__NOTOC__ The Max Planck Institute of Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics (MPI-CBG) is a

biology Biology is the scientific study of life and living organisms. It is a broad natural science that encompasses a wide range of fields and unifying principles that explain the structure, function, growth, History of life, origin, evolution, and ...

research institute located in

Dresden Dresden (; ; Upper Saxon German, Upper Saxon: ''Dräsdn''; , ) is the capital city of the States of Germany, German state of Saxony and its second most populous city after Leipzig. It is the List of cities in Germany by population, 12th most p ...

Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It lies between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea to the north and the Alps to the south. Its sixteen States of Germany, constituent states have a total popu ...

. It was founded in 1998 and was fully operational in 2001. Research groups in the institute work in

molecular biology Molecular biology is a branch of biology that seeks to understand the molecule, molecular basis of biological activity in and between Cell (biology), cells, including biomolecule, biomolecular synthesis, modification, mechanisms, and interactio ...

cell biology Cell biology (also cellular biology or cytology) is a branch of biology that studies the structure, function, and behavior of cells. All living organisms are made of cells. A cell is the basic unit of life that is responsible for the living an ...

developmental biology Developmental biology is the study of the process by which animals and plants grow and develop. Developmental biology also encompasses the biology of Regeneration (biology), regeneration, asexual reproduction, metamorphosis, and the growth and di ...

biophysics Biophysics is an interdisciplinary science that applies approaches and methods traditionally used in physics to study biological phenomena. Biophysics covers all scales of biological organization, from molecular to organismic and populations ...

systems biology Systems biology is the computational modeling, computational and mathematical analysis and modeling of complex biological systems. It is a biology-based interdisciplinary field of study that focuses on complex interactions within biological system ...

, and

mathematics Mathematics is a field of study that discovers and organizes methods, Mathematical theory, theories and theorems that are developed and Mathematical proof, proved for the needs of empirical sciences and mathematics itself. There are many ar ...

supported by various facilities.

Research

The research theme of research at MPI-CBG lies in the fundamental scientific questions pertaining to organisation of biology at various scales: How do biomolecules organize in a functioning cell? How do cells form tissues? and How do tissues form organisms? The research in the institute encompasses many topics from

molecular A molecule is a group of two or more atoms that are held together by attractive forces known as chemical bonds; depending on context, the term may or may not include ions that satisfy this criterion. In quantum physics, organic chemistry, ...

, cellular, and

as well as from

. An incomplete list of individual topics follows: phase separation,

neural development The development of the nervous system, or neural development (neurodevelopment), refers to the processes that generate, shape, and reshape the nervous system of animals, from the earliest stages of embryonic development to adulthood. The field ...

cell division Cell division is the process by which a parent cell (biology), cell divides into two daughter cells. Cell division usually occurs as part of a larger cell cycle in which the cell grows and replicates its chromosome(s) before dividing. In eukar ...

lipid rafts The plasma membranes of cells contain combinations of glycosphingolipids, cholesterol and protein receptors organized in glycolipoprotein lipid microdomains termed lipid rafts. Their existence in cellular membranes remains controversial. Indee ...

endocytosis Endocytosis is a cellular process in which Chemical substance, substances are brought into the cell. The material to be internalized is surrounded by an area of cell membrane, which then buds off inside the cell to form a Vesicle (biology and chem ...

embryogenesis An embryo ( ) is the initial stage of development for a multicellular organism. In organisms that reproduce sexually, embryonic development is the part of the life cycle that begins just after fertilization of the female egg cell by the male ...

regeneration Regeneration may refer to: Science and technology * Regeneration (biology), the ability to recreate lost or damaged cells, tissues, organs and limbs * Regeneration (ecology), the ability of ecosystems to regenerate biomass, using photosynthesis ...

, tissue and organoid development.

Organisation

The MPI-CBG is headed by six tenured directors or group leaders – Anne Grapin-Botton (France) as managing director, Anthony Hyman (UK), Marino Zerial (Italy),

Stephan Grill Stephan Wolfgang Grill ( born 5 May 1974 in Heidelberg) is a German biophysicist. Education Grill studied physics at the University of Heidelberg. He then worked at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Heidelberg with Anthony H ...

(Germany),

Heather Harrington Heather A. Harrington (born 1984) is an applied mathematician interested in applied algebra and geometry, dynamical systems, chemical reaction network theory, topological data analysis, and systems biology. Since 2020, she is professor of mathem ...

(USA), and

Meritxell Huch Meritxell Huch (Barcelona, 1978) is a stem cell biologist and director at the Max Planck Institute of Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics. Her research considers tissue regeneration and the development of tissue-specific disease models for human ...

(Spain). Directors emeritus are:

Eugene Myers Eugene Wimberly "Gene" Myers Jr. (born December 31, 1953) is an American computer scientist and bioinformatician, who is best known for contributing to the early development of the NCBI's BLAST tool for sequence analysis. Education Myers recei ...

(USA),

Kai Simons Kai Simons is a Finnish professor of biochemistry and cell biology and physician, living and working in Germany. He introduced the concept of lipid rafts, and coined the term ''trans-Golgi network''. He is the co-founder and co-organizer of the ...

(Finland), Elisabeth Knust (Germany), Wieland Huttner. Together with the directors' groups, 23 independent research groups led by untenured principal investigators and about 21 facilities make up the work force of the institute. In total, the institute employs around 550 people of whom about half are not German. The flat organisation and the absence of department divisions fosters direct communication and a slim administration.

Networking

The MPI-CBG is located in a hub of biomedical research institutes including research centers of the

Technische Universität Dresden TU Dresden (for , abbreviated as TUD), also as the Dresden University of Technology, is a public research university in Dresden, Germany. It is the largest institute of higher education in the city of Dresden, the largest university in Saxony a ...

(TUD) such as, the Center for Regenerative Therapies (CRTD), the

B CUBE - Center for Molecular Bioengineering B, or b, is the second letter of the Latin alphabet, used in the modern English alphabet, the alphabets of other western European languages and others worldwide. Its name in English is ''bee'' (pronounced ), plural ''bees''. It represent ...

as well as the University Hospital Carl Gustav Carus Dresden, the Medical Theoretical Centre (MTZ) and the BioInnovationsZentrum (BIOZ). The MPI-CBG has collaborations with its neighbouring research institutes and with other centres in the city like the

Max Planck Institute for the Physics of Complex Systems The Max Planck Institute for the Physics of Complex systems is one of the 80 institutes of the Max-Planck-Gesellschaft, located in Dresden, Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. I ...

(MPI-PKS). Together with the MPI-PKS and the TUD, the MPI-CBG founded the Center for Systems Biology Dresden (CSBD). This center develops theoretical and computational approaches to biological systems across different scales, from molecules to cells and from cells to tissues. The MPI-CBG is also part of DRESDEN-concept, a research alliance of the TUD together with the four major research institutions – Max Planck, Helmholtz, Fraunhofer, and Leibniz – and the research-active museums in Dresden. It also collaborates with institutions abroad. In addition, it operates an international PhD program together with the aforementioned neighbours.

References

External links

Homepage of the institute

Homepage of the institute's international PhD programme
{{Max Planck Society Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics Genetics in Germany Molecular biology institutes Research institutes established in 1998 1998 establishments in Germany