Professor Schüth, you are a Max Planck director in your main job, and you also hold numerous honorary positions. Do you know off the top of your head how many there are?
There are actually quite a few, but I don’t have the exact number at hand. The roles are very different, also in terms of the time required. It ranges from 80 percent of my working hours in the years as Vice President of the Max Planck Society to a two-hour meeting every few years in smaller committees. 

A few months ago, I took on another role: that of Vice President and incoming President of the GDNÄ. What motivates you to get involved with the GDNÄ? 
I like the breadth of topics it covers. The GDNÄ shows how different areas of science interact – this is not so clearly visible in other societies. When I was asked whether I would like to take on the role, I only had to think about it briefly before saying yes. The presidency begins gently with two years as vice president and ends just as gently – that makes a lot of things easier.

 © Isabel Schiffhorst für MPI für Kohleforschung

Main entrance to the Max Planck Institute for Coal Research in Mülheim an der Ruhr.

How do you intend to proceed as a new member of the presidium? 
First of all, I will take a close look at everything and support what is going well. One example is the new GDNÄ junior organisation, the jGDNÄ. I think it’s great that it exists now and that it is absolutely in keeping with the times. Similar developments can be seen in other scientific societies – I am thinking, for example, of the young chemists’ forums of the German Chemical Society, which practically every local section now has. What is important is that young members are given the freedom to create something themselves. 

What priorities would you like to set in the future? 
The effect of science on society seems to me to be increasingly interesting and important. What do citizens think about science and research, what do they get out of it and what can we scientists offer them? In my opinion, the GDNÄ is a good forum for such questions and for exchanging ideas with the public. 

How can this be achieved?
Perhaps in the future we should involve the social sciences, humanities and arts more closely, at least selectively. I am currently experiencing how helpful this can be at the Leopoldina, where I am participating in a focus group on climate and energy. We natural and technical scientists in the group benefit greatly from the expertise of the economists who are also involved. They help us to develop business models for our great ideas. Because if it doesn’t pay off, you can forget it – that’s an important insight that I’ve gained over many years of work. Economic expertise, for example, could also enrich the GDNÄ, for example in individual topics at the meetings. Nevertheless, it would retain its character as a scientific society. 

© Frank Vinken für MPI für Kohleforschung

A scientific society that engages in dialogue with the public…
…yes, and that is strength of the GDNÄ, which we can further expand. There is a great need for communication, because on the one hand science is more important than ever, but on the other hand society trusts it less than it did 20 or 30 years ago. Today there are alternative facts and lateral thinkers with whom a reasonable conversation is hardly possible. As scientists, we have to justify our work more than we used to and explain more precisely what science can and cannot do. The GDNÄ is a very good platform for this. 

Political issues are currently dominating public discourse. This also includes the anti-scientific behaviour of the Trump administration. Should Germany take the opportunity, as some suggest, to specifically poach US scientists? 
We should signal our willingness to accept them and show them the options available in Germany. I don’t think it’s the right approach to aggressively encourage American scientists to leave their country.

Is your institute affected by current US policy?
Yes, the consequences are noticeable. For decades, we were able to send our postdocs to the US for a few years of research without any problems. This is difficult at present because many US research institutions are uncertain and do not know what will happen tomorrow. “Get back to us in a few months” is often the response to our inquiries now.

© Frank Vinken / MPG

The grinding process in a ball mill activates a catalyst in such a way that it mediates the synthesis of ammonia at a much lower temperature and pressure than is necessary in the established Haber-Bosch process.

Your current research work is about the energy of tomorrow. It is in this context that mechanocatalysis should be seen, and last year you were able to obtain a 2.5 million euro Advanced Grant from the European Research Council (ERC) for research into this area. What are you planning to do with it? 
We want to understand the fundamental processes in mechanochemistry at the molecular level. We carry out our mechanochemical reactions in ball mills. These reactions take place at room temperature and normal pressure, for which several hundred degrees and hundreds of bar of pressure are otherwise required. The new approach saves resources, time and costs. My research group has already realised exciting projects with this concept, for example the synthesis of ammonia. A detailed understanding of the process could enable the production of completely new materials. However, this is not part of the ERC project, and the clarification of the processes is initially pure basic research. Nevertheless, my department is currently preparing to establish several start-up companies based on the knowledge gained.

 Let’s take a look at your background: you studied chemistry and law, an unusual combination of subjects. How did that come about?
Most chemists go into industry after graduating, so I thought that an additional law degree wouldn’t be a bad idea. Lawyers think differently, and that interested me. When I failed the first exam three times, I was seized by anger and wanted to prove that I could do it. Anger is a good motivator. My career then took a different path, but my knowledge of law helped me later when I founded our company hte. 

You are celebrating your 65th birthday this year. For many working people, that’s a turning point in life. How about you?
I plan to retire at the age of 68, which is the retirement age possible for Max Planck directors without major hurdles. That would be almost two years later than the regular retirement age. By then, we are talking about 2028, the doctoral projects in my field should be completed, and the ERC project will also be running until then – with me spending a few months in my emeritus workplace. I am looking forward to the new freedoms of retirement. I will write books, perhaps starting with a book about energy. And I want to hike across Germany, once from north to south.

Professor Kohse-Höinghaus, we are taking International Women’s Day on 8 March as an opportunity to talk about your recently published autobiography. In it, you describe your path as a woman in a technical field, as the subtitle says. Do you see yourself as a pioneer?
Yes, definitely. For a long time, there were hardly any women in physical chemistry and especially in research on combustion processes. When I started at the German Aerospace Center (DLR) in Stuttgart in 1979 as a newly graduated chemist, I was the only woman scientist there. At first, I was eyed sceptically, but then I was accepted. Later, when I applied for professorships, I learned behind closed doors that they were looking for an established man for the position. And not a young mother with a baby and a husband with his own career, as was the case with me. Fortunately, this changed and women were increasingly recognised in my discipline as well. 

How did that become noticeable?
To give an example, condescending behaviour towards female colleagues became increasingly rare. For me personally, there were two events that made me feel I had arrived: in 2007, I was the first woman to be appointed chair of the German Bunsen Society, and in 2012, I was the first woman to be elected president of the Combustion Institute, the leading international professional society, for a four-year term. Both of these achievements have also paved the way for other female scientists. 

Who is your book aimed at?
Above all, for young people who are pursuing a career in science. I want to show them, using my example, how winding career paths can be and encourage them to follow their own compass. But in principle, anyone who is interested in the development of science and technology over the last fifty years can benefit from the book. It is richly illustrated and I have tried to write in a way that is easy to understand, entertaining and vivid. That’s another reason why I think the volume would make a good gift or prize for special achievements.

 © from the book “Burning for Science”

Doctorate in 1978, here with supervisor Professor Friedrich Stuhl.

You wrote the book in English. Why not in German?
English is the global language of science today and my academic network is international. I want my colleagues around the world to be able to read the book easily. Young people are familiar with English anyway, so I don’t see any problems there. 

That wasn’t the case when you were young. And it wasn’t foreseeable back then that you would become a professor of physical chemistry.
That’s right. I grew up in the Ruhr area in a family of teachers, and my parents weren’t thrilled when I wanted to study chemistry. Would you even be able to find a husband with a degree like that? Today it’s hard to imagine, but back then people worried about things like that. It wasn’t easy for me at university either. I came from a grammar school that specialised in modern languages, had deficits in maths and physics and had to catch up on a lot during the first semesters at the University of Bochum. I often set three alarm clocks to make sure I didn’t miss a course. It was exhausting, but also a good time with a lot of freedom. 

Can you give us an example?
The first thing that comes to mind is how I built a laser at the end of the 1970s that was important for my doctorate in atmospheric chemistry. A lot was happening in this field of research in the 1970s and there was a great deal of public interest in it. The background to this was the increasing air pollution, especially in the Ruhr area. For my laser, I had to delve deeply into physics, which I really enjoyed. My doctoral supervisor Friedrich Stuhl spent a research semester in the US during that time. When he came back, I was able to hand him my completed dissertation. 

Now the big wide world of science was open to you. Which stations were decisive for you?
I got my first permanent position in 1979 at the DLR in Stuttgart. I had already said goodbye to atmospheric chemistry – now I wanted to find out where air pollution actually came from and what could be done about it. So, scientifically, I had switched to combustion research and at the DLR I was able to examine such high-temperature processes in detail using laser spectroscopy.

© from the book “Burning for Science”

A permanent research position at the age of 27 – that’s what many young researchers dream of today.
I was also very happy to receive the offer from Stuttgart back then. I had good working conditions, great colleagues and a secure income there, but after a while I needed new challenges. In 1987, I then moved to California with my husband Klaus for a good year to do research at Stanford. There I learned a lot about mechanical engineering and molecular spectroscopy, and both opened up new horizons for me in combustion research. During this time, I made many new friends who are still important parts of my professional network today. 

Many young female scientists are not accompanied by their partners on a year abroad, but the opposite is often the case. How come your husband travelled with you?
We had already had a long-distance relationship for a few years and didn’t want to repeat that. So my husband, who is a doctor, took unpaid leave from a clinic in Stuttgart and applied for and received a scholarship. We were both kept very busy and in 1988 we returned to our institutes in Stuttgart full of fresh ideas and energy. 

