uni.news

» Published on 15. April 2014

Sun protection for algae

Biologists at Bielefeld University discover important molecular mechanism

Researchers at Bielefeld University together with colleagues from Italy and Australia identified a molecular mechanism that microalgae use to protect themselves from damaging environmental stress. According to the researchers, the results of their analysis could be used to speed up the cultivation of algae for the production of valuable products. An advance version of the study is now published online in the internationally renowned journal "Plant Cell".

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» Published on 9. April 2014

Extending the largest radio telescope in the world

Bielefeld University and the University of Hamburg cooperating with the Netherlands Institute for Radio Astronomy – Contract to be signed this Wednesday

Bielefeld University and the University of Hamburg together with the Netherlands Institute for Radio Astronomy ASTRON are setting up a telescope the size of a football pitch. The observation station will be installed in Norderstedt (Schleswig-Holstein). It will link up with the largest radio telescope in the world, the international LOFAR telescope. As a consortium of what will then be 49 stations, LOFAR can produce high-resolution images of extremely distant galaxies. The project partners will meet up at the Hannover Messe 2014 on April 9 to present the project at to sign a cooperation agreement for the new station in Norderstedt. 

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» Published on 8. April 2014

Why auditory pitch and spatial elevation get high together

Researchers uncover why there is a mapping between pitch and elevation 

Have you ever wondered why most natural languages invariably use the same spatial attributes – high versus low – to describe auditory pitch? Or why, throughout the history of musical notation, high notes have been represented high on the staff? According to a team of neuroscientists from Bielefeld University, the Max Planck Institute for Biological Cybernetics in Tübingen and the Bernstein Center Tübingen, high pitched sounds feel ‘high’ because, in our daily lives, sounds coming from high elevations are indeed more likely to be higher in pitch. This study has just appeared in the science journal PNAS.

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» Published on 3. April 2014

Bielefeld’s household robot serves in competition

‘Tobi’ at the German RoboCup competition at Magdeburg

The Bielefeld robot ‘ToBI’ is competing in the ‘RoboCup German open’ in Magdeburg, which is being held from Thursday to Saturday, 3 until 5 April.  During the competition, robots from German and international research institutes will be tested for their skills. There will be football robots, rescue robots and also robots for industrial use, amongst others. The team representing the Cluster of Excellence Cognitive Interaction Technology is entering ‘ToBI’ into the @home league of the competition.

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» Published on 1. April 2014

The Caring Apartment

The Cluster of Excellence CITEC begins large scale project on intelligent apartment 

Researchers from the Cluster of Excellence Cognitive Interaction Technology of Bielefeld University are working on a project to develop a socially competent apartment able to support residents in their everyday lives. This project is one of a kind in Germany. Twelve research groups from the research institute are collaborating on this new large project. CITEC has invested around 1.8 million Euros into the project that will run until 2017. An important component of the intelligent apartment has just arrived: a service robot built by Meka Robotics, a company from San Francisco, USA. This week, it moved into the laboratory apartment in the CITEC building at Campus North. 

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» Published on 1. April 2014

Bielefeld researchers develop software for simulating the human brain

‘Human Brain’ project: Bielefeld University as new partner in EU initiative 

Bielefeld University has become a new partner in the ‘Human Brain’ project financed by the European Union. The aim of this EU flagship project is to integrate all previous findings on the human brain. New computer-based models should then be used to produce a simulation of the human brain. Computer scientists and engineers engaged in the project in Bielefeld are working on models that simulate aspects of the human nervous system in special computers.

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