Berlin Science Week 2026 | BIH Program Offers
From November 1 to 10, Berlin Science Week is transforming the city into a vibrant festival of scientific ideas and debates. Discover over 200 events in the city and online that combine science, art, and culture—including BIH. Visit us at the Haus der Kulturen der Welt (HKW), take part in the Diversithon, meet us at MDC-BIMSB, or at one of our other partner events. We look forward to seeing you!
BIH events
5 Nov, 4:30 pm | Design a tool for anonymous digital psychotherapy!
© Fraunhofer AISEC Have you ever been frustrated by a poorly designed user interface? Want to know how to do it better? Find out with us!
Dive into the world of human-centered design and become part of cutting-edge research at the same time! In this interactive design workshop, you’ll gain a hands-on insight into the methods and mindsets used to develop digital products today. No prior experience is required to participate. The focus is on anonymous, digital therapy services: You’ll work on solutions while tackling real-world challenges.
In the workshop, you’ll form a team with other participants and compete against other groups. Round after round, a fictional client will present new requirements and surprising twists. Your task: React quickly, develop ideas, think ahead, and “pitch” your solution convincingly.
Whether you have prior knowledge or are completely new to human-centered design: If you’re interested in learning new things in a playful way and actively contributing to research, you’ve come to the right place. If you’re at least 18 years old and we’ve piqued your interest, feel free to register for our free workshop by November 4, 2026, via the link! Please sign up for the waiting list if no further spots are available for the event. If enough people sign up on the waiting list, an additional workshop will be offered in English. We’re also offering the workshop in German on November 3, 2026: Designe ein Tool für digitale anonyme Psychotherapie!
This event is part of the VERANDA research project, funded by the BMFTR. Together with our project partners (Berlin Institute of Health, Institute for Sexology and Sexual Medicine at Charité, Technical University of Berlin, and the German Research Center for Artificial Intelligence), we are investigating the potential of anonymous digital therapy for people who have difficulty accessing psychotherapy due to stigma. A concept for a tool designed to enable anonymous psychotherapy has been developed. Various studies have been conducted, including several that focus on users’ experiences with the tool.
Organized by Applied and Integrated Security AISEC
Date: 5 November 2026
Time: 4:30 - 7:30 Uhr
Venue: Fraunhofer-Forum Berlin (EG), Anna-Louisa-Karsch-Str. 2, 10178 Berlin4 Nov, 3 pm | BIH Diversithon - Let's Diversify Wikipedia Biographies
How many women scientists do you know? And how many of them have a Wikipedia article? Join our Diversithon and let's diversify Wikipedia together.
We all use Wikipedia as a source to find information and learn more about certain people. But did you know, that less than 20% of all English articles on Wikipedia are about women and the number for women scientists is even smaller?
With the BIH Diversithon we want to change this and contribute to a more diverse Wikipedia. Join our Edit-a-thon and learn how to edit and create new Wikipedia articles about women scientists, scientists of colour and other marginalised groups, which are underrepresented in Wikipedia.
Everyone is welcome to participate, you do not need any knowledge about editing or writing Wikipedia articles. All you need is some time and a notebook.
Experienced members of the WomenEdit group Berlin will give an introduction and support you to take your first steps or dive deeper into editing Wikipedia entries.The welcoming note will be held in English, but the introduction and editing support will be offered both in English and German.
Date: 4 November 2026
Time: 3 - 7 pm
Venue: Berlin Institute of Health at Charité, Rahel Hirsch Center for Translational Medicine, Luisenstr. 65, 10115 Berlin4 Nov, 7 pm | Einstein in the Dome: New Methods in Biomedicine
© Charité 3R / Mark von Wardenburg Milad Rezvani, Annette Künkele, and Michael Gotthardt offer fascinating insights into the future of medicine—impressively visualized beneath the planetarium’s dome.
Animal testing often remains indispensable in biomedical research—yet methods using human tissue are opening up new perspectives. How are new therapies for cancer, heart failure, or organ failure developed? And how are researchers today able to specifically reprogram cells, regenerate tissue, or activate the immune system against tumors? Animal testing remains indispensable in many areas of biomedical research—yet at the same time, increasingly innovative methods based on human tissue are emerging, opening up new perspectives for medicine.