Two years later, in the summer of 1990, your daughter was born. At that time, there was neither a parental allowance nor the right to a day care place. How did the dual-career couple Kohse-Höinghaus fare during this phase?
It was a period of upheaval in every respect. I was aiming for a professorship at a university so that I could pursue my own research interests and work more with young people. My husband was looking for a leading position in a clinic, which he eventually found in Oldenburg. In 1992, parallel to my work as a group leader at the DLR, I was able to habilitate at the University of Stuttgart, as the first woman in the faculty. It was a turbulent time, which Klaus and I survived thanks to our solidarity, with moral support from relatives and friends, as well as private childcare and a housekeeper. Since then, Oldenburg has been the centre of our lives. From there, I regularly commuted to the University of Bielefeld, where I had been appointed to the Chair of Physical Chemistry in 1994. My husband and I shared the family work, and our daughter was well looked after. Nevertheless, some people couldn’t stop calling me a bad mother. 

Do you see yourself as a role model for young women today who want to combine research and family? 
Yes and no. Today, there is more state support for young families. The climate in terms of equal opportunities has also changed significantly in research funding and appointments. Many universities and research institutions make it easier to combine two careers and a family with dual-career strategies. However, it is still a balancing act that requires a great deal of commitment. In an experimental subject like chemistry, it can help to avoid laboratory-intensive periods when you are pregnant. And it is not only when the children are small that you need a lot of support and preparation for any eventuality – but that applies equally to other professions. However, especially in an international context, I realise that many young women today still face similar difficulties to those I faced more than 30 years ago.

© from the book “Burning for Science”

Today you mentor young people. Did you have something like that in your career?
No, and I missed that very much. That’s why I always tried to support younger generations with advice and practical help. As a senior professor, I still maintain contact with more than a hundred scientists who have worked with me. The teutolab is another example of mentoring in the broader sense. I founded the Bielefeld-based hands-on laboratory as one of the very first such extracurricular learning centres to inspire children and young people to take an interest in the natural sciences. The corresponding federal association, which we helped to establish in Bielefeld, is now 20 years old, and this year we are celebrating the 25th anniversary of the teutolab. 

You are still active as a senior professor. How can we picture your activities?
I sit at my desk a lot and I travel a lot. At my desk, I work on lectures, professional articles or scientific statements for academies and scientific organisations. In the last two years, I have been intensively involved in working on my autobiography. As a scientist with an extensive network and long-standing connections abroad, I am often on the road, for example in China. I think it is very important to maintain contacts there despite political tensions, especially with young scientists. Without China, there is no solution to some of the global problems of our time – we have to work together. 

One of these problems is climate change, which is largely due to the combustion of fossil fuels. Has this not made you doubt your field of expertise?
Absolutely not. We have to give up burning fossil fuels, but not combustion research. This is because it provides the scientific basis we need to develop climate-neutral fuels for industry and transport. Combustion research also provides us with the tools to better fight major fires, whether in the wild or in cities. With my research, I have been able to contribute to our understanding of the complex chemical reactions that take place in high-temperature processes and to identify ways to avoid pollutants. And that makes me feel good.

What has been achieved, what lies ahead? After two years as GDNÄ President, Heribert Hofer looks back – and forward to exciting times with the young GDNÄ. 

Professor Hofer, your term of office as President of the GDNÄ is coming to an end. How do you look back?
With a good feeling. I overcame the initial shyness I felt in the face of the GDNÄ’s great history. The positive response at the meeting in Potsdam, whose scientific program was developed during my term of office, contributed to this. Today, more than ever, I am convinced that the GDNÄ is on the right track with its concerns and is filling a gap in the science system. Just think of the unique combination of personal, interdisciplinary exchange that we cultivate at our meetings, or of the programmes to promote young talent. 

You have been involved in the GDNA’s student programme for many years and have created the popular science slam format “Science in 5 Minutes”. Do you feel that the founding of the Young GDNÄ a few weeks ago in Potsdam was the crowning glory of your term in office?
“Crowning glory” is perhaps a bit much; I would rather speak of a highlight. With the Young GDNÄ, we are giving young people significantly more of a say and more opportunities to shape our society. This was evident in Potsdam, for example, in the many panel discussions in which young people discussed issues with established scientists on an equal footing. The format was so well received by the audience that we want to keep it in the future.

© MIKA-fotografie | Berlin

Right in the thick of it: Professor Heribert Hofer at the GDNÄ conference 2024 in Potsdam.

Until now, there was the student program, but now there is almost always talk of the Junge GDNÄ. How are the two related?
The former student program has been incorporated into the Junge GDNÄ. It includes not only high school students, but also university students and young professionals. The age range is therefore much broader than in the student programme, stretching from 17 to around 32 years of age. The Young GDNÄ are young people with excellent grades in science and medicine who are keen to get involved in the GDNÄ. 

