Start-up Cerebri GmbH - 05/08/2024

Comprehensive EEG supply thanks to telemedicine

Fewer and fewer patients are getting timely access to electroencephalograms, as the process of measuring brain activity and interpreting the results requires specific expertise. Cerebri GmbH, a newly established Tübingen-based company, aims to address this issue by offering user-friendly EEG caps and providing rapid, location-independent and top-tier diagnostics by experts.

Innovations in the field of endoscopy - 08/06/2020

Gastroscopies with pill cameras

A pill camera to examine the gastrointestinal tract that can be swallowed without major difficulty, controlled intuitively from the outside and deliver images in real time - why would any doctor or patient say no? To non-experts, it sounds more like science fiction but such a device is actually already in development: since 2019, Tübingen-based Ovesco Endoscopy AG and three partners have been working together on this in a project called nuEndo.

High-resolution microscopy technology bypassing the diffraction limit - 26/10/2023

From micro- to nanoscope

It has long been impossible to distinguish objects closer than 200 nanometres using light microscopes. However, novel devices developed by a company called abberior Instruments GmbH, which use technology developed by Nobel Prize winner Prof. Dr. Stefan Hell and his teams in Heidelberg and Göttingen, are now able to bypass this resolution limit and provide detailed insights into living cells in the lower nanometre range.

Scientists from the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) and the German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ) have developed an AI model that assesses the long-term individual risk for more than 1,000 diseases. The model, which was trained and tested using anonymized medical data from the UK and Denmark, can predict health events over a period of more than a decade.

Hummingbird Diagnostics GmbH, a pioneer in harnessing blood-based small RNAs for early disease detection and characterization, today announced the publication of a new study in Nature Communications Medicine introducing an Oxford Nanopore Technologies (ONT)-based method for detecting small RNA modifications in blood.

In a study, a team of researchers show that groups of magnetic microrobots can generate fluidic forces strong enough to rotate objects in different directions without touching them. These microrobot swarms can turn gear systems, rotate objects much larger than the robots themselves, assemble structures on their own, and even pull in or push away many small objects. The work was now published in Science Advances.

Vicinity Bio: Optimisation of cancer diagnostics - 27/11/2024

Comprehensive histological diagnostics through high-dimensional imaging and artificial intelligence

Microscopic examination of tissue samples is essential, particularly in tumour diagnostics. The Tübingen-based company Vicinity Bio leverages cutting-edge imaging technologies combined with machine learning to generate comprehensive datasets of individual cells from tissue sections. This approach not only helps identify more targeted therapies but also enhances our understanding of cellular functions and processes within tissues and tumours.

Workplace of the future - 10/08/2021

Intelligent body support system for surgery staff

Operating room staff often spend hours in strenuous postures, which has a significant impact on concentration and quality of work. While operating room equipment is increasingly networked, state-of-the-art medical technology, conditions for operating room staff trail way behind. The start-up company Hellstern medical offers an effective solution for serious pain, fatigue and incorrect interventions.

With clinical medicine and medical technology Heidelberg University is again among the best players in Medical Sciences worldwide. In the Global Ranking of Academic Subjects 2026 clinical medicine rose by one place over last year to rank 17th internationally in clinical medicine and so leads the field in Germany. Medical technology is in 21st place internationally and continues to be ranked third in Germany.

Genome duplication probably gave biodiversity a decisive evolutionary boost. A Chinese-German research team led by Axel Meyer from the University of Konstanz has now investigated the early phases of the process known as re-diploidization. The results show that the fusion of chromosome sets is asynchronous.

Microfluidics in medical technology - 24/03/2021

Ultra-compact: valves with shape memory actuators

Karlsruhe-based company memetis shows that this is possible. Intelligent components for controlling fluids open up huge potential in the medical technology and biotechnology sectors - from vaccine development and cell line analysis to drug research and point-of-care solutions.

Working with a new Emmy Noether Group, Dr. Pascal Schlosser is investigating how machine learning can aid in understanding the complex relationships between genes, proteins, and diseases.

Collagen has been used in ophthalmology since the 1990s, particularly in the treatment of corneal defects. However, why and how this technique works was only known in theory. Researchers at the NMI Natural and Medical Sciences Institute in Reutlingen led by Lu Fan have found the necessary evidence and can now reliably explain how this technique works.

Dr Simon Binder has been awarded a five-year, 1.5 million euro grant from the Carl Zeiss Foundation for his research into novel neuroimplants. Binder will establish the early career research group ‘Biohybrid Neuroimplants based on Soft Hydrogel Electrodes’ at the University of Freiburg. It is affiliated with the research institutions BrainLinks-BrainTools.

On May 9, 2025, representatives from the life sciences industry in North Carolina and Baden-Württemberg met in Stuttgart for professional exchange. The goal of the event was to explore opportunities for collaboration in biotechnology, medical technology, and pharmaceutical research.

Microstructure Technology - 17/07/2020

An electronic nose for many applications

Sensory organs are sophisticated masterpieces of nature. That is why humans have often tried to copy them. Be it cameras or microphones - there are technical objects that have always been based on natural models such as the eye or the ear. For a long time, however, no artificial sense of smell has featured in the technical repertoire. Now researchers at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) have developed an electronic nose. It can…

Pipetting robot for academic research - 28/08/2024

goodBot GmbH: a third arm for researchers

Repetitive tasks that researchers have to conduct in the lab tend to be tiring and often lead to errors. Precise pipetting is crucial for achieving reproducible results. Automation is underrepresented in research labs and existing pipetting robots are unsuitable for scientists. This is why Dr. Julius Wiener, Tobias Zundel and Oliver Brunner decided to found the company goodBot GmbH and develop a pipetting robot tailored to academic research.

A cutting-edge chemical process is the first to make it possible to quickly and easily produce modified peptides with boronic acids. As part of this work, scientists managed to synthesize a large number of different biologically active peptide boronic acids and investigate their properties. They open up new possibilities in the young research field of synthetic immunology and could go on to be used primarily in immunotherapy.

CELLnROLL is a spin-off from the Max Planck Institute for Intelligent Systems. The newly founded company develops a high-precision microrobotic-based cell sorting system to help clinicians make fast, affordable, and informed decisions for cancer diagnostics. Now, the project has received €865,000 in funding through the EXIST Transfer of Research program, a funding program initiated by the German Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy.

With its Vivalytic analysis platform, Bosch has set itself the goal of making fast and highly precise diagnostics accessible at the point of care – and aims to use molecular diagnostics to become a leading provider in the market by 2030. To achieve this, Bosch has now agreed on a strategic partnership with Randox Laboratories Ltd., a leading diagnostic and medical technology company.

Through the Endeavour Awards, the Mark Foundation supports research projects that bring together scientists from different disciplines to advance the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of cancer. One of the only four Endeavour Awards presented this year goes to a project coordinated by scientists from the German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ).

How can the transformation to increase sustainability in hospitals succeed? Participants in the SustainMed project presented their answers at the closing event on 27 June 2025 in Stuttgart. The Ministry of the Environment, Climate Protection and the Energy Sector Baden-Württemberg provided approximately 500,000 euros in funding to develop solutions for goals such as reducing volumes of waste in hospitals.

Joint press release of the Heidelberg Faculty of Medicine at Heidelberg University and the German Center for Infection Research: With the FDA approval of Hepcludex (bulevirtide), a therapy for chronic hepatitis D developed at the Heidelberg Faculty of Medicine at Heidelberg University, Heidelberg University Hospital, and the German Center for Infection Research (DZIF) has now reached the world’s most important pharmaceutical market.