Three leading research organizations have joined forces to establish a new institution dedicated to fundamental, curiosity-driven research and scholarly collaboration across geographic and disciplinary boundaries
Founding of the Advanced Research Consortium (ARC): On October 22, 2026, Patrick Cramer, President of the Max Planck Society, hosted an event at the Otto Warburg Haus in Berlin.
© MPG / David Ausserhofer
The Advanced Research Consortium (ARC) will draw on the leadership, legacies, and resources of its three founding partners: the Institute for Advanced Study in the United States, the Max Planck Society for the Advancement of Science in Germany, and the Weizmann Institute of Science in Israel.
The ARC research program will bring together scholars from around the world for periods ranging from a week to one year, giving them the time, space, and resources to work collaboratively on fundamental questions across the natural, exact, and social sciences, as well as the humanities. ARC will reinforce existing networks and create new pathways for collaboration across disciplines and borders, providing the conditions in which new research communities and even new fields of inquiry can emerge.
Exchange of ideas across borders
ARC will develop three programs. The Core Program will support research collaborations lasting up to one year. The Exploratory Program will bring small groups of researchers together for an intensive exchange of ideas, allowing them to test new approaches. And the Postdoctoral Program will give early-career scholars the opportunity to work across disciplines and institutions, advancing their careers and strengthening the cross-border flow of talent and ideas. Together, these programs will create new opportunities for ideas to develop, from first conversations to ambitious, long-term collaborations.
“Collaboration isn’t just ‘nice to have’ – it’s essential if we are to make serious progress on so many important and complex questions,” said Alon Chen, President of the Weizmann Institute of Science. “I couldn’t imagine a better dream team of founding institutions to enable an ambitious project of this scope and I’m excited to see what new ideas and directions will emerge in the years to come.”
“ARC will assemble the intellectual breadth required to explore questions that no single scholar, discipline, or institution could readily address alone,” said Patrick Cramer, President of the Max Planck Society for the Advancement of Science. “We believe it will strengthen international networks and give rise to new research communities.”
“At a time when geopolitical pressures can fragment the global scientific community and the value of fundamental research is increasingly questioned, ARC will affirm the importance of open, independent inquiry across borders,” said David Nirenberg, Director of the Institute for Advanced Study. “Our shared commitment to excellence in research depends on the free exchange of ideas.”
Based in Dahlem, Berlin’s historic center of scientific discovery, ARC will be an independent organization governed by a directorate with faculty representatives from each of the three founding organizations. The inaugural directors are Irit Dinur (Institute for Advanced Study), Nicole Dubilier (Max Planck Society), and Ziv Reich (Weizmann Institute of Science). Rather than building a permanent faculty, ARC will continually renew its research program through the scholars and projects it brings together.
In part because of their respective histories, these institutions have dedicated themselves to the independent pursuit of knowledge at the highest level. They have adopted institutional forms distinct from governmental organizations and from traditional institutions of higher learning.
ARC’s Administrative Director, Alexandra Rosenbach, will oversee ARC’s operations, including the reopening of the historic Otto Warburg House, the research center of the 1931 Nobel laureate that will serve as the principal home for ARC’s research programs.
Union of nations
ARC hosted an opening event in Berlin on October 22, 2026, featuring a panel discussion with Alon Chen, Patrick Cramer, and David Nirenberg. The keynote speaker was Steffen Seibert, Germany’s former ambassador to Israel, who previously headed the Federal Government’s Press and Information Office and served as government spokesperson under Angela Merkel. He echoed Albert Einstein’s call that “institutions which serve the interests of science should be a factor making for the union of nations and men.”
Seibert added: “The three institutions coming together in this Advanced Research Consortium are doing a tremendously Einsteinian thing. At a time when ties are cut, countries are looking inwards, political conflict overshadows, overpowers scientific cooperation – you decide to prove that there is another world besides the one we see on our TV screens and news feeds every day. […] a world of scientists, researchers, seekers of knowledge who fiercely protect their exchanges across borders. And who continue to believe that therein lies the future of humankind.”