How do the young talents react to the offer?
They are incredibly pleased about the interest of established scientists in them. Many of them come to our meetings with the idea that the older ones are not interested in them – a realisation that has amazed me again and again in recent years. With the Young GDNÄ, we welcome the young people with open arms – and they think that’s great. There are already a lot of suggestions and requests. This became clear at a recent strategy meeting, which was attended by three elected representatives of the Young GDNÄ, in addition to the GDNÄ board. 

What do young women and men want from the GDNÄ?
For example, interesting offers between the meetings, opportunities for personal exchange at the local level and with established GDNÄ members. 

What are the next steps?
A meeting of the Young GDNÄ is planned for next year, when there will be no large GDNÄ meeting. The meeting will serve to promote internal networking and strategic discussion. We also want to establish local groups in which GDNÄ members of all ages can come together to discuss and support each other. The first steps in this direction were taken in 2018 by the then president Wolfgang Wahlster, but understandably this initiative has been dormant during the pandemic years. It is also conceivable that interesting events could be organised, such as guided tours of institutes or companies. We will probably start in a few university towns and expand our network of local groups step by step. The first groups are expected to be up and running in about six months.

© MIKA-fotografie | Berlin

“Sharing knowledge means multiplying knowledge” is written on the T-shirt that GDNÄ President Heribert Hofer was presented with by Secretary General Michael Dröscher at the end of the 133rd Assembly in Potsdam.

You are outlining a cross-generational project. Will the older GDNÄ members play along?
I am quite confident. The contributions of the young GDNÄ are very well received at the meetings, both by the speakers and the audience. And in many conversations with established members, I have sensed a great willingness to get involved in promoting young talent.

 The project requires a lot of coordination: Who pulls the strings in the GDNÄ?
As the future vice president, I will take on this task for two years. We have agreed on this in the board. It will be a lot of work, but I am looking forward to it. 

You may soon have a little more time for such projects.
That’s right. I will reach retirement age at the end of March 2025, which means that my term of office as director of the Leibniz Institute for Zoo and Wildlife Research will come to an end. My regular professorship in this field at Freie Universität Berlin will also expire at that time. Although I will continue to work at my university as a senior professor, my workload will be significantly reduced. This will give me more time for the GDNÄ. 

And what about your spectacular hyena research in the Serengeti?
I will definitely continue with that. Not necessarily on site in Tanzania, as others are now taking over that role, in particular Sarah Benhaiem, to whom I have handed over the project. But in the 37 years of my hyena research, a large amount of data has been collected that is waiting to be evaluated and published. That will easily keep me busy for five years.

Professor von Engelhardt, your 670-page book “Goethe as a Natural Scientist in the Opinion of 19th Century Scientists and Doctors” was recently published. You are the editor of the book. What inspired you to do this work?
I have been studying Goethe and his relationship with science and medicine around 1800 for decades. During my research, I noticed that the German and international reception of Goethe as a natural scientist in the natural sciences and medicine of the 19th century was not dealt with in research, with a few exceptions. This prompted me to address this reception and to document it with selected texts, some of which were found in remote locations. The 670 pages are due to the abundance of remarkable essays.

Who is this volume aimed at?
The work is aimed at Goethe researchers, historians of science and medicine, and anyone interested in Goethe’s contributions to the natural sciences and medicine.

What criteria did you use to select the articles?
The 48 essays by scientists, many of whom were members of the Society of German Natural Scientists and Physicians, are intended to provide a representative international impression of the reception of the natural sciences and medicine in the 19th century. For reasons of space, I had to dispense with extensive monographic presentations, which I mention in the detailed introduction, and which are listed in the complete bibliography of 240 texts.

The volume contains texts in German, English, French, Italian, Spanish and Dutch. Why did you decide on the original languages?
I wanted to give an authentic impression in the languages that Goethe also understood. In addition, this approach allows foreign quotations to be cited directly from the texts and referenced bibliographically. Nowadays, anyone who wants translations can easily do so using the appropriate software.

© SUB Göttingen Cod. Ms. Lichtenberg VI, 44.

Goethe considered his theory of colors, symbolized in the color wheel, to be his most important work.

Which texts would you recommend to the reader in a hurry? 
For readers in a hurry, I would particularly recommend the articles by Carl Gustav Carus (first published in 1843), Hermann von Helmholtz (1853), Rudolf Virchow (1861), Emil Du Bois-Reymond (1882) and Ernst Haeckel (1882) – all of whom were members of the GDNÄ. Among the foreign texts, the remarks of Ernest Faivre (1859), François-Louis Hahn (1883), François-Jules Pictet (1838) and John Tyndall (1880) deserve special attention. The chapter on the English biologist Thomas Henry Huxley is also very impressive – he was awarded an honorary membership of the GDNÄ at the 1877 meeting in Munich. Huxley opened the first issue of the now internationally authoritative science magazine Nature, published in 1869, with Goethe’s Aphorisms on Nature (see margin). 

