Max Planck Society convenes in Berlin

Max Planck Society

The organisation’s 73rd Annual Meeting will also see the announcement of the new President-Elect

From June 22 to 23, the research organization’s key decision-making bodies will meet in Berlin. Alongside the Scientific and Supporting Members of the Society, these are the Senate, the Executive Committee, and the Sections, which among other things, discuss the appointment of further Scientific Members. The General Meeting will adopt the Annual Report 2021. The Senate meeting on Thursday is also eagerly awaited: the Chair of the Presidential Search Committee, Andreas Barner, will present the Commission’s proposal for a successor to President Martin Stratmann, who is stepping down from office in June 2023. And there are further highlights in store for the Max Planck community.

Photo for the Annual General Meeting: the silhouette of Berlin

The Max Planck Society’s key decision-making bodies are convening in Berlin. The successor of President Martin Stratmann will also be announced at the Annual Meeting.

© Max Planck Society

The Max Planck Society’s key decision-making bodies are convening in Berlin. The successor of President Martin Stratmann will also be announced at the Annual Meeting.
© Max Planck Society

The plenary assembly will focus on the two Nobel Prizes 2021 to Klaus Hasselmann and Benjamin List. The latter will answer questions from Mai Thi Nguyen-Kim in a live discussion on location. The science journalist, chemist and influencer Nguyen-Kim has been a member of the Senate of the Max Planck Society since 2020.

Kick off with the presentation of the Max Planck Start-up Award of the Stifterverband

Included on the agenda is a special highlight on the evening before the Annual Meeting: the newly established Max Planck Start-up Prize of the Stifterverband, endowed with 50,000 euros, will be presented to the start-up Meshcapade. The company, which was founded in 2018, is a spin-off of the MPI for Intelligent Systems. Its 15-member team led by Naureen Mahmood, co-founder and CEO, and Talha Zaman, co-founder and CFO, develops 3D digital doubles of humans – with promising opportunities not only for the fashion, gaming and film industries, but also for medical and healthcare fields. In a live panel talk, Max Planck President Martin Stratmann, Cornelius Riese, Vice President of the Stifterverband, and Thomas Sattelberger, Commissioner for Transfer and Spin-offs from Science, will take the opportunity of the award ceremony to discuss the topic of technology transfer.

Berlin unites the Max Planck Society’s history and future

“The capital of Berlin has always had a very special significance for the Max Planck Society. It is the founding site of our predecessor organisation, the Kaiser Wilhelm Society, and there are few places in Germany where our historical roots can be felt as strongly as in the Harnack House, our conference venue in Dahlem,” says President Martin Stratmann. The Max Planck Society maintains five Institutes and one research centre at its Berlin location: the scientists at the Max Planck Institute (MPI) for Infection Biology, the MPI for Human Development, the MPI for the History of Science, the Fritz-Haber-Institute the MPI for Molecular Genetics and the Max Planck Research Unit for the Science of Pathogens with the 2020 Nobel Laureate in Chemistry, Emmanuelle Charpentier, help drive the dynamics of research based in the capital.

Note: This article is updated on an ongoing basis.

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