Three leading scientists provide fascinating insights into the medicine of the future—impressively visualized beneath the dome of the planetarium.
Milad Rezvani (Charité Department of Pediatrics) demonstrates how new liver tissue is formed from stem cells and what role regenerative medicine could play in the future in curing serious diseases. Michael Gotthardt (Max Delbrück Center, Translational Cardiology Group) takes the audience on a journey into the beating heart and explains how molecular processes control our heart function and why their interaction determines health and disease. Annette Künkele (Charité Department of Pediatrics, BeCAT) illustrates how genetically modified immune cells recognize and fight tumors—and what hopes modern immunotherapies hold for cancer treatment. The event was organized in collaboration with the Einstein Center 3R and Charité 3R.
With impressive projections, scientific precision, and clear explanations, “Einstein in the Dome” combines exciting research questions with an immersive experience for anyone who wants to learn how the medicine of tomorrow is being developed.
Free admission - registration required.
Organized by Einstein Foundation Berlin, Stiftung Planetarium Berlin
Date: 4 November 2026
Time: 7 - 8:30 pm
Venue: Zeiss-Großplanetarium, Prenzlauer Allee 80, 10405 Berlin4 & 5 Nov, 6 pm | Workshop: One Cell at a Time: Understanding the Building Blocks of our Bodies
© Marc Beckmann/Berlin Science Week Get in touch with the smallest unit of life. Discover how single-cell research is reshaping what we know about health, disease, and ourselves.
Did you ever wonder how our body develops from a single cell? Or how our cells can turn into cancer cells? Our event takes you inside the fascinating world of single-cell research, where scientists study life one cell at a time to uncover how our bodies form, stay healthy, and sometimes fall ill. It is a field built on curiosity: spending years in uncertainty to ask what a cell is, what it remembers, and what it might become.
We begin with an introduction to single cell technologies. Researchers will share insights into how organs and tissues form, how our blood and immune systems develop, how mutations can trigger disease, and how we can make our immune system fight cancer. Along the way, you will see how machine learning and data science help us make sense of millions of measurements.
After the talk, small guided lab tours offer an up-close look at how these discoveries are made. You will be able to try simple experiments yourself - pipetting, visualizing cells, and even counting them. You can also follow live demonstrations of advanced laboratory equipment and explore real-world sequencing data to see how we turn raw measurements into meaningful discoveries.
Throughout the event, our researchers will be available to answer all your questions - about the science, the work, and what it is like to spend a career in pursuit of something that might never give a final answer. Together, we invite you to get in touch with the smallest unit of life - where understanding single cells opens new possibilities for predicting, preventing, and treating disease.
Speakers
- Viktoria Flore, Berlin Institute of Health at Charité & Max Delbrück Center Berlin
- Marc Appis, Berlin Institute of Health at Charité & Max Delbrück Center Berlin
- Philipp Stachel-Braum, MDC/BIH/Charité
- Shriya Lele, Berlin Institute of Health at Charité & Max Delbrück Center Berlin
- Soniya Shende, Berlin Institute of Health at Charité & Max Delbrück Center Berlin
- Benedict Monteiro, Max Delbrück Center Berlin
- Henrike Schwarzenbacher, Berlin Institute of Health at Charité & Max Delbrück Center Berlin
Organised by the Single Cell Focus Area, Berlin Institute of Health at Charité and Max Delbrück Center, Berlin
Date: 4 & 5 November 2026
Time: 6:00 - 7:30 pm
Venue: Max Delbrück Center - Berlin Institute for Medical Systems Biology, Hannoversche Str. 28, 10115 Berlin5 Nov, 5 pm | How Could New Therapies Change Your Future?
© gorodenkoff / iStock A medical breakthrough only matters if it reaches the people who need it. Discover what it takes to make that happen.