Intermaxillary bone, theory of colours, archetypal plant: the naturalist Goethe was involved in an impressive number of scientific topics. How did this come about? 
Throughout his life, inorganic and organic nature, its phenomena, processes and developments were of great interest to Goethe – as such, but also in connection with science, art and human life. “Experience, observation, conclusions – connected by life events” – this is how he described his method in natural research. For Goethe, colours are not only mathematical and physical phenomena; for him, they also have ethical, psychological and cultural-historical meanings. The phenomenon of metamorphosis applies to plants and animals: “The doctrine of metamorphosis is the key to all signs of nature,” as stated in a posthumous text called Morphology. Goethe also published numerous scientific-theoretical writings, including The Experiment as Mediator between Object and Subject or Inventing and Discovering or Analysing and Discovering. Goethe’s scientific writings comprise eleven volumes in the Leopoldina’s critical scientific edition. 

Goethe was a poet and a naturalist: did the one influence the other? 
Despite all the differences, of which Goethe repeatedly reminds us, the connection between the two, or rather the four cultures, was extremely important to him. What is meant here is the cultures of the natural sciences, the humanities, the arts and life. This connection can be seen in both Goethe’s scientific and literary texts, as well as in his autobiographical writings Poetry and Truth or Italian Journey. One literary example is the novel The Elective Affinities, which corresponds with contemporary chemistry in both title and content and interprets the relationships between elements in analogy to the relationships between people. However, Goethe explicitly points out that people have the freedom and responsibility to resist sensual attractions. In his Theory of Colours, Goethe developed numerous ideas about the theory and practice of colours in painting. And the law of the primal plant, as Goethe recognised in Italy, “can be applied to everything that lives”.

© Frithjof Spangenberg, Illustrationen & Kommunikationsdesign

The illustration shows a sheep’s skull with a clearly visible intermaxillary bone (front right). This was the subject of a heated dispute between Goethe and the GDNÄ founder Lorenz Oken.

To what extent was Goethe a child of his time as a natural scientist?
Goethe was very knowledgeable about the natural sciences and medicine of his time. He was influenced by the state of science, maintained connections with many natural scientists and physicians of the time, but also considered the historical development of the sciences and individual researchers of the past. The Theory of Colours is a prime example: Goethe dedicated an entire book to it, describing its history from antiquity to the present day. 

How did Goethe’s contemporaries react to his work?
As can be seen in the present work, the spectrum of reactions among scientists and physicians of his time and up to the present day was diverse and varied according to scientific discipline. The reactions in physics were extremely critical. There was approval in geology, botany and anatomy. According to Nees von Esenbeck, member of the GDNÄ and president of the Leopoldina from 1818 to 1838, Goethe was the first to organise the plant world according to “scientific principles” and to introduce it philosophically. Overall, Goethe the naturalist made a strong impression on his contemporaries. It would be necessary and informative to compare this with the reactions in the humanities and arts from the 19th century to the present day – a task I would like to leave to other researchers. 

What was Goethe’s relationship with the GDNÄ?
Goethe took an interested and approving part in the meetings of the Society of German Natural Scientists and Physicians, founded in 1822, and wrote a study of the GDNÄ that was not published in his time but was later printed several times. He particularly welcomed the new research society’s aim of bringing scientists into personal contact, while noting that its members were not the “least bit” like him. In his speech at the Berlin conference in 1828, Alexander von Humboldt referred to Goethe as a “patriarch of patriotic fame”, whose literary creations did not prevent him from “plunging the researcher’s gaze into the depths of natural life”. 

What was Goethe’s relationship with Lorenz Oken, the founder of the GDNÄ?
The relationship was ambivalent on both sides. A plagiarism dispute between Goethe and Oken triggered the discovery of the cranial vertebra, which Oken described in a publication in 1807 and also sent to Goethe. He was very impressed by the study. He invited Oken to Weimar and supported his appointment to the University of Jena, for which Oken was extremely grateful. In 1823, Goethe claimed the discovery for himself in the Heften zur Morphologie (notebooks on morphology). He said that he had made the discovery in 1790 on the basis of a sheep skull found on the dunes of the Lido of Venice, and although he did not publish it, he reported on it several times in letters from Italy to Germany. Many scientists participated in the controversy and repeatedly took Oken’s side. In other areas, Goethe and Oken were quite close. Despite differing political views and although he described the ban of Oken’s journal Isis in Thuringia, Goethe called the GDNÄ founder “genius”. 

