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One would expect a high school graduate to have little time for extracurricular activities shortly before the final written exams. Nevertheless, Alexander Becker can regularly be found in the laboratories of the Helmholtz Institute for Pharmaceutical Research Saarland (HIPS), even at this time of year. HIPS is a site of the Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research (HZI) in collaboration with Saarland University. There, the 18-year-old student from the Gymnasium am Stefansberg in Merzig is trying to isolate myxobacteria from unusual soil samples. His work is part of a project with which he successfully took part in the Jugend forscht competition for young scientists. Together with ten other students from Saarland, he qualified for the 59th national Jugend forscht competition, which will take place in Heilbronn from May 30 to June 2, 2024.

The message is clear: The Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research (HZI) aims to become one of the world's premier infection research institutes. Professor Josef Penninger, Scientific Director of the HZI since 1 July 2023, has set the bar high. Christian Scherf, the Administrative Director of the HZI since 1 January 2023, is going to do everything in his power to support him.

Martin Korte researches the influence of infections and infection-associated inflammations on neurodegenerative diseases that damage, for example, learning processes or memory. Korte is group leader of the “Neuroinflammation and Neurodegeneration” research group at the Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research (HZI) and director of the Zoological Institute at the Technische Universität Braunschweig where he also holds a professorship for Cellular Neurobiology. A newly emerging field of research are the symptoms summarily known as "long COVID", which continue to manifest for months in about ten per cent of patients after overcoming a COVID-19 disease. In this interview, Martin Korte explains these long-term consequences, which are the subject of his new book (in German).

Dr Peggy Riese is a scientist in the Department of Vaccinology and Applied Microbiology at the Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research (HZI) in Braunschweig, Germany. Her research focuses on the special features of the immune system in its interaction with vaccines. In this interview, she talks about current developments in SARS-CoV-2 vaccine research.

A conversation about the direction of research at the HZI with Prof Thomas Pietschmann, who is the head of the "Experimental Virology" department at the HZI and director of the Experimental Virology Institute at the TWINCORE - Centre for Experimental and Clinical Infection Research

The cold season has arrived along with the question of whether a vaccination against influenza makes sense in times of the ongoing pandemic. And when is the right time for the third vaccination, i.e. the booster vaccination against Covid-19?