The Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Foundation) is establishing five new Research Units. This was decided by the DFG Joint Committee on the recommendation of the Senate. The new Research Units will receive total funding of approximately €27 million, including a 22-percent programme allowance for indirect project costs. In addition to establishing these five new groups, the decision was made to extend the funding of another five Research Units for an additional period.

Research Units enable researchers to pursue current and pressing issues in their areas of research and take innovative directions in their work. They are funded for up to eight years. In total, the DFG is currently funding 186 Research Units, seven Clinical Research Units and 16 Centres for Advanced Studies in Humanities and Social Sciences. Clinical Research Units are also characterised by the close connection between research and clinical work, while Centres for Advanced Studies in Humanities and Social Sciences are specifically tailored to forms of work in the humanities and social sciences.

The new research networks in detail
(in alphabetical order of the spokespersons’ higher education institutions)

The controlled and finely regulated expression of genes is essential for all organisms and viruses. The transcription of DNA into RNA, mediated by specialised multi-subunit RNA polymerases (msRNAPs), is the crucial first step in this process. Errors here can lead to dysregulation and consequently to serious diseases. The causes may lie in the peripheral subunits of msRNAPs, which differ considerably from one another, or in the coupled processes of RNA processing and the factors involved in transcription. Only a small number of msRNAPs have so far been studied in detail, however. The Research Unit Multi-subunit RNA polymerases across all domains of life: Mechanisms underlying transcription activity and regulation aims to address this knowledge gap. (Spokesperson: Professor Dr. Claus-Dieter Kuhn, University of Bayreuth)

Hospital-acquired infections affect millions of patients in Europe every year, even though many are potentially preventable. The Research Unit Hospital-acquired infections – Dissecting protective and predisposing factors to enable novel prophylactic strategies (HAI) aims to identify the factors and understand the mechanisms that influence colonisation by clinically relevant pathogens and the course of subsequent infections, for example in connection with antibiotic treatment. The researchers will start by characterising microbiota- and immune-mediated protective mechanisms in the body. Building on this knowledge, they will develop new approaches to preserve or restore defence mechanisms capable of preventing potential infections. (Spokesperson: Professor Dr. Bastian Opitz, Charité – Universitätsmedizin Berlin)

Climate change also threatens the biodiversity and water balance of tropical cloud forests. The spread of invasive plant species and the decline of cloud-dependent species such as epiphytes could have serious consequences, including for the water supply of entire ecosystems. The cloud forests of the Galápagos Islands provide an ideal model system for investigating the underlying processes and mechanisms. The Research Unit Fog-dependent water relations and plant invasion in the Galápagos Archipelago under climate change (GArua) will therefore combine ecological field experiments in the region with remote sensing and modelling approaches. The unit brings together expertise in climatology, plant and epiphyte ecology, hydrology and soil science. (Spokesperson: Professor Dr. Maaike Bader, University of Marburg)

Whether romance, crime or science fiction, the Heftroman remains a popular literary format. The Research Unit Medium – Commodity – Work: The German Heftroman (pulp novel) from 1913 to the present day examines this distinctive publishing market from a range of methodological perspectives. Its research covers production conditions and distribution channels, as well as processes of market concentration, monopolisation and changing market trends. It also explores the distinctive role of authors in contrast to the traditional book trade. In addition, the participating literary scholars will analyse waves of innovation, including the emergence of new genres, changing patterns of market acceptance and the design of novel covers. (Spokesperson: Professor Dr. Christine Haug, LMU Munich)

Identifying and describing changes in the meanings of words over time is a fundamental task in the humanities. Modern computational methods often reach their limits in this field: although large language models (LLMs) are highly capable, they require vast training corpora that are generally not available for historical and linguistic research. This limits both their practical applicability and their scholarly value for the humanities. The Research Unit Semantic Shifts in Low-Resource Domains: Computational Humanities and Natural Language Processing in Dialogue therefore aims to develop methods for detecting semantic change that are specifically tailored to humanities research questions. (Spokesperson: Professor Dr. Fotis Jannidis, University of Würzburg)

The research networks extended for a second funding period (in alphabetical order of the spokespersons’ higher education institutions and with references to the project descriptions in the DFG’s online database GEPRIS):

Research Unit FOREST FLOOR: Functioning, Dynamics, and Vulnerability in a Changing World (Spokesperson: Professor Dr. Friederike Lang, University of Freiburg)
The Research Unit is jointly funded under the D-A-CH cooperation with the Austrian Science Fund (FWF). https://gepris.dfg.de/gepris/projekt/457330647

Research Unit Human Rights Discourse in Migration Societies (MeDiMi) (Spokesperson: Professor Dr. Jürgen Bast, University of Gießen )
https://gepris.dfg.de/gepris/projekt/458456362

Research Unit KI-FOR: Deep Learning on Sparse Chemical Process Data (Spokesperson: Professor Dr. Marius Kloft, RPTU Kaiserslautern-Landau)
https://gepris.dfg.de/gepris/projekt/459419731

Research Unit Cereal Stem Cell Systems (CSCS): Establishment, Maintenance and Termination (Spokesperson: Professor Dr. Thomas Dresselhaus, University of Regensburg)
The Research Unit is jointly funded under the D-A-CH cooperation with the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF).
https://gepris.dfg.de/gepris/projekt/448353073

Research Unit Lasting Learning: Cognitive mechanisms and effective instructional implementation (Spokesperson: Professor Dr. Tobias Richter, University of Würzburg)
https://gepris.dfg.de/gepris/projekt/450142163