at the TUD Institute for Applied Photophysics (IAPP). The new solar cells developed by him to produce cheap electricity will play a major role. In addition, it is essential to use resources more efficiently in the future, for example by improving levels of efficiency in lighting. And Karl Leo is once more at the forefront of this technology with organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs) that bring an entirely new dimension to sources of light.

You once estimated that Desertec would require 400 billion euros of investment in total by 2050. Does that still hold true?

We made a rough estimate five years ago, but the figure is now probably more like 500 billion. However, that sum is put into perspective when you consider that around 40% of the power plants currently operating in Europe will need to be replaced anyway over the coming years due to their age. The main stumbling block is not the total sum, but the seed money needed to establish the technological basis of this form of energy generation and make it competitive with conventional alternatives.

When will that stage be reached?

2020 is what we previously estimated, but I now have my doubts. It will probably be more like 2025. But even if the schedule slips, I think that we will only ever be able to convert to using mainly sustainable energy in Germany if we establish this sort of North-South collaboration. That would require solar thermal power plants to be built in sunny regions that can continue operating at full load even after sunset utilising stored heat. Solar thermal would be a useful addition to photovoltaic and wind power plants with their fluctuating levels of energy generation.

Thank you for the interview.

Prof. Dr. Brigitte Voit

•     Professor of organic chemistry of polymers at the TU Dresden
•     Scientific Director of the Leibniz Institute of Polymer Research (IPF)
•     Director of the IPF Institute Macromolecular Chemistry

Professor Voit, was it a wrench for you to move to Dresden in 1997?

No, it was an easy decision to come to Dresden. I had an alternative offer from a university in the Berlin region, but at that time, TU Dresden had a much stronger reputation for science and engineering. In any case, there was more to it than a job at TU Dresden; it also came with a senior role at the Leibniz Institute of Polymer Research attached. That added to the attraction.

Dresden's rise to prominence as a city of science was in its infancy then. What were your impressions at the time?

It is certainly the case that TU Dresden has evolved tremendously over the past two decades. It has considerably raised its profile and has acquired an excellent reputation, particularly in the fields of engineering, material science and biomedicine. In all these areas, of course, the natural sciences play a major role.

What about in your own specialist area, polymer science?

As home of the Leibniz Institute of Polymer Research (IPF), Dresden is one of the leading research locations in Europe. But quite apart from this, we pride ourselves on having high international visibility. Dresden is known around the world for this branch of science. Materials research in Dresden enjoys a superb reputation, not only in Europe but also as far afield as Korea, China, Japan and the United States.

What is the secret of Dresden's attraction as a location?

I think it is a combination of several factors. First of all, there is a genuine and enthusiastic sense of partnership, not only between the various departments of the university but also with the extramural institutions. This spirit of collaboration is subscribed to by all parties. The reason is almost certainly that, after the communist regime collapsed, everyone here felt they had to pull together to overcome the challenges ahead. It was like starting all over again. And also, there was an influx of new colleagues at that time. Secondly, it has to be acknowledged that a lot of money was pumped into the region, though obviously, from a research perspective, you can never get enough.

As a professor at TU Dresden and scientific director at the Leibniz Institute of Polymer Research supervising the work done by 500 staff, you exemplify the link between university and non-university research. Does this dual role ever cause you problems?

On the contrary. There are many such joint appointments in Dresden, which naturally results in the institutions working together and not against each other. My terms of employment state that my direct employer is TU Dresden. But at the same time, of course, I also answer to the Leibniz Institute where I am in charge of scientific research. I have to balance the interests of both institutions at all times, but this rarely leads to friction. Of course, it can give rise to minor conflicts at the administrative level. But overall, it works wonderfully well, also for the management at IPF.

And that's probably why there is so little envy of successes such as the Cluster of Excellence...

Indeed, we've all worked together to secure the University of Excellence label for TU Dresden because we all benefit from it. This accolade reflects well on the entire community. Scientists and students who also rate as ‘excellent' are attracted to Dresden, and contacts can be more readily made with third-party funding providers. Our staff at IPF are also directly involved in the Cluster of Excellence.

Is there also a Dresden feel-good factor?

Of course, our guests are always impressed by the city. The quality of life is remarkable, and cultural life is second to none. Families especially like to move here. You have a pleasant living environment plus excellent school and nursery provision. Also, if you are the partner of someone moving to Dresden, you will find a job more easily here than, say, in a town where the local economy relies almost exclusively on its university.

How would you explain polymer research to a lay person?

