Topics range from language models and unconventional magnetism through to the sustainability of food supply chains / Approximately €55 million for the first funding period

The Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Foundation) is establishing eight new Priority Programmes (SPP) which are due to start in 2026. This was recently decided by the DFG Senate in Bonn. The eight new networks were selected from among 53 initiatives submitted and will receive a total of approximately €55 million for an initial period of three years. In addition, there is a programme allowance of 22 percent for indirect project costs.

Priority Programmes are designed to enable work on topics that are expected to have a formative impact on a particular research field. This can be achieved by discovering new areas of research or by working on familiar areas from a different perspective or using a new approach. In addition, Priority Programmes involve collaboration between researchers on an interdisciplinary basis and across different locations.

The networks that have now been approved cover a wide range of subjects in the engineering sciences, life sciences and natural sciences through to the humanities. The projects focus on such things as developing new recyclable composite materials, exploring sex-specific mechanisms of cell function in the nervous system, and examining disinformation from a new perspective.

In the coming months, individual calls for proposals will be issued for the Priority Programmes by the DFG inviting interested researchers to participate in the networks. The DFG assesses the incoming funding proposals for their scientific quality and their contribution to the overriding research theme in each case. