Far too much red tape hampers careers and research projects and obstructs cooperation between university and industry, he says. No wonder many young and promising scientists choose to go to the United States, usually on a one-way trip.
Abstract
Germany's federal research ministry has initiated a program that provides independent funding for its country's young scientists in an effort to stem the flow of promising researchers to the United States. Although a coalition of Social Democrats and the Green party took power last month, the BioFuture program will continue unchanged.
Facing the dominance of scientists from the United States among this year's winners of the Nobel Prize, Klaus Landfried is dissatisfied." Scientists are not hatched properly in Germany," complains the president of the Hochschulrektorenkonferenz, a union of 257 German universities. "Above all, top-ranking scientists face too many unnecessary hurdles in this country."
Far too much red tape hampers careers and research projects and obstructs cooperation between university and industry, he says. No wonder many young and promising scientists choose to go to the United States, usually on a one-way trip.
Germany's innovative federal research ministry, the Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung (BMBF), has tried its best to make Germany attractive again to top scientists. As one of the most important fields for global competition, biotechnology has been the primary focus of the ministry's efforts. When Jürgen Rüttgers took over as research secretary in 1994, he publicly declared his aim to make Germany the leading European biotech nation by the year 2000.
Industry sources acknowledge that this could well be achieved. A program called BioRegio has sought to encourage biotechnology research and development at the regional level. Since 1995, when the program started, it has attracted entries from 17 regions and led to a founding wave of biotechnology companies; more than 285 million euros in private venture capital were raised, and from 1996 to 1997 the number of entrepreneurial biotech companies doubled.
In April 1998, BMBF started the BioFuture competition to encourage young molecular biologists to set up research groups in German institutions. "It will ensure that for the first time, outstanding young scientists can independently apply for public grants," Rüttgers explains. "The second aim is fundamental innovation. I want to see us promoting pure research in a way that generates new impulses for the development of the life sciences and their applications."
A grant will make it possible for young scientists to head their own independent research teams at German universities or research institutes. As a condition of the grant, applicants must have a doctorate degree or be qualified as a university lecturer, and they should have at least some experience in heading a research team. Nationality, however, is not important. "Success will depend only on the quality of the project," Rüttgers states.
Nine team leaders have already been chosen from more than 200 applicants; most of the projects fall into cutting-edge fields of molecular biology. For example, 39-year-old biophysicist Frank Bier, of Potsdam University, plans to design microstructures on chips with biochemical tools. "We will try to put DNA strands across chip structures so that we can add other molecules to form ordered nanoscale structures," he says. "This could be useful to design very tiny switches, memory modules, etc., for analytical applications or sensors or in information technology."
Three team leaders who work in the field of evolutionary biotechnology will return to Germany from the United States to start their projects. Andreas Schwienhorst wrote his thesis in the evolutionary biotechnology group of German Nobel Prize winner Manfred Eigen; he plans a project to screen for new lead structures and biocatalysts in microstructures. Petra Schwille, who did her thesis in the same lab, wants to establish new ways to identify and select single biomolecules that can then be optimized according to the principles of evolutionary biotechnology. Thomas Tuschl, currently at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, will develop combinatorial biology methods to study the processing of pre-RNA in humans, a central feature in the regulation of gene expression with potential therapeutic applications in several hereditary diseases.
Neurodegenerative diseases will be addressed by two other researchers. Erich Wanker, formerly holder of an Erwin Schroedinger Scholarship at the University of California at Los Angeles and currently head of the group studying Huntington's disease in Hans Lehrach's department at the Max Planck Institute for Molecular Genetics, aims to inhibit amyloid formation in Huntington's disease. Horst Simon, now at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies, will return to Germany to identify genes involved in the survival of certain neurons in the brain that might be important for the understanding and therapy of Parkinson's disease.
An entirely different field is being explored by Roland Strauss, of the Max Planck Institute for Biological Cybernetics. His group will study the motion of insects and try to transfer the findings to robots to make automated devices more autonomous.
The winners all stress that BioFuture has given them their only chance to build an independent research group of their own. "The conditions are excellent and even in the U.S. can be found only at elite universities," Tuschl says. "Besides, I am glad that I don't have to spend a third of my time in the U.S. anymore just to write new
research proposals for German funding institutions."
Without BioFuture, Tuschl and most of the other winners would have stayed in the United States. "I guess most of the German postdocs who went to the U.S. would prefer to go back to Germany because of family and cultural ties," Simon notes. "The main reason they stay is the unbelievable encrustation of the powerful institutions in the German science funding system."
To apply, scientists do not have to write the 100-plus pages of elaborate research proposals that are customary in Germany. Instead, they are asked to provide a project outline not longer than five pages. BioFuture's focus is on topics on the frontiers of biology and its neighboring disciplines - chemistry, nanotechnology, engineering sciences,
and even mathematics.
"The main purpose of the grant," explains Ekkehard Warmuth, head of BMBF's biological research and technology division, "is to infuse fresh blood into basic bioscience research in Germany." Applicants who fail to win one of the grants need not despair: "We'll ask them whether they think their proposal is suitable for an industry cooperation and assist them to find a project partner willing to provide financing," Warmuth promises.
The jury, consisting of 10 biotechnology experts from German research institutions and companies like Merck KgaA and Roche Boehringer Mannheim Diagnostics, chooses the winners based on originality and on the expected contribution of the proposed project to the field. The qualifications and suitability of the applicant as project leader also will be taken into account. After a preliminary selection process, candidates are invited to submit a formal application.
The competition will select 50 teams of scientists to receive 150 million deutsche marks in priority funding over a five-year period. Successful applicants will receive public-sector grants covering personnel costs of the team leader, up to two postdocs, one or two doctoral students, and one or two technicians. Grants will also cover equipment and other materials. The selection of the 50 winners will be done in three phases, and applications for the last round can be filed until January 15, 1999.
Apart from BioFuture, junior scientists cannot apply for research projects of their own; they must channel applications through the usual institutional jungle, where influential names, protection, and formal criteria are much more important than good ideas. Hence, the brain drain out of Germany continues.
"That's what we have got to change," Warmuth admits. "BioFuture is the first step to enhance career outlooks for young scientists so that their innovative potential and valuable know-how remain at home."
Ludger Wess is a molecular biologist who has been a freelance science writer for almost ten years. He covers biotechnology for German, Swiss, and U.S. media.
Endlinks
European Life Sciences Entrepreneur of the Year 1998 - a speech by the German federal minister of education, science, research, and technology, announcing the BioFuture initiative.
Migration of Foreign Scientists and Engineers to the United States - summarizes a workshop examining the related policy, labor market, and productivity issues.
USACM: Federal Funding for Scientific Research - list of current bills, reports, and essays on the allocation of federal funds for science and technology in the United States.
Science's Next Wave - career advice for the "next generation" of scientists. Maintained by the American Association for the Advancement of Science.
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