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This is the archive of uni.aktuell news (until March 2022). For more recent news and stories please visit aktuell.uni-bielefeld.de.

A giant puzzle with billions of pieces

Published on 21. Dezember 2012
Bielefeld’s Center for Biotechnology and the Joint Genome Institute, USA, decipher genetic information of microbes in biogas plants

Day after day, legions of microorganisms work to produce energy from waste in biogas plants. Researchers from Bielefeld University’s Center for Biotechnology (CeBiTec) are taking a close look to find out which microbes do the best job. They are analysing the entire genetic information of the microbial communities in selected biogas plants up and down Germany. From the beginning of 2013, the Californian Joint Genome Institute will undertake the sequencing required. The biocomputational analysis will be performed at CeBiTec. Not an easy task, since the data will be supplied in billions of fragments stemming in turn from hundreds of organisms. Piecing together this huge jigsaw puzzle will be painstaking work.[Weiterlesen]
Posted by MBorchert in General
Tags: hp fo

Male bushcrickets are in charge when it comes to sex

Published on 14. Dezember 2012
Biologists at Bielefeld University publish research findings in specialist journal

All a question of timing: When bushcrickets mate, the male attaches a sticky package, the so-called spermatophore, to the female’s abdomen. Alongside the sperm themselves, this ‘bridal present’ consists of a protein-rich mass that the female eats after mating. It then takes several hours for the sperm to find their way into the female’s reproductive tract. But, who decides when that will happen? A study by the Bielefeld biologists Professor Dr. Klaus Reinhold and Dr. Steven Ramm suggests that it is the male who determines the dynamics of this process even when he has long ‘hopped off’ somewhere else. They have now published their results in the online first version of the journal Behavioural Ecology and Sociobiology.[Weiterlesen]
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German Research Foundation to fund globally unique twin study on social inequality

Published on 7. Dezember 2012
Interdisciplinary study by Bielefeld and Saarland Universities

Much celebration at the universities in Bielefeld and Saarbrücken. The German Research Foundation (DFG) has approved funding for a long-term research project by Professors Dr. Martin Diewald and Dr. Rainer Riemann from Bielefeld University and Dr. Frank Spinath from Saarland University. They are studying the development of social inequalities – for the example of 4,000 pairs of twins living in Germany. The name of the study is ‘Twinlife’. The DFG announced its decision today (7 December), and will be providing more than four million Euros of funding for the first three years.[Weiterlesen]
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Professor Katharina Kohse-Höinghaus officially received by the Chinese government

Published on 7. Dezember 2012
Consolidation of Bielefeld University‘s international relations

The new Chinese government has been in office for only three weeks. On Wednesday 5 December, the new General Secretary of the Communist Party of China and designated President of the People's Republic of China, Xi Jinping, received a delegation of 20 selected international experts currently visiting China – including Bielefeld’s chemistry professor Dr. Katharina Kohse-Höinghaus. The President of the International Combustion Institute and Holder of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany is currently on a lecture tour of China.[Weiterlesen]
Posted by MBorchert in General
Tags: hp