The Free State of Bavaria sustainably promotes university-based research.

Prof. Eichii Nakamura not only impressed the audience of the Siegfried Hünig Lecture 2017 with unique movies of molecules in motion but also demonstrated his excellent skills as a baroque flute player.

British and German scientist met for the second time during three days for a joint conference of both national Liquid Crystal Societies BLCS and DFKG, in which all aspects of the modern, interdisciplinary research area “Liquid Crystals” from the life sciences over the materials research to theory has been discussed thoroughly. The project of the binational symposium, which has been established from the two national topical meetings, has been assessed as a value-added European collaboration, from which especially the rising generation of young liquid crystal researchers benefits. The international participants have been enthusiastic and inspired by the unique historical event location, the Tuscany Hall of the Residence, which Würzburg could offer to its guests.

Nicolas Zigon is originally from France – he took a detour via Japan to Germany. At the University of Würzburg, the postdoc studies supramolecular systems at the Institute of Organic Chemistry.

"Chemistry: A Bridge between Molecular World and Real World" is the title of this year’s lecture on April 27. Prof. Nakamura, internationally renowned chemist from the University of Tokyo, is going to give his audience an overview of more than 35 years of extraordinarily successful research in his laboratories.

The Second German-British Liquid Crystal Conference will be held from 3.-5. April 2017 in Würzburg. It is organized by Prof. Matthias Lehmann and his team.

Frank Würthner received the Elhuyar-Goldschmidt-Award of the Real Sociedad Española de Química. Therefore, Würthner recently gave lectures at three Spanish research institutions.

On Monday, 5th of December, Dr. Florian Beuerle successfully finished his habilitation on "Design and Synthesis of Complex Molecular Architectures Based on Small Organic Molecules" and received the "facultas docendi".

Frank Würthner is one of the four professors from the University of Würzburg that have been identified as "highly cited researchers". The US media corporation Thomson Reuters awards this title to researchers whose work receives exceptional attention worldwide and is highly cited by other scientists.

Bavarian's Minister of Education and Science, Ludwig Spaenle, awarded Anke Krüger from the University of Wurzburg for "well-taught lessons at the state-run universities in Bavaria". The award comes with a € 5,000 prize money.

On November 4, the University of Würzburg and the "Gesellschaft Deutscher Chemiker (GDCh)" (German Chemical Society) celebrated the 65th birthday of Gerhard Bringmann, chemistry professor from Würzburg, with a celebratory scientific symposium.

They stimulate the immune system and regulate the intestinal flora: Functional sugars are of high interest for many applications. A new German-Mexican project is dedicated to the development of improved synthetic methods for such kind of sugars.

On Wednesday, 2nd of November, Dr. Gustavo Fernández successfully finished his habilitation with the title „Self-Assembled Nanostructures based on π-conjugated scaffolds“ and received the "facultas docendi".

A newly discovered protein from a fungus is able to suppress the innate immune system of plants. This has been reported by research teams from Cologne and Würzburg in the journal "Nature Communications".

On 7 October, Secretary of State Bernd Sibler inaugurated the new building to accommodate the Center for Nanosystems Chemistry (CNC) of the University of Würzburg. The centre will provide ideal conditions for the staff of Professor Frank Würthner to develop innovative concepts of harnessing solar energy among other research activities.