The Bavarian Research Foundation is a foundation of the Free State of Bavaria, which was founded 28 years ago in order to sponsor innovative and application-oriented research and pre-competitive development projects, which are of strategic importance for the development of science and technology in Bavaria. The projects funded by the Bavarian Research Foundation have to be supported jointly by science and economy and primarily conducted in Bavaria. Projects in the fields of life science, information and communication technology, microsystems technology, materials science, energy and environment, mechatronics, nanotechnology as well as process and production technology can receive funding.
Having a broad spectrum of defined key fields, interdisciplinary approaches can be reached and interfaces can be covered allowing the applicant from science and economy to generate and conduct crosscutting projects. Thereby, the Foundation sponsors maximum 50% of the entire costs of the respective projects with a grant, the involved industry partners usually bear the other 50%. New ideas are born through research and when different perspectives come together. This is why the Bavarian Research Foundation also sponsors PhD and postdoc scholarships as well as short-term mutual stays of scientists in partner labs in close connection to the projects. A broad international networking strengthens the visibility. In Bavaria, the strategic partnership AWARE of Technische Hochschule Ingolstadt (THI) is an excellent example for that. During its 6-years funding by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF), it has become especially visible, that regional anchoring and international engagement are not contradictory. On the contrary, they can bring benefits to everybody involved if well cross linked: It is almost ten years ago when two professors of the Federal University of Paraná UFPR visited the Bavarian Research Foundation with their colleagues
from Ingolstadt and presented their research activities. Topic of the talks was also the public-law foundation system in Bavaria and in the Southern Brazilian Federal State of Paraná.
We are glad, that one of these professors of UFPR returned to Bavaria in the frame of a longer-term stay and is doing his research at THI: He will be establishing a German-Brazilian research group within the next years at the research and test center CARISSMA. The group will be dealing with questions of environment sensing via radar, Lidar and other sensors (see page 130/131). The Bavarian Research Foundation, too, benefits from the networking. In 2016, an exchange on prioritization and impact control of regional innovation promotion took place with the Brazilian Institute for Applied Economic Research Ipea.
Prof. Dr. Dr. h.c. (NAS RA) Arndt Bode
President