A child born with a rare genetic disease. A cancer patient running out of treatment options. For some people, the next generation of therapiescould offer possibilities that did not exist just a few years ago. In this event, researchers, clinicians, innovators and entrepreneurs will explore the potential of Advanced Therapy Medicinal Products (ATMPs), which use living cells and genes to open up new possibilities for patients and create new options where conventional treatments have reached their limits. From scientific discoveries to regulation, manufacturing and patient access, they will share the opportunities and challenges involved in bringing advanced therapies into healthcare.
The conversation goes beyond science alone. It touches on how societies support innovation, how healthcare systems adapt to new technologies, and how emerging treatments can be made accessible to the people who need them. Understanding these dynamics offers a unique perspective on how the future of medicine is shaped.
Speakers
- Katharina Günter, Green Elephant Biotech GmbH
- Annette Künkele-Langer, Charité
- Alexander Stumpf, SPARK-BIH
Organized by: EURICE - European Research and Project Office GmbH
Date: 5 November 2026
Date: 17:00 - 19:00 Uhr
Venue: Eurice - European Research and Project Office GmbH, Alt-Reinickendorf 25, 13407 Berlin6 Nov, 3:00 pm | Privacy in Digital Medicine and Research: Try out a text and speech anonymizer!
© www.pexels.com/license/ Have you ever been worried about sharing medical information? Discover how hard or surprisingly easy it is to identify someone by the way they speak.
Have you ever been concerned about sharing personal identifying information?
We invite you to try out our speech and text anonymization tool, and share your thoughts about the topic - What data is acceptable for sharing? From who, to whom? For what purpose?Conversations between people can contain vast amounts of useful information for medical research. Whether a recorded interview between researcher and research participant, or between doctor and patient, these conversations can reveal a great deal of valuable insights to improve research and healthcare. But conversations are complex - How can we anonymize such conversations, at scale, in an ethical manner?
In this interactive workshop, you will get to test our transcription tool and discover just how difficult, or surprisingly easy, it can be to recognize someone from the way they speak, even after their data has been removed. Through this challenge, you will explore questions around privacy, identity, and digital technology in an engaging way.This event is part of the VERANDA research project (funded by the BMFTR), which explores the potential of anonymous digital therapy for individuals who face barriers to accessing psychotherapy due to stigmatization. Over the past 2.5 years, we have investigated the specific needs and requirements of people who experience high levels of stigma. Anonymization of live therapy conversations may help reduce these barriers.
Date: 6 November 2026
Time: 1:00 - 5:00 pm
Venue: Berlin Institute of Health at Charité (BIH), Rahel Hirsch Center for Translational Medicine, Luisenstr. 65, 10115 Berlin
Room: Esther Lederberg (02 328) >> Meeting Point in the entrance hall6 Nov, 4 pm | Speaker's Corner: Stammzellen – Hoffnungsträger der Medizin von morgen?
Only in German
Stammzellen erneuern unseren Körper ein Leben lang. Entdecken Sie, wie Stammzellforschung neue Perspektiven für die Medizin der Zukunft eröffnet.
Treffen Sie den Wissenschaftler Daniel Besser vom Berlin Institute of Health und dem German Stem Cell Network in der Speaker’s Corner und erfahren Sie, wie Stammzellforschung dazu beiträgt, Erkenntnisse aus der Forschung in neue Ansätze für die Gesundheit zu übersetzen.
Haare wachsen ein Leben lang, Wunden heilen und unsere Blutzellen werden kontinuierlich erneuert – all das ermöglichen Stammzellen, eine besondere Zellart unseres Körpers. Sie können sich über lange Zeit selbst erneuern und zu unterschiedlichen spezialisierten Zelltypen entwickeln. Gerät dieses fein abgestimmte System aus dem Gleichgewicht, können Krankheiten entstehen.
Die Stammzellforschung hilft uns, grundlegende Prozesse unseres Körpers besser zu verstehen – von der Entwicklung und Regeneration bis hin zur Entstehung von Krankheiten. Gleichzeitig eröffnet sie neue Perspektiven für Diagnostik, Therapie und die Medizin der Zukunft.
