University’s President Prof. Dr. Karl-Joachim Ebeling presented the certificate of appointment to Professor Nakauchi during the grand opening of the Graduate School’s annual Fall Meeting. Professor Nakauchi's lecture during the opening ceremony was about stem cells and their future therapeutic potentials. The expert for stem-cells is not only going to establish a new research-group, he will also offer additional seminars for the PhD-students in Molecular Medicine.
Scientists at Ulm University believe that Nakauchi’s commitment will support their reapplication for the second round of the German Universities Excellence Initiative next year. Dr. Dieter Brockmann, managing director of the Graduate School, stresses that Baden-Württemberg’s program for visiting professors has been established in order to endorse such applications. “The program pays for half of Nakauchi’s stay and the Graduate School bears the rest of the expenses”, adds the spokesman, Professor Michael Kühl. Both researchers are convinced that the successful PhD-program of the Graduate School will profit from the visiting professor. The Director of the Institute of Molecular Medicine, Professor Karl Lenhard Rudolph, is delighted as well because Nakauchi’s research-group will be annexed to his team. Rudolph, who received the prestigious Leibniz price last year, suggested offering the visiting professorship to Nakauchi. “He is one of the leading scientists in the field of stem-cell research and will enrich Ulm University in the fields of stem-cells research, ageing and the origin of cancer”, emphasizes Rudolph who is also expecting strong impulses for other research-groups: “Nakauchi’s visit means a further concentration of expertise in Ulm”, even more because the visiting professor is going to bring experts for the purification of stem-cells to Germany “which is necessary to conduct research on adult stem-cells.” Besides the obvious advantages for the international Graduate School, the university’s President is hoping for positive impulses for the whole university and its research profile for example for a requested “Sonderforschungsbereich” (collaborative research center). “I am convinced that Nakauchi’s visit will increase our chances.”