Forum Junge Spitzenforschung
Topic 2025: Water & Water Management
Water is vital and omnipresent – but even in Germany, it is becoming increasingly scarce: groundwater is at risk, every second adminsitrative district is already experiencing water stress, soils are drying out and rivers are carrying less water. This not only affects nature, but also people and industry. Water is an indispensable resource in industrial applications, for example as a coolant, cleaning medium, waste stream or as an alternative to environmentally harmful resources. Against this backdrop, innovations in the field of water technologies and water management represent a fundamental building block for industry, nature and societies of the future.
Water can be much more than just a scarce resource – technologies related to water and water management are also key to solving many current challenges: as digital systems that monitor water flows, water quality and the condition of water infrastructure, or precise and smart irrigation that saves resources and makes agriculture more climate-resistant. As smart water treatment systems, they are an indispensable component of urban cycles in the face of increasingly scarce resources. Innovative materials can reduce their footprint in the water cycle – for example, through rapid, pollutant-free degradation in water bodies – and facilitate urban or rural water management or optimise and enable water recycling. Last but not least, the water balance in humans determines their health, and medical innovations that address this can have an impact on health and quality of life. Whether the innovations focus on wastewater, rainwater, groundwater, process water, drinking water or improvements in their management, research by excellent young scientists is opening up new perspectives for a sustainable industry, more liveable cities and a healthy society.
As part of the Forum Junge Spitzenforschung 2025, the Stiftung Industrieforschung and Humboldt-Innovation GmbH, together with Berlin's universities – Freie Universität Berlin, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, Technische Universität Berlin and Charité – Universitätsmedizin Berlin – are looking for innovative application ideas from young researchers in all disciplines who, based on their excellent research, can provide innovative solutions for dealing with water in industrial, urban or social contexts, thus opening up new perspectives in the field of water and water management.