Speaker: Dr. Daniel Besser, Berlin Institute of Health at Charité & German Stemcell NetworkDate: 6 November 2026
Time: 4:00 - 4:30 Uhr
Venue: Haus der Kulturen der Welt (HKW), Angie Stardust Foyer | John-Foster-Dulles Allee 10, 10557 Berlin6 Nov, 4:30 pm | Can Science Remain Open in an Authoritarian World
© Masaaki Komori / Unsplash Open science fuelled the discoveries shaping our world. But can it survive authoritarianism, geopolitics & proprietary AI? Join the dialogue.
For over a decade, open science has been a promise that sharing research, methods, data, and teamwork across borders solves humanity's greatest challenges. But today, in times of growing nationalism, security concerns and authoritarianism, we stand at a crossroads. And the stakes have never been higher – not just for science, but for society itself.
What's at Stake for Society?
Open science is not merely an academic ideal – it is the infrastructure of collective problem-solving and the engine of scientific progress itself. Virtually every breakthrough today builds on openly shared findings, methods, and data, thus the free flow of knowledge across borders and institutions. Transparency and reproducibility, upheld through open access to methods and data, are the foundation of scientific integrity and public trust. If we retreat from openness, we risk a return to opaque, unverifiable research.
Multiple Pressures to close
Yet the pressures to close are mounting from multiple directions. Geopolitical tensions fracture international partnerships. Governments invoke research security and technological sovereignty, restricting knowledge flows in the name of dual-use concerns. The most powerful AI systems reshaping science today were built on openly shared research – yet they are closed and proprietary, and are now being used to flood the research ecosystem with content of questionable quality.
How Do We Preserve Openness in a Closing World?
Yet is the choice really between fully open and fully closed? Or can we design frameworks that balance transparency with legitimate security concerns, ensure AI systems trained on open data contribute back, and protect international collaboration while addressing dual-use risks? Join us for a critical dialogue together with experts on international cooperation and Open Science and contribute your insights and experiences.
Speakers
- Kamran Naim, Open Science at the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN)
- Andrea Fleschenberg dos Ramos Pinéu, Institute for Asian and African Studies at Humboldt University in Berlin
- Sakine Weikert, Center for International Academic Cooperation (KIWi) at the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD)
Organized by Einstein Foundation Award for Promoting Quality in Research, Center for Open and Responsible Research (CORe), Berlin Center for Global Engagement (BCGE), Berlin University Alliance, Robert K. Merton Center for Science Studies, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin
Date: 6 November 2026
Time: 4:30 - 6 pm
Venue: Haus der Kulturen der Welt (HKW), Angie Stardust Foyer | John-Foster-Dulles-Allee 10, 10557 Berlin8 Nov, 12 pm | Inspiration Stage: Inside Disease
© National Cancer Institute When things go wrong inside the body.
Our bodies are constantly working to protect, repair, and regulate themselves. But during disease this delicate balance can be disrupted in unexpected ways. Disease may arrive from outside, like a bacterial invader. Or it can emerge from within, when our own cells change behaviour and start to cause us harm.
New science looks at disease holistically, tracking how disease affects the body as a whole. From rogue cells and drug-resistant bacteria to inflammation and systemic disease, these talks explore how illness takes hold, and what we can learn by looking beyond individual cells and organs to the body as a whole.
Can your cells change identity and should they?
12:00 - 12:15 | Elisa Moutin, Berlin Institute of Health
Have you ever had to become someone else to fit in? It turns out, the cells making up your organs do all the time! This talk will explore the reasons for such transformations and health consequences.
Chronic inflammatory diseases such as chronic liver disease, inflammatory bowel disease or chronic obstructive pulmonary disease are responsible for up to 25% of all recorded cancers cases. When an organ is chronically inflamed, cells making up the affected organ are able to switch identity and become a different cell type. This allows the cells to survive the inflamed environment and regenerate the damaged organ. In this talk, I will first explain what are the processes that allow this switch of identity, before presenting new data suggesting that cell identity switching could be at the origin of all types of liver cancer.
Pump it out: How do bacteria outsmart our antibiotics?
12:15 - 12:30 | Julien Thebing, Federal Institute for Materials Research and Testing at Bundesanstalt für Materialforschung und Prüfung (BAM)
Antibiotics transformed medicine, making once-fatal infections treatable. But bacteria never stop evolving. Discover how they outsmart antibiotics, one of medicine's greatest ongoing challenges.
