The welcome week: first common events
During the first week of the semester the new students meet each other for the first time and had some social and informative events. The week ended with a hiking tour in the upper Bavarian mountains.
During the first week of the semester the new students meet each other for the first time and had some social and informative events. The week ended with a hiking tour in the upper Bavarian mountains.
In the first two days the students of the Elite Graduate Program "Biomedical Neuroscience" got information about most of the participating institutions. Lectures from different groups were talking about their scientific projects. During these presentations the students met some of the lectures from different institutions and had first insights into the scientific work they performed. This information is very helpful for the students since later, they have to choose scientific groups for their lab internships based on their personal scientific interests. For students that had not yet focused on specific topics the presentations given by the lectures where helpful to spark interest in various fields of the neuroscience research.
This year the career day was focused on the topic “academic careers”. For this event the students from the current as well as from the previous cohort were invited. The latter ones are in the second year of the program and are close to the decision about their future career path. The day started with an introduction to the different PhD programs in natural sciences at the Munich universities by the respective coordinators and speakers. The further sequence followed the steps of a typical academic career: first two PhD students, Ms. Katja Saalbaum and Mr. Tom Schwerd-Kleine, both are graduates of the Elite Master Program Biomedical Neuroscience introduced themselves. They reported their experiences in finding and selecting their PhD positions. After that a group leader and two young professors presented their individual career paths. The career day ended with a forum discussion between the students and the professors. In this discussion it was very important for the students to hear what is important for a successful application for a PhD position.
The so-called “chemical kitchen” project was developed at the Imperial College in London to teach basic laboratory techniques like exact scaling or protein precipitation. Such techniques are also important in cooking. Another analogy of basic laboratory techniques and cooking is the need to follow precisely given instructions. To perform this event, we invited our cooperation partner Mr. Jacub Radzikowski, one of the founders of “chemical kitchen” to Munich. In a rented location the students produced amongst other dishes spaghetti made from Agar and a cheese cake. On the next day we had a hybrid event conducted via zoom by Mr. Jozef Youssef in London. It was an interactive event called “kitchen theory”. Following his explanations and practical instructions the students had a lot of multisensory experiences.
Text: Helmuth Adelsberger, Elite Graduate Program "Biomedical Neuroscience"