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Events
- On 25 February, the Three-Minute
Thesis Competition will take place. In
this competition, doctoral researchers from all
disciplines present their dissertation topics in
English ¨C in no more than three minutes time! This
renowned competition is conducted at numerous
universities around the world. It starts at 19.00h
in the Rosens?le (F¨¹rstengraben 27). (Photo:
Graduate Academy)
- Love Data Week is a worldwide event series
that takes place from 9 to 13 February. This year's
motto is "Where¡¯s the Data?". During this week,
numerous online events will provide information on a
wide range of research data management topics. As
part of this year's Love Data Week, the Thuringian
Competence Network for Research Data Management
(TKFDM) will be organising three
events as well as a coffee lecture.
- How can cultural assets be preserved digitally?
That's the main idea behind the HACK
THE HERITAGE hackathon on 20 and 21
February in Jena. Researchers, students and artists
will be tackling real challenges from museums,
archives, and libraries and come up with prototype
solutions ¨C like how to use, structure, visualise,
or share digital cultural data.
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Get
involved
- An online
survey wants to investigate the leaky
pipeline and focus in particular on the
compatibility of academic work and care work. The
survey is part of a master's thesis by a student at
the German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity
Research (iDiv) Halle-Jena-Leipzig. It is aimed
particularly at doctoral candidates and takes about
15 to 20 minutes to complete.
- On 20 November 2026, the next Long
Night of Science will take place in
Jena. Researchers from the university can
participate with their own topics and programme
ideas. Sought are insights into current research,
offering interactive formats, experiments or new
perspectives on research. Proposals can be submitted
until 21 February using this
form. (Picture above: Nicole Nerger/Uni Jena)
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Qualification
offers
There are still vacancies in the following online and
on-site workshops:
- Graduate Academy:
- Lehre Lernen:
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Announcements
- The ProChance
¨C Exchange programme offers female
doctoral candidates and postdocs financial support
for short research stays, publication costs and
participation in workshops and summer schools. You
can apply for up to €1,000. The University of Jena's
IMPULSE
¨C conferences programme supports
participation in academic conferences. Doctoral
candidates and postdocs can apply for up to €1,000.
Applications for both programmes can be submitted on
an ongoing basis.
- The project ¡®Gender in Focus¡¯ has announced the ¡®Gender
Aspects in Focus 2026¡¯ award. The award
honours research work in which aspects of sex and/or
gender have been taken into account. Application
deadline is 31 March 2026.
- The project ¡®Gender in Focus¡¯ supports researchers
with a funding
programme to better incorporate aspects
of sex and/or gender into their research. For this,
there are funding schemes for doctoral candidates as
well as for postdoctoral and advanced researchers.
The application deadline is 31 March 2026.
- The Thuringian Competence Network for Research
Data Management (TKFDM) is once again awarding the FAIRest
dataset in Thuringia. Researchers at
Thuringian universities can win up to €2,000 by
submitting a published dataset that complies with
the FAIR principles (Findable, Accessible,
Interoperable, Reusable).
- The Jena Academy for Teaching Development is once
again looking for innovative
teaching projects. Applications for
project funding can be submitted to the study dean
of your faculty by 15 February. A maximum of 15,000
euros can be granted for individual projects.
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This
may be of interest to you
- The Centre for Higher Education Development (CHE)
has
analysed the figures for completed
doctorates nationwide: more than half of the
approximately 27,500 doctorates awarded each year
are in the subjects of medicine, biology, chemistry,
physics and mechanical engineering. Chemistry has
the highest ratio of doctorates: 80% of master's
graduates obtain a doctorate in this subject.
Slightly lower percentages are found in medicine
(71%), biology (71%) and physics (57%).
- Every year, there is a wide range of summer
schools for doctoral researchers in Europe. Summer
schools offer the opportunity to learn more
about a topic relevant to your own research in a new
location together with other researchers. An
overview of many European offers can be found on this
website, while language and specialist courses
in Germany are listed on this
DAAD website.
- An analysis
of 7.7 million articles in the life sciences
revealed that the review process takes longer
for articles written by female scientists. The
difference between men and women was up to 14 days.
Possible
explanations for this difference include, on
the one hand, potential bias on the part of
reviewers towards women and their research and, on
the other hand, that female researchers may need
longer to revise articles due to the additional care
work they have to perform.
- The correct use of statistics is a fundamental
skill in many scientific disciplines. Nevertheless,
statistics are often embellished or even tampered
with. Some websites are dedicated to exposing these
manipulations or to creating new statistics in
creative ways: Every day, the website ¡®Spurious
Correlations¡¯ publishes a correlation
between two randomly selected data sets (see graphic
above) and explains it using AI. For more than 10
years, ¡®Unstatistik
des Monats¡¯ (Unstatistic of the Month)
has been questioning published statistics in Germany
and their interpretation in the media. For several
years now, author and columnist Katja Berlin has
been creating ¡®Torten
der Wahrheit¡¯ (Pies of Truth), in which
she skilfully skewers current developments using
diagrams.
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News
from University of Jena
- A team of
researchers from the University of Jena has
examined Johann Wolfgang von Goethe's amber
collection using modern imaging techniques.
Enclosed in the amber, they found a fungus gnat, a
black fly and an ant. The now extinct ant was of
particular interest: thanks to its well-preserved
condition, the researchers were able to create a 3D
model. However, Goethe was probably unaware of
the existence of these animals, as they are not
visible to the naked eye.
- The University of
Jena has joined the European
network CoARA, which aims to develop new
criteria for research assessment: the focus
should be less on the quantity of output or the
impact factor of a journal but rather on the quality
of the research. In doing so, the University of Jena
has committed itself to developing an action plan
within a year. Researchers who wish to contribute to
this process are welcome to join the university
working group and contact Karoline Oelsner from the
Vice-Presidency for Research and Innovation (coara@uni-jena.de).
- Since this year,
the Family Office at the University of Jena has been
offering a free
babysitter-finding service. A
babysitting pool has been set up for this purpose.
The babysitters can look after children of all ages.
Their tasks can range from picking up children from
childcare facilities, playing with them, taking them
to the playground or looking after them in the
evenings, to helping older children with their
homework. Payment for the babysitters is handled by
the family.
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Latest
News from Jena and Thuringia
- The Technical University of Chemnitz has revoked
the doctoral title of Thuringia's
Minister President Mario Voigt. In 2024, an
external plagiarism checker criticised several
passages in the dissertation. The university then
initiated an investigation and sought an expert
opinion. Now the faculty council has decided to
revoke the doctoral title. Voigt now wants to have
this reviewed legally. The far-right AfD party used
the revocation to put forward a vote of no
confidence in the Thuringian state parliament. The
motion was
rejected and Voigt remains Minister President.
- The HackSpace Jena
is launching a series
of events to help people gain more control
over their digital communication and break free from
their dependence on commercial platforms. Events in
this series will take place on the first Sunday of
every month from 14 to 16.00h. The series is part of
the nationwide campaign ?Digital
Independence Day¡° launched by author
Marc-Uwe Kling at the 39th Chaos Communication
Congress. (Illustration above: Logo of the Di.Day by
Florian Biege)
- The verdict in the case of Maja T. has
been announced: Maja, a non-binary person, has
been sentenced to eight years in prison in Hungary.
The Hungarian public prosecutor's office accuses
Maja of travelling from Jena to Hungary in early
2023 and attacking right-wing extremists with a
hammer. In 2024, Maja was arrested in Berlin and
extradited to Hungary in a cloak-and-dagger
operation. Maja T. is from Jena, which is why the
arrest, extradition and trial sparked major protests
in Jena.
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