Right now, millions of bacteria are growing, dividing, and evolving in your surroundings, on your skin and even inside your body. In fact, the human body contains roughly as many bacterial cells as human cells. As bacteria multiply, random changes occur in their DNA, and some of these mutations make them resistant to antibiotics. One particularly fascinating strategy is their ability to produce tiny molecular pumps that actively remove antibiotics from within bacterial cells before they can do any harm. These pumps are at the centre of my own research. I study how bacteria evolve to become better at pumping out antibiotics and how this can lead to the spread of antimicrobial resistance. The discovery of antibiotics truly transformed medicine making countless surgeries possible and once-fatal infections treatable. While bacteria are constantly evolving at a dramatic pace, developing new antibiotics is slow, expensive and increasingly difficult. Can research keep up in this evolutionary arms race? This talk is for anyone who wants to understand how their next antibiotic treatment will work or why it could be ineffective.
Seeing systemic disease in 3D
12:30 - 12:45 | Doris Kaltenecker, Institute for Diabetes and Cancer, Helmholtz Munich
What if we could make an entire organism transparent and watch disease unfold across the whole body?
Diseases such as obesity affect the entire body, yet we often study them by examining tiny pieces of tissue under a microscope. While this approach has led to countless discoveries, it can also make us miss the bigger picture: how organs communicate and how changes in one part of the body influence many others. What if we could step back and observe the body as a whole? Recent advances in tissue clearing, 3D imaging and artificial intelligence are making this possible. In mouse models, scientists can render organs, and even entire organisms, transparent and create detailed three-dimensional maps of biological structures. AI then helps analyze these enormous datasets and identify patterns that would otherwise remain hidden. In this talk, I will take the audience inside these remarkable images and show how they are changing the way we investigate health and disease. Rather than viewing organs in isolation, we can begin to understand the body as an interconnected system and uncover relationships that remain invisible when we examine only one small piece at a time.
How does food set inflammation in motion?
12:45 - 13:00 | Sreepradha Eswaran, Uniklinik RWTH Aachen University
Your immune system responds not only to infections, but also to what you eat. Discover how diets high in processed sugars, fat, and cholesterol can keep inflammatory signals switched on.
Every meal becomes part of an ongoing conversation within the body. Immune cells detect signals, move between tissues, and help determine whether inflammation protects, supports repair, or contributes to disease. In this talk, I draw on eight years of research to explain how diets high in fructose, fat, and cholesterol can disturb this balance. My work examines how the intestinal immune system may act as a gateway through which dietary signals contribute to persistent inflammation and conditions such as steatotic and alcohol-associated liver disease. Using examples from preclinical models and patient-derived samples, I will explain how dietary components can set off a cascade of inflammatory signals and how molecular signals guide immune cells through the body. The talk is intended for anyone interested in what happens after food leaves the plate and how everyday dietary patterns may influence long-term health.
Meet the Scientists-session
13:00 - 13:20
Stay around for an informal networking session: ask your own questions, start a conversation, and connect directly with the speakers.
Date: 8 November 2026
Time: 12 - 1.30 pm
Venue: Haus der Kulturen der Welt (HKW), Angie Stardust Foyer | John-Foster-Dulles-Allee 10, 10557 Berlin8 Nov, 4 pm | Inspiration Stage: Reprogramming & Repair
© Fayette Reynolds The body as a system for repair and a source of data for understanding it.
Our bodies have a natural ability to heal themselves. A fracture rebuilds itself, guided by immune cells changing identity. A liver worn down by years of damage uses its ‘cellular memory’ to regenerate. Today scientists are going further, reprogramming patients’ own immune cells to fight cancer in their bodies. At the same time, researchers can track and measure the body more closely than ever, giving them a deeper understanding of health and disease.
Spanning immunotherapy, bone healing, liver regeneration, and health data privacy, these talks explore what our cells can teach us about self-healing, and as we share more of ourselves through data, where the line between insight and privacy should sit.