Do you still perceive an interest in Goethe as a naturalist today?
A new interest can be observed in the present, especially in Goethe’s theory of colours. There are attempts to understand Goethe’s research, observations and views in this area in the context of his holistic understanding of nature, which contrasts with the objective or experimental-statistical concept of science in modern times. This is very evident in Goethe’s psychological-cultural interpretation of colours, which is usually neglected by physicists, and in his concept of metamorphosis and morphology in the organic sciences.

To what extent can Goethe contribute to a growing together of cultures in science and art?
Goethe’s significance undoubtedly also lies in his contribution to overcoming or, better said, alleviating the separation of the two or four cultures. Goethe was particularly concerned with a mutual connection and communication between these cultures, which is a challenge for natural sciences and medicine. Conversely, however, the arts and humanities would also have to recognise their scientific basis or dependence on nature – arguably an even greater challenge. Goethe describes how worthwhile the effort can be: “It is a pleasant business to explore nature and oneself at the same time, without harming either nature or one’s mind, but rather to balance the two through gentle reciprocal influence.”

Professor Lohse, at the GDNÄ meeting in Potsdam, you recently gave a lecture on placebos or therapy with nothing. But your profession as a pharmacologist is more about therapy with something. How does that fit together?
At first glance, one might see a contradiction here. But placebo effects also accompany every drug therapy and other medical measures, and that is why they are part of it.

The audience was enthusiastic about your lecture, applauded extensively and had many questions. Why is there so much interest in placebos?
I think that many people are affected by it because they have experienced it themselves or seen it in others and have thought about it. The topic also brings together most diverse schools of thought – from scientific drug therapy to shamanism.

How did you come across the topic?
I have been covering it in my introductory pharmacology lectures for more than twenty years because I think that doctors and pharmacists should know about it. They all work, consciously or unconsciously, with placebo effects. These also include harmful effects, so-called nocebo effects. Over the years, I then delved deeper into the subject because I wanted to know what was actually proven in this field and what was just speculation. Just recently, I have come across many new results and some amazing things.

What has amazed you the most?
That the same brain centers are activated in the mind of the doctor as in the mind of the patient when it comes to placebo effects. This has been studied primarily in the treatment of pain. It seems that the doctor must first empathize with the patient’s pain. Then, with this idea, he can activate his own pain-suppressing systems, and that in turn is transferred to the patient. This ability of the doctor correlates closely with his ability to empathize, as can be measured in psychological tests. In my lecture, I went into more detail about the corresponding research results.

Placebo effects in pain suppression result from the interaction between patients and doctors. Pain activates so-called pain centers in the brain (yellow star), as shown by functional magnetic resonance imaging. When empathic doctors come together with such patients, they in turn activate the same centers in the brain. However, they can also activate their own pain-suppressing centers in their brain (blue symbol). This is transferred to patients and leads to the activation of pain-suppressing nerves in them, which release endogenous opioids and other transmitters in the body and thus produce the pain-suppressing placebo effect. This effect occurs regardless of whether the drug administered to the patient contains an analgesic active ingredient or whether it is a pure placebo.

What does this mean for medical practice?
Doctors who are able to put themselves in their patients’ shoes can achieve a great deal with empathy in the reciprocal relationship. It would be good if we could use such placebo effects more systematically and on a reasoned basis, not just intuitively and based on personal experience. That’s why we should increase knowledge in this field and incorporate it more into the training of doctors and pharmacists. 

Can empathy, which obviously plays a major role, be taught and learned at all?
Some things are a matter of talent, but others can be learned. Since empathy is a core skill for therapists, it should be incorporated into the entire training program. The current courses in medical psychology for prospective doctors are a start. 

How far has placebo research come?
Compared to many other areas of medicine, it is still in its infancy. We have only been able to speak of serious, scientifically based placebo research for about three decades. It is an area where medicine, psychology and the new imaging techniques come together. Functional magnetic resonance imaging, in particular, gives us an idea of what is happening in the minds of patients and therapists. So, placebo research is making progress and Germany is playing an important role in it. Four years ago, for example, a national special research area was set up that has already led to a number of interesting results.

© MIKA-fotografie | Berlin

Great interest from the audience: After the lecture, there were many questions and comments on the placebo effect.  

So far, placebos have mainly been used in drug studies to find out whether drugs work compared to them. Do we also learn something from this about how placebos work?
Not really, because in such studies, the placebo arm only serves as a background against which the effect of a drug is to be shown. But treatment with placebos is not neutral. This is shown by studies with open placebos, in which patients know that they are receiving a placebo but still feel a healing effect. There are probably many types of placebo effects – just as there are countless drugs. In the future, we should characterize these in detail and examine their interactions.

A few more words about drug trials: it is rare for a verum to be tested against a placebo alone. If an effective drug already exists, giving a dummy drug is prohibited on ethical grounds. In these cases, the standard treatment plus a placebo is tested against the standard treatment plus a new drug. This makes it more difficult for new drugs to gain market approval: they not only have to work themselves, but also have to provide an additional benefit to standard therapy. 

