The winners of the “From idea to impact” competition have been announced. They will each receive up to €5,000 for a project that brings their research to a wider audience. The three winners are researchers at the University of Tübingen and have the coming year to implement their projects. The funds come from the University of Tübingen's Excellence Strategy.
First prize goes to physician Dr Kristina Hopfensperger. She wants to educate people about how HIV manipulates our immune system in order to successfully reproduce. She will invest her prize money in the development of an interactive exhibition and organize information evenings at the Tübingen City Museum over the course of the coming year. Kristina Hopfensperger works as a postdoctoral researcher at the Institute for Medical Virology and Epidemiology of Viral Diseases at the University Hospital of Tübingen.
Second prize goes to Junior Professor Dr Katerina Tsarava from the Hector Institute for Empirical Educational Research at the University of Tübingen. She is developing the app “Wissenschaft geht rund” (Science Goes Round). With its help, bicycle tours will lead to various scientific institutions in the city with many exciting, interactive stations. The aim of the project is to promote early scientific thinking and bring local research stories to life in an appealing and sustainable format.
Dr. Gerlinde Bigga receives the third prize. Together with the team from the Geogenomic Archaeology Campus Tübingen (GACT), she will take schoolchildren on a search for DNA in cave mud, introducing them to scientific work. Over the course of the coming year, she will be showing the exhibition “Dirty Science” at the University of Tübingen Museum in Hohentübingen Castle – an allusion to research involving sediments. Young visitors will learn how humans and animals lived together in and around caves and influenced each other.
The winners had previously taken part in a workshop organized in the summer by the Research Center for Science Communication in collaboration with the Graduate Academy at the University of Tübingen. During the workshop, participants developed initial project ideas into concepts, which were then awarded prizes. “With this competition, we were looking for good, innovative ideas that could actually be implemented,” said Professor Dr. Olaf Kramer, head of the Research Center for Science Communication. Hence the name of the competition: “From idea to impact.”
“The University of Tübingen engages in dialogue with society through a wide variety of formats. At our Research Center for Science Communication, these possibilities are systematically explored. This connection to society is crucial for the acceptance of science in the 21st century,” said Professor Dr. Dr. h.c. (Dōshisha) Karla Pollmann, Rector of the University of Tübingen.
