World renowned US scientist Peter J. Stang was happy to accept the invitation to give this year's Siegfried Hünig Lecture on May, 6th in Würzburg.

Christine Werner is the best apprentice in the Würzburg-Schweinfurt region and is continuing an impressive tradition of having excellent apprentices in the University's chemistry institutes.

The University of Ruwenzori in the Congo has awarded the professors Gerhard Bringmann (Würzburg) and Virima Mudogo (Kinshasa) the honorary doctorate. By this, the two scientists are honored for their search for new agents against tropical infectious diseases, but also for the initiation of the excellence scholarship system BEBUC.

Prof. Michael R. Wasielewski will give the first CNC lecture of the winter 2012/13 semester. The title is "Artificial Photosynthesis: Solar Fuels to Address Global Energy Needs"

Bringmann’s contributions to science and his continued dedication to reviving Congolese universities were recently recognized in the form of The Congolese Medal of Merits in gold, his appointment as a member of the European Academy of Sciences and Arts, and an invitation to the Federal President’s garden party.

Professor Seibel has been awarded a DuPont Young Professor Award for his promising research on enzymatic preparation of prebiotic oligosaccharides. He is the only non-US citizen to be awarded in 2012.

For the first time, three BEBUC scholars from the partner university of Kinshasa (UNIKIN), Democratic Republic of the Congo, are guest students at the University of Würzburg. The scholarship program BEBUC has been initiated by Professor Bringmann, chair of Organic Chemistry I, and his African partner Prof. Mudogo.

The Institute of Organic Chemistry will invest 1.6 million euros to purchase two new NMR spectrometers and upgrade one of the existing NMR instruments.

Chemists and physicists at the Center for Nanosystems Chemistry have initiated a new collaboration at the University of Würzburg. The aim of their work is to design and produce novel materials with tailored properties for efficient interaction with light. The German Research Foundation (DFG) is funding the new Research Unit (Forschergruppe) with 2.3 million € over the next three years.

Prof. Jean-Marie Lehn (Université de Strasbourg) will give the Siegfried Hünig Lecture 2012 on May, 7th.

Axel Muck was awarded "Best Apprentice in the Region Würzburg/Schweinfurt", and Dr. Alfons Ledermann was honoured for his outstanding commitment to apprentice training.