Let’s take a closer look at the placebo effect: what do we know about its psychological and biological basis?
Psychologically, the expectations of patients are important. Both positive and negative expectations have a strong influence on the success of treatment – therapy with nothing, so to speak, is based on our expectations. We still know very little about the biological processes involved. What we do know is that placebos increase the activity of certain brain regions. For example, when it comes to pain suppression, placebos activate precisely those regions and neural pathways in the brain that are responsible for controlling pain perception. 

Do you need pills for the placebo effect or is positive expectation enough?
Pills, with or without active ingredients, or other specific measures such as acupuncture have a placebo effect. The best approach is a good medicine combined with positive expectations. Most studies show that a medicine plus placebo works twice as well as a placebo alone. 

For which illnesses is the placebo effect greatest?
The effect has been well studied for pain, especially for migraine, for functional disorders of the gastrointestinal tract, and in general for disorders with a strong psychosomatic component. Even depression can often be alleviated with placebos. This effect has been convincingly demonstrated and it is what makes studies on antidepressants so difficult. 

For which diseases should the placebo effect not be relied upon?
Whenever you know that there are drugs with a good verum effect, whose ingredients have been shown to help against a specific disease. In this case, you have to use the verum – knowing that its effect will be supplemented by placebo effects. If you don’t do that as a doctor, for example in cancer therapy, it becomes dangerous. This is also the strongest criticism of controversial forms of therapy such as homeopathy. 

More than a few patients report amazing healing successes with homeopathic remedies. What is your opinion on this?
Good homeopaths know how to use placebo effects efficiently. The effect of homeopathy is based on this, and not on the almost infinitely diluted medicines that are used. I think it is nonsense to ascribe verum effects to these remedies. 

What is the future of the placebo effect?
I expect to see a lot of new findings soon. And I hope that we will identify and understand very different placebo effects and mechanisms, and that we will be able to draw practical conclusions for training and therapeutic practice.

Professor Hasinger, a year ago you were appointed founding director of the German Centre for Astrophysics (DZA) in Lusatia, Saxony. How can we imagine your day-to-day work?
We can’t talk about everyday life in the usual sense yet, we haven’t been around long enough for that. The political decision for our centre was only made in autumn 2022. That was our big bang, so to speak: there was nothing before that, now everything is being created step by step. 

What are the next stages?
We will be organising three major international conferences here as early as 2025. The official founding of the DZA is planned for early 2026 – we are currently still in the set-up phase. In the winter semester of 2026/2027, the new Master’s degree programme in Astrophysics will start with five professorships at the Technische Universität Dresden. We hope to be able to move into our new central buildings on the outskirts of Görlitz around 2030. In around ten years’ time, around a thousand people will be working at the DZA. 

That’s an ambitious schedule. Where are you currently?
We are pretty well on schedule. In the first year, we took on a good 20 people, mainly in the administrative area, and this year we plan to take on just as many more. We are currently setting up temporary accommodation for five years in the historic post office in Görlitz. Planning for the future centre is in full swing. Now it’s all about creating sustainable structures for a globally unique large-scale research centre. 

Who is supporting you in this Herculean task?
A large team of great colleagues from ten renowned research institutions throughout Germany, including the German Electron Synchrotron DESY in Zeuthen and the TU Dresden. We submitted the application to establish the DZA together and are now sharing the work. A lot of support also comes from business and politics, directly on site in Görlitz, and of course at federal and state level.

© Paul Glaser

Handing over the keys with prominent visitors (from left): Saxony’s Science Minister Sebastian Gemkow, TU Dresden Rector Ursula Staudinger, Minister President Michael Kretschmer, Federal Research Minister Bettina Stark-Watzinger, DZA Director Günther Hasinger and Görlitz Mayor Octavian Ursu met in February 2024 to inaugurate the DZA’s transitional offices in the centre of Görlitz.

The DZA is made possible by funding from the structural change fund for lignite mining regions. How high is the budget?
A total of 1.2 billion euros is available from the state until 2038. The money comes 90 per cent from the federal government and ten per cent from the state of Saxony and will flow in annual instalments. We also want to attract third-party funding from national and international sources. Our budget is generous, but that alone is not enough. 

What more do you need?
We also need to think about housing, schools and daycare centres for our employees, the quality of life on site, roads and railway lines. We are currently holding many discussions on such topics. A new ICE railway line from Berlin to Wroclaw via Dresden and Görlitz would be fantastic. The region is currently left behind in terms of transport, but fast train connections would open up completely new opportunities also for scientific contacts, such as those we are currently establishing in Poland and the Czech Republic, specifically with universities in Wroclaw and Prague.