Your own cells, reprogrammed to fight cancer
16:00 - 16:15 | Schayan Yousefian, Berlin Institute of Health at Charité (BIH)
What if your own immune cells could be reprogrammed to recognize and attack cancer? This talk explores how cell and immunotherapies are transforming the treatment of cancer.
A diagnosis of leukemia, lymphoma, or myeloma can change a life in an instant. And when a blood cancer returns or stops responding to treatment, the options have traditionally become increasingly limited. Cell and immunotherapies changing that. One of the most striking examples is the possibility of taking a patient’s own immune cells, reprogramming them to recognize their cancer, and returning them to the body to fight it. Alongside other immune-based treatments, these approaches have created new possibilities for people with blood cancers that were once extremely difficult to treat. But this talk is about more than a new technology. What does it actually mean for a patient to receive a treatment made from their own cells? How can these therapies change not only the chances of controlling a disease, but also the experience of living with cancer? And who can currently benefit from them? This talk will explore how cell and immunotherapies have reshaped the treatment of hematological malignancies, the opportunities and challenges they bring, and what this rapidly evolving field could mean for patients and their families in the future.
When bones Break: the hidden power of immune cell identity
16:15 - 16:30 | Ann-Kathrin Meß, Berlin Institute of Health at Charité (BIH)
Whether you're eight or eighty, bone fractures affect us all — and how well we heal also depends on how our immune cells can change their identity through interactions, much like we do.
Believe it or not, our immune system is not just important to fight a cold but plays an essential role in bone fracture healing as well. Many different types of immune cells cooperate in a well-orchestrated process to make bone healing successful. Unfortunately healing doesn’t always go well. One important factor is immune cell identity, which can change and adapt throughout the healing process. But which direction does the cell decide to go? And why? What makes a cell decide what kind of cell she wants to be - a good or a bad one for bone healing?
Public health: Balancing privacy and data sharing
16:30 - 16:45 | Luke Flanagan, Berlin Institute of Health at Charité (BIH)
Who would you share your health data with? The benefits of sharing, and the privacy measures to protect your data.
Healthcare needs your data, now more than ever. From diagnosing current health issues, to identifying potential future challenges and addressing them early – sharing your health data with healthcare professionals is necessary to get the right help. Medical researchers also need your data, to better understand the core causes of health issues and improve treatments. However, medical data is private and sensitive information. How do you and your data stay safe when you share it?
In this short talk, Luke, a PhD Student in the field of Health Data Privacy, will explore the role of privacy in healthcare. We will learn about the relevancy of privacy in healthcare both for the lived experiences of people experiencing stigma, and for the average person, even those who ‘have nothing to hide’.
So, who would you share your health data with?
Cellular memory in the liver
16:45 - 17:00 | Irene Talon, Berlin Institute of Health at Charité (BIH)
Do your cells have memory? In this talk, I will show how adult liver cells respond to chronic damage by using fetal programs, reawakening developmental memory to drive regeneration.
Chronic liver disease affects millions of people worldwide and can be caused by viral infections, alcohol, obesity and metabolic disorders. As damage builds up over many years, the liver passes through different stages of disease and gradually loses its ability to repair itself. In this talk, I will explore how some adult liver cells respond to chronic injury by becoming unexpectedly flexible: they can change their identity to help regenerate tissue, a process known as transdifferentiation. Our work shows that they do this by using programs from fetal development, drawing on a kind of cellular memory stored through epigenetics — the molecular system that controls which genes are switched on or off.
Meet the BIH Scientists
17:00 - 17:20
Stay around for an informal networking session: ask your own questions, start a conversation, and connect directly with the speakers.
Date: 8 November 2026
Time: 4:00 - 5:30 Uhr
Venue: Haus der Kulturen der Welt (HKW), Angie Stardust Foyer | John-Foster-Dulles-Allee 10, 10557 Berlin9 Nov | Try out digital anonymized psychotherapy!
© Hannes Gieseler Have you ever hesitated to seek psychotherapy because you were afraid of stigma or shame? Find out how anonymous digital therapy can help.
Therapy can be very helpful and yet many people never seek it. Not because they don't want help, but because they are scared of being judged or viewed negatively when sharing whatever they struggle with. Especially topics related to sexuality can be difficult to share.
