Research in Germany

When viruses travel through the air in tiny droplets, they can quickly start to dry out. Yet many viruses remain infectious after rehydration—something that is still not fully understood. Now, an international team of researchers have directly observed at the European XFEL how the protein shells of viruses can change shape during dehydration, offering new clues to viral resilience and opening new possibilities for virology research. The results, published in Light: Science & Applications, lay the groundwork for potential applications in virology and public health, and can for instance help developing antiviral strategies.

Mindelo (São Vicente). For five years now, a distinctive green laser beam has been shining at night up to 30 km above the harbour of the island’s capital. It forms part of a high-energy lidar with which the Leibniz Institute for Atmospheric Research (TROPOS) operates continuous aerosol and cloud measurements at the Ocean Science Centre Mindelo (OSCM). The lidar is part of PollyNET, a global network of fixed and mobile lidar systems coordinated by TROPOS. This network enables the detection of airborne particles (aerosols) – such as desert dust, forest fire smoke, industrial pollution or even sea salt – as well as their trajectories across our planet.

People living in Germany have more confidence in themselves today than 20 years ago. They have more faith in their ability to influence their own lives and key life events. This has now been shown in a long-term study conducted by Dr. Theresa M. Entringer from the University of Greifswald and colleagues from Berlin and the USA, based on the Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP). Data from more than 42,000 individuals was analysed for this purpose. The examination period spanned over two decades; those interviewed were aged between 16 and 98. The study was published in the European Journal of Personality.

Researchers at the National Center for Tumor Diseases (NCT/UCC) in Dresden, including Prof. Oliver Bruns and Dr. Bernardo Arús, are participating in an international study that has, for the first time, developed completely novel proteins for near-infrared (NIR) and short-wave infrared imaging (SWIR). The research was conducted in collaboration with an international team that included chemistry Nobel laureate Prof. David Baker, who was honored in 2024 for his work on computational protein design. The study, with shared first authorship, was recently published in the Journal of the American Chemical Society (JACS), one of the world's leading chemistry journals.

Researchers at the IUF – Leibniz Research Institute for Environmental Medicine in Düsseldorf release an open, privacy-preserving platform that genotypes CRISPR, base, and prime editing outcomes — with no installation and without uploading sensitive data. Published in Trends in Biotechnology (Cell Press). The work was conducted together with colleagues from the University Hospital in Düsseldorf, the ETH Zürich and the University Paris Cité.

For conservation and the management of human-wildlife conflicts, it is of great interest to know which species are eaten by carnivores. Scientists from the Ngorongoro Hyena Project at the Leibniz Institute for Zoo and Wildlife Research (Leibniz-IZW) analysed this for spotted hyenas in the Ngorongoro Crater in Tanzania using DNA analysis of hundreds of faecal samples collected over 24 years. They found that hyenas rarely eat livestock in the multi-use Ngorongoro Conservation Area, which is also used for grazing, and do not regularly prey on black rhinos. The study is published in the journal “Wildlife Biology”.