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Organisation

  • ISAS is a non-profit research institute in the legal form of a registered society. The purpose of the society is to promote analytical research in materials sciences and life sciences. The society's statutory organs are the Executive Board, the Supervisory Board, the Scientific Advisory Board and the General Meeting. The institute consists of three research departments at the two locations in Dortmund and two application laboratories in Berlin; the administrative departments are organised as staff units.

    As a member of the Leibniz Association, the institute is sponsored by the German federal government and its states.

  • Executive Board

  • The Executive Board at ISAS consists of two members. It heads the society and two of its members represent it judicially and extra-judicially. Together the members of the Executive Board are particularly responsible for determining the strategic objectives of ISAS and for preparing the annual accounts.

    The duties of the Executive Board are laid down in detail by rules of procedure that regulate the matters reserved for the complete Board and the division of tasks amongst the individual board members. The Executive Board is represented and supported in the fulfilment of its duties by the society's staff in their spheres of responsibility.

Albert Sickmann

Chairman (photo: left)

Jürgen Bethke

Chief Financial Officer

Prof. Dr. Albert Sickmann, Vorsitzender (links) und Jürgen Bethke, Kaufmännischer Vorstand.
© ISAS

  • Department Heads

    In matters of strategic scientific importance, the Executive Board is supported by the Heads of the research departments. The regular meetings of the directors focus on further developing the institute's research programmes, on coordinating interdisciplinary research and on developing and providing technical science services. This applies both to internal work and to external target groups from science and industry.

  • Departments

    The institute consists of three research departments with 13 research groups in total, including four junior research groups. In addition, there are two application labs. The scientific directors are responsible for leading the research departments. They define and organise the scientific undertakings and inter-departmental projects together with the leaders of the research groups. The themes addressed by the latter extend across the three research programmes of the institute.

    • Bioanalytics

      The Bioanalytics research department includes the Lipidomics, Multi-dimensional Omics Data Analysis, NMR Metabolomis, Proteomics, Spatial Metabolomics and Translational Analytics research groups. The work of the six research groups is devoted to gaining further insights into the extremely complex signal and metabolic paths in cells and cell clusters in human bodies at various levels – from individual lipids or proteins to intercellular communication processes, for example. Researchers in this department therefore develop mass spectrometry measurement techniques to perform location- and time-resolved measurements of molecular distributions. To gain the clearest most reliable overall picture of the individual biological processes, the research groups in this department work on living cells.

    • Biospectroscopy

      The Biospectroscopy research department includes the research groups AMBIOM, Biofluorescence and Bioimaging. The work undertaken by the researchers here involves improving early detection, especially of cardiovascular diseases or tumours, and developing the assessment of individual risks following a diagnosis using imaging methods. Taking experimental model systems as the starting point, the scientists in the Biospectroscopy department initially investigate the complex biochemical and cellular foundations of diseases in different phases of their development. They then transfer the results to the human body. Modern imaging methods play a significant part in this. Different mesoscopic methods (ranging from a few micrometres to several centimetres) and high-resolution (less than one micrometer) 3D microscopy are therefore used to visualise cellular and biophysical processes in intact tissue and entire organs.

      By combining this modern imaging with a subsequent molecular analysis, it is possible to record all the necessary magnitudes of molecules through to supracellular structures required to perform a location and time-resolved analysis. The insights into biological systems gained from this holistic apporach provides the researchers with the basis for developing new tailored prevention and therapy measures in joint projects as part of the research programmes.

    • Translational Research

      The research groups Cardiovascular Pharmacology, Miniaturisation and ERC-Sulfaging, which are integrated in the Translational Research department, work interdisciplinarily at the border between biology, medicine and physics.

      The researchers are engaged in the investigation of key molecular events to identify potential targets and biomarkers in cardiovascular diseases, in particular cardiomyopathies and heart failure. They develop and optimise analytical test procedures using, among other things, primary cell cultures, disease models, miniaturised plasma sources and so-called dielectrically hindered electrospray. Furthermore, they analyse bioactive surfaces and their interaction with the environment in terms of molecular organisation, transport, catalytic reactions and biological compatibility.

      In short, the research groups belonging to this department collaborate to advance translational research in the fields of analytics, therapeutics and sustainability.

  • Staff Units

    • Finance, Procurement, IT & Building Technology

      In the scope of his responsibility for administrative matters, Jürgen Bethke also heads the staff unit Finance, Procurement, IT & Building Technology.

    • Personnel, IP Management & Communications

      Dorit Günther has been an authorised manager of the institute in the scope of the procura since 2012. She heads the staff unit for Personnel, IP Management & Communications.

  • Supervisory Board

    The Supervisory Board appoints the members of the Board of Directors and undertakes supervisory duties for the society. It oversees all scientific, programmatic and financial matters of the society, insofar as such are not reserved for the General Meeting. It is directly involved in decisions of fundamental importance for the society; in particular, it determines the principles for monitoring the success of the society, approves the financial planning and research planning and prepares proposals for the General Meeting to amend the statutes. The chairperson of the Supervisory Board is Dr Christiane Fricke (State of North Rhine-Westphalia). The deputy is Prof Dr Gerhard Schembecker (TU Dortmund University).

  • Scientific Advisory Board

    The Scientific Advisory Board provides continuous advice to the Board of Directors and the Supervisory Board concerning the on-going scientific work of the society. It monitors the quality of the scientific work by means of annual audits in accordance with the guidelines on quality controls laid down by the Leibniz Association for its member institutes. The current contact person of the Scientific Advisory Board in place of the Chairperson of the Advisory Board is Prof. Dr. Jörg Feldmann (University of Graz). The deputy is Professor Ina Koch (Goethe University Frankfurt).

    • Members of the Scientific Advisory Board

      Prof Ronen Alon, Department of Immunology, Weizmann Institute of Science, Israel

      Dr Anne K. Bendt, Singapore Lipidomics Incubator (SLING), Life Sciences Institute (LSI), National University of Singapore

      Prof Dr Jörg Feldmann, Institute of Chemistry, University of Graz

      Prof Dr Denise Hilfiker-Kleiner, Department of Medicine, University of Marburg

      Prof Dr Ina Koch, Institute of Computer Science, Department of Molecular Bioinformatics, Goethe University, Frankfurt am Main

      Prof Dr Andreas Radbruch, Deutsches Rheuma-Forschungszentrum Berlin

      Prof Dr Markus Sauer, Department of Biotechnology and Biophysics - Biozentrum, Julius-Maximilians-Universität of Würzburg

      Prof Andrea Urbani, Faculty of Medicine and Surgery, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Italy

  • General Meeting

    The members of the society exercise their rights of organisation and control in the General Meeting. Among other things, the General Meeting selects the society's auditors, adopts the annual accounts and resolves on the discharge of the Executive Board. The Executive Board comprehensively reports to the General Meeting each year on the situation of the society, including the scientific and financial planning.

  • Further Assignees

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