During this event, you can try out our anonymization tool for a short mock therapy session in which we will mimic an intake for sex therapy. This way, you can test out the experience of an anonymized conversation with a therapist via video call. In the intake, we will find out more about your sexual preferences and satisfaction. This is part of the standard procedure we do with our patients in the first session at the Institute for Sexology and Sexual Medicine at the Charité. You do not need to share anything you don't want to share and there is also the option to talk about a different topic. Of course, we treat everything you tell us as confidential, and we do not store any identifying information, such as your name.
In your 1-hour slot, besides the short intake, you will learn more about the background of the project and how the programme works. We will also ask you to give us feedback about your experience with the anonymization tool.
This event is part of the VERANDA research project funded by the BMFTR. Together with our project partners (Berlin Institute of Health, Fraunhofer AISEC, Technische Universität Berlin and German Research Centre for Artificial Intelligence) we explore the potential of anonymous digital therapy for individuals who face barriers to accessing psychotherapy due to stigmatization.
We can't wait to hear about your experience!
Date: 9 November 2026
Time: 10 am - 5 pm
Venue: Berlin Institute of Health (Rahel Hirsch Center), Luisenstr. 65, 10117 Berlin9 Nov | Measure. Understand. Prevent. Meet Young Croatian Scientists in Biomedicine
How do we build a world we want to live in? Start with science: three researchers, three questions, and perspectives on health and prevention.
What makes someone dedicate their life to understanding depression, dementia or preventing disease? And what happens when those stories meet?For one evening, Croatian researchers from Berlin and Zagreb come together to share not only their science, but the personal journeys behind it: the questions that stayed with them, the experiences that shaped their research, and why they believe their work matters.
Their stories take us from measuring depression, through the surprising connections between metabolism and dementia, to asking whether osteoarthritis can be prevented after a knee injury. Along the way, the story of Znanost u prolazu shows how one conversation can grow into a community — and how we do not always have to wait for change, but can start building the world we want to live in.
This is science made for citizens: personal, accessible and interactive. Ask questions, share your perspective and join the conversation in Croatian, German and English. No scientific background needed — just curiosity.
And the conversation does not end with the talks: stay for a drink, meet the researchers and continue it together.
Talk 1: Možemo li mjeriti depresiju?
Speaker: Eda Jovičić, univ. mag. ing. el. techn. inf.
Depresija, „bolest 21. stoljeća“, spada u afektivne poremećaje raspoloženja, koje je obilježeno padom životne energije, gubitkom volje i tužnim raspoloženjem. Možemo li mjeriti depresiju, pitanje je na koje pokušavaju odgovoriti istraživači FER-a i Klinike za psihijatriju Vrapče. Korištenjem snimki EEG-a i strojnog učenja istražuju se još uvijek nepoznati mehanizmi nastanka depresije, te se time pokušava ostvariti bolja skrb pacijentima. Krajnji cilj je izgraditi sustav potpore odlučivanju koji bi medicinskoj struci pomogao prilikom postavljanja dijagnoza, određivanja protokola liječenja i drugih zadataka. Istraživanje se provodi u sklopu projekta ALFABEATS, HRZZ istraživačkog projekta o kojem se više može pročitati na sljedećoj poveznici: https://www.zemris.fer.hr/~ajovic/alfabeats/index.html
Talk 2: The Sweet Path of Dementia
Speaker: Kamelija Horvatović, MD, MSc mol. biol.
Diabetes and insulin resistance are increasingly recognized as risk factors for neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer's and Lewy body dementia, though the underlying mechanisms remain unclear. Current research at the Max Delbrück Center in Berlin is investigating this link by modeling how metabolic dysfunction shapes tau-alpha-synuclein co-pathology in lab-grown brain organoids. This lecture will trace a young researcher's journey, from showing that insulin resistance drives cognitive decline, through uncovering the environmental and biological factors that shape it, to building a human brain organoid model to explore these mechanisms further.
Talk 3: Kniearthrose nach Verletzungen vorbeugen – mit digitalem Training
Speaker: Dr. Matej Škrobot
Veränderte Bewegungsmuster nach einer Knieverletzung können wesentlich zur Entstehung einer Kniearthrose beitragen. In dieser EU-geförderten klinischen Studie wird untersucht, ob ein digitales Trainingsprogramm das Risiko für eine Kniearthrose nach einer Verletzung verringern kann. Die Studie wird an der Charité – Universitätsmedizin Berlin durchgeführt und umfasst Berlin Movement Diagnostics, das Julius Wolff Institut und das Centrum für Muskuloskeletale Chirurgie.
Moderator: Dr. Inga Patarčić
Title: Building the world you want to live in: from a glacier in Chamonix to a network of 100+ women scientists
Meaningful change rarely begins with a grand plan, funding, or a formal position—it often starts with a single conversation. In my moderation, I will share how a passion for explaining science to people outside academia led me from Soapbox Science to founding Znanost u prolazu, a science outreach NGO that today connects more than 100 women scientists. Along the way, I learned that we do not have to wait for change to happen around us; we can start creating it ourselves.
Following the talks and discussion, the Croatian Embassy will host a reception (domjenak), giving visitors the opportunity to meet the speakers and continue the conversation informally.
Date: 9 November 2026
Time: 6:00 - 9:00 pm
Venue: Embassy of the Republic of Croatia in Berlin, Ahornstr. 4, 10787 Berlin9 & 10 Nov | Multiscale Human Touchpoints
© CNS at Indiana University Go on a fantastic voyage of the human body. Explore how proteins, cells, and organs work together and across scales to keep you healthy.
Visit the Berlin Institute of Health, located next to Charité, to embark on a fantastic voyage through the human body. Large-format data visualizations let you explore the healthy male and female body across ten spatial and temporal scales. Zoom in to see anatomy, tissues, cells, and proteins work together to keep us alive.
The Human Reference Atlas (HRA) uses a three-dimensional, multiscale reference framework so patient data can be mapped and explored visually. Linking the HRA to the Human Phenotype Ontology (HPO) allows researchers to map disease traits clearly and identify which measurements can best predict outcomes. Adding advanced decision support via the Decision Theater project (DT) lets patients and health care providers use this high quality data to make better decisions.
Using Lee Hood’s P4 approach to wellness and health (personal, predictive, preventive, and participatory), this unique setup brings together expertise, data, and visualizations from three teams: The Human Reference Atlas led by Börner at Indiana University, the Human Phenotype Ontology led by Robinson at the Berlin Institute of Health, and the Decision Theater led by Laublichler at Arizona State University. It is supported by a Stiftung Charité Fellowship.
Organized by Indiana University, Berlin Institute of Health @ Charite (BIH), Arizona State University
Date: 9 & 10 November 2026
Time: 10 am - 5 pm
Venue: Berlin Institute of Health at Charité (BIH), Luisenstr. 65, 10117 Berlin10 Nov, 3 pm | Meet the Finalists Live – Early Career Award 2026
Bright Ideas for Responsible Research
Meet the finalists championing research quality, transparency & reproducibility. Who will take home the €100,000 Einstein Foundation Early Career Award? Up to six early-career researchers, competitively selected by an international jury from a global pool of applicants, will present their proposals for promoting research quality. Following each presentation, both the jury and the audience are invited to pose questions. The jury will then deliberate and select the winner of the €100,000 award.
The €350,000Einstein Award for Promoting Quality in Researchin cooperation with the QUEST Center for Responsible Research at the Berlin Institute of Health at Charité honors researchers, institutions, and early career researchers around the globe whose work helps to fundamentally advance the quality, transparency, and reproducibility of science and research.
The finalists will be selected and announced here a few days prior to the event. The pitch session will be moderated by Ulrich Dirnagl, Secretary of the Einstein Foundation Award and Founding Director of the QUEST Center for Responsible Research at the Berlin Institute of Health.
The Early Career Award is generously funded by the Berlin Institute of Health.
Speaker: Ulrich Dirnagl, QUEST Center for Responsible Research at the Berlin Institute of Health at Charité (BIH)
Date: 10 November 2026
Time: 3 - 4:45 pm
Online: via Zoom