Polymers are large molecules, also referred to as macromolecules. Synthetic chemists, of which I am one, enjoy designing new molecules. You have to consider very carefully how the structural elements need to look if they are going to constitute an application-specific customised material that will ultimately consist of these macromolecules. That's precisely what we do here at the Institute, with my team right at the centre of the process. It is essential that we meet the exact criteria for the material, which is why we come into contact at an early stage with the users and/or the physicists and engineers who best understand the application for which it will be used.

Could you perhaps give us a concrete example?

There is one area that we have been looking at in much greater detail for the past five or six years; we have set up a dedicated team to research new functional polymers for organic electronics. These are polymers that have semiconductor properties that you will find in silicon-based chips. In this case, however, they are made of organic material, namely these polymers. We are working closely with Karl Leo's project team on this. And it is a subject area in which we are also involved in the new Cluster of Excellence which is working on materials to be used in the information technologies of the future. Organic materials promise a high level of flexibility. With them, you can open up entirely new areas of application, for example making much more use of sensor technology in everyday life.

What is the special advantage of organic materials?

The main advantage of organic polymers is that they can be processed with inexpensive manufacturing techniques. We are already seeing the first examples of ‘printed electronics'. Using printing techniques that are familiar from the newspaper industry or from your home printer, you can print an integrated circuit, a chip or a transistor. Silicon-based semiconductor technology, by contrast, is very expensive. It has to be said, however, that organic electronics still lag behind conventional technology in terms of performance. But we're working on it.

IPF can also point to some major achievements in biomedical research...

That's right. For the past seven years or so, a team reporting directly to me has been working on what we call ‘carrier structures'. These are organic macromolecules with specific functions. One very clear function might for example be that these macromolecules can transport drugs safely in the human body. Many drugs are insoluble in water and are therefore difficult to administer, so we need to find suitable carrier systems. It is also very important that they work selectively. In cancer therapy, for example, the drugs used are often toxic and are intended solely for the infected cells or tumour. These polymers have to hold on to the drug as they travel to their destination, but then release it into the cell in order to be effective.

Who are you collaborating with in this group?

We need to know how the biology interacts with such a synthetic macromolecule. Therefore, we are working very closely with colleagues in medicine and cell biology. Our local partners are based at TU Dresden, the university hospital and the Max Planck Institute of Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics (MPI-CBG). I also have some PhD students who are integrated into the Dresden International Graduate School for Biomedicine and Bioengineering (DIGS-BB) where they will find excellent conditions for networking.

When can we expect to see the fruits of this research being used in medicine?

Timelines in medicine can be quite long, but you could say that we are relatively well advanced. Take for instance these spherical molecules (dendrimers) with their complex branching structure: they look a bit like a snowflake and are good at encapsulating things. We have given them a shell of maltose to make them biocompatible. We have just demonstrated that these substances are well tolerated by the blood and cells and our medical colleagues have conducted experiments on animals in this respect. Also, we were able to confirm absorption of these substances by the cell and their therapeutic efficacy. So we have succeeded in targeting tumours and releasing the drug in the affected cells. But even though we have made such considerable scientific progress, there is still a long way to go - possibly years - before we get approval for use on patients. The process is so complicated and expensive that a research institute is unable to bear the cost all on its own. So we publish our findings and hope that pharmaceutical companies will be interested. Incidentally, the research is not aimed exclusively at beating cancer. We have also had good results with brain disorders, more specifically Alzheimer's disease.

How big is the competition?

We are obviously not the only ones who are researching carrier structures. The science is very broad, and researchers around the world are trying to identify new effective structures in this area. While there are always new results and new medications in which polymer chains play a role in administering the drug, the big breakthrough - which would include licensing - is yet to come.

And how do things stand here in Dresden?

I think that we are further along the road than many other groups with the polymer chains we have developed. Our advantage is that we work very closely with cell biologists and the medical profession. The environment you operate in has to be just right. Many groups that are made up predominantly of chemists publish details of their new structures but have to stop at that point because they haven't got the partners to take the research further and to test it in the field. Our location represents a clear advantage in this regard. We also involve partners from outside Dresden, of course.

Are polymers set to revolutionise medicine?

Well, they certainly aren't a niche application. These carrier structures can be used for many different medications and different therapies. This is hugely important for the pharmaceutical industry. But don't expect the new polymer to make the headlines. These will be reserved for the active ingredient of the drug. We may have beautiful polymer chains and make a significant contribution to a successful outcome, but ultimately this will be only one factor amongst many.

Do you feel that the chemists do not get enough recognition?

It's the medical and pharmacology researchers who receive the major accolades rather than the people working in polymer chemistry. But at least we get an honourable mention and know that we have played our part.

Thank you for the interview.