© Paul Glaser

At a discussion event on the prospects for Saxony as a centre of science in January 2024 in Crostwitz

Keyword science: What is the focus of the DZA?
There are three main areas. Firstly, basic astrophysical research to help us understand the development of the universe. This involves receiving and analysing signals from the early days of the cosmos. This is possible with modern telescopes that are spread all over the world, in the Chilean highlands as well as in the Antarctic ice. New, huge radio observatories are currently being built in Australia and Africa. Europe is planning another gigantic research instrument in the form of the Einstein Telescope. In future, the measurement results from all of these facilities will converge in Saxony, where the world’s largest civilian data set will be created, much larger than today’s internet. This treasure is to be analysed in a cost-effective and energy-saving manner, and this is where our second focus comes into play: the DZA will develop new technologies and algorithms for resource-saving digitalisation that will benefit society as a whole. Focus number three is a technology centre in which we develop innovative solutions for observatories – I am thinking, for example, of new semiconductor sensors, silicon optics or control technologies. Modern companies with around two thousand high-quality jobs are to be created through spin-offs and other effects. 

That sounds fascinating. But how does all this fit in with Görlitz, the easternmost city in Germany with only 57,000 inhabitants, right on the Polish border?
If you look at Europe as a whole, beautiful Görlitz lies at the centre. There is a great deal of scientific and technical expertise in the area: with the Zittau-Görlitz University of Applied Sciences, the renowned Dresden University of Technology and a long company tradition in precision mechanics and microelectronics. The particularly good granite in Lusatia is of great importance to us. Near Görlitz, in the district of Bautzen, we are planning a globally unique laboratory for the development of astrophysical and commercial technology. It will be located two hundred metres underground and will be about the size of an underground station. It owes its name Low Seismic Lab to the Lusatian granite rock. This dampens the seismic waves that constantly pass through the ground, meaning that a special geological calm prevails here, with almost no seismic disturbance factors. This is an invaluable advantage for sensitive measurements, such as gravitational waves. The laboratory is also suitable for the development of quantum computers and other high-tech applications. If we are lucky, we will soon be able to participate in the billion-dollar Einstein Telescope, the most sensitive gravitational wave observatory of all time. 

What do local people say about the DZA and its big plans?
We are now getting a lot of encouragement. But there was also headwind at the very beginning. A citizens’ initiative in Lusatia feared that the construction work would lower the groundwater level and create a repository for radioactive waste. We then organised a barbecue for everyone in the summer of 2022, i.e. before our project was awarded the contract, to get people talking. As it turned out, the opposition came from a small but loud minority; everyone else was rather curious and open-minded. When I later picked up the guitar and joined them on a musical journey through life from Oberammergau to Munich, Potsdam, Hawaii, Madrid and Görlitz, the ice was broken. We now organise the barbecue every year. I have promised to sing a song in Sorbian this summer. I still have a lot of practising to do.

© Paul Glaser

The guitar solo by the head of the DZA, here in Cunnewitz in August 2023, is a fixed item on the programme of the barbecue and information evenings for the public.

An astrophysicist who gets up on stage with a guitar and sings–- you don’t see that every day. How come?
In my youth, I was a member of the Munich rock band “Saffran”, which released a record and even made it onto the cover of Bravo magazine. Later, I wanted to become a sound engineer, but then decided to study physics. I owe the fact that I caught fire for astrophysics to two gifted academic teachers, Joachim Trümper and Rudolf Kippenhahn. Both were Max Planck directors, which is what I wanted to become. That worked out and everything else developed from there. 

You took on the founding mission for the DZA at an age when others had long since retired. What appealed to you?
The huge opportunity – you only get something like this once in a lifetime. I’ve managed large institutes with up to a thousand employees before, but taking a centre from zero to one hundred is new and really appeals to me. What we as a specialist community have been calling for in our memoranda for decades is finally coming true: a national centre for astrophysics. 

You recently turned 70 – is retirement even an option for you?
First of all, I want to get the DZA up and running and help organise my successor. That will certainly take a few more years. After that, I want to retire, but I don’t want to be idle. My non-fiction book “The Fate of the Universe”, published in 2005, urgently needs a sequel. I want to write it and develop my musical skills – I might like to learn the double bass. 

You gave a lecture on black holes and the fate of the universe at the GDNÄ’s 200th anniversary celebrations in Leipzig. How do you remember the anniversary?
As a science festival in an elegant setting and with a rich programme. It was a showcase for research in front of an impressive audience. 

If we imagine the scientific system as an orchestra: What part does the GDNÄ play?
I imagine the GDNÄ perhaps as the viola. Its warm, dark sound forms a kind of bridge from the first and second violins to the low string instruments cello and double bass. Some of the greatest composers were violists, for example Bach, Beethoven and Mozart.