Cluster initiative livMatS in Excellence Competition
Living, Adaptive and Energy-autonomous Materials System (livMatS)
livMatS develops completely novel, bioinspired materials systems that adapt autonomously to various environments and harvest clean energy from their surroundings. The intention of these purely technical – yet in a behavioral sense quasi-living – materials systems is to meet the demands of humans with regard to pioneering environmental and energy technologies. The societal relevance of autonomous systems and their sustainability will thus play an important role in their development.
The research program of livMatS is characterized by highly interdisciplinary collaboration between researchers from a broad range of fields including engineering, chemistry, physics, biology, psychology, the humanities, and sustainability sciences.
livMatS will use the ideas factory IDEASfactory@FIT to implement new forms of scientific exchange and interdisciplinary cooperation. The communication concept “learning from nature in nature” will convey the scientific content at the interface between nature, technology, and society to the general public. livMatS is based on the Freiburg Center for Interactive Materials and Bioinspired Technologies (FIT) and reinforces the university’s strategic alliance with Freiburg’s Fraunhofer Institutes, as exhibited, among other things, in the jointly operated Sustainability Center Freiburg.
livMatS is headed by Prof. Dr. Jürgen Rühe (Faculty of Engineering, Spokesperson), Prof. Dr. Anna Fischer (Faculty of Chemistry and Pharmacy, Vice-Spokesperson), and Prof. Dr. Thomas Speck (Faculty of Biology, Vice-Spokesperson).
The full proposal was submitted in February 2018 and presented in front of an international review panel in Bonn in June 2018. The funding decision will be announced on September 27th 2018.
>> Press Release University of Freiburg: Invitation to submit full proposal
>> Press Release University of Freiburg: Submission of full proposals
Publication of results in Nature Communication