With the Emmy Noether Programme and the Heisenberg Programme, the DFG offers two established funding lines for different career stages in science. Both programs are aimed at highly qualified scientists and support them in independently developing their research and qualifying for a long-term career in scientific leadership.

Emmy Noether Programme: Independent Group Leadership for Young Scientists
The Emmy Noether Programme is aimed at outstanding postdocs and junior professors with fixed-term contracts who are in the early stages of their scientific careers. The goal is to create the conditions for a professorship within six years through the independent leadership of a junior research group. Junior professors who have already completed a positive interim evaluation are not eligible to apply.

Between April and June 2025, 15 scientists were newly accepted into the Emmy Noether Program. Relevant projects from the field of materials science:

• Dr.-Ing. Zhuocheng Xie (RWTH Aachen University): Hierarchical defect engineering for intermetallic design
• Dr. Aniket Pal Ph.D. (University of Stuttgart): Viscoelastic instabilities for physically intelligent, flexible mechanical metamaterials
• Dr. Hannes Pfeifer (Technical University of Munich): Optically controlled mechanical metamaterials – vibration control on a chip

Heisenberg Programme: Top-Level Research With a View to a Professorship
The Heisenberg Programme is aimed at scientists who already meet all the requirements for a permanent professorship – for example, through the Emmy Noether Programme, project management, habilitations, or achievements equivalent to a habilitation. Junior professors who have received positive interim evaluations, returnees from abroad, and internationally qualified scientists who wish to work in Germany are also part of the target group.

After being accepted into the programme, participants can choose from four funding options: Heisenberg Professorship, Heisenberg Position, Heisenberg Rotation Position, and Heisenberg Fellowship, which can also be combined depending on the individual situation. The goal is to continue independent research projects at a location of choice and to further increase scientific visibility.

In the second quarter of 2025, 18 new researchers were accepted into the Heisenberg Programme. Of particular relevance to materials science:

• Dr. Fritz Körmann (Ruhr University Bochum): Short-range order, phase stability, and defects in chemically complex alloys

The selection of these projects underscores the role of materials science as an integrative discipline at the interface between basic research and technological application.