9/7/2010

BIG STORY: Brain gain in Bavaria – Research and development 2010

Early summer’s arrivals at Munich TUM (Technical University) read like the wish list of every major research center in the world. The celebrated Gerhard Kramer (University of Southern California) and Holger Boche (Humboldt University in Berlin), regarded as two of the greatest minds in the key area of structuring communication and information flows, were appointed in June to chairs at the university.

Arriving a few weeks later, this time from the University of California in Berkeley was Leon Chua, whose memristors (“memory resistors”) are poised to revolutionize both information storage and the neurosciences.

Chua took up his Visiting Fellowship at TUM’s Institute of Advanced Study. As a celebrated expat scientist, Chua will be in good company at the IAS, nearly all of whose 9 Visiting Fellows and 30 Fellows earned their renown elsewhere in the world prior to joining the Institute.

And these expat scientists were by no means the only ones joining TUM, which, not surprisingly and according to the renowned Humboldt Foundation, ranks first in this category in Germany. Number two: Munich’s Ludwig Maximilians University.

And the state’s 11 universities are by no means the only institutions in the state experiencing this ‘brain gain’.  Also profiting from it are the state’s 12 Max Planck institutes of basic research and 7 Fraunhofer ones of applied development. Also in the state are 3 of Germany’s 15 Helmholtz large-sized facilities of research.

Bavaria’s corporate sector is also a prime beneficiary. The innovations stemming from this ever-greater agglomeration of excellence are incorporated into the products and services engineered by the state’s company.

The opportunity to be part of such chains of innovation has induced the world’s most innovative companies—including, notably, General Electric and Google, to set up major R & D centers in the state

The question arises: what’s causing this brain gain? For the scientists themselves, the answer is obvious. “The freedom and the resources to pursue your ideas without encumbrances,” states Ulrich Hartl, short-listed by a number of ranking agencies for the Nobel Prize. One of the world’s leading experts on proteins, Hartl arrived in Bavaria from the Howard Hughes Institute (Chevy Chase, Maryland) in 1997, to take up a directorship at the Martinsried-based Max Planck Institute for Biochemistry.

The experts see other factors at work.
"Excellence calls out to the excellent. The reason why so many top researchers and teachers, from all over the world, flock to TUM is the opportunity to work with other brilliant minds. And the way we amassed this critical mass of excellence was by paying attention the top scientists' professional and personal needs--and of those of their sectors and of the company and institutions deploying their innovations," states Wolfgang A. Herrmann, TUM’s president.
Source: Invest in Bavaria, Business Bavaria newsletter, Issue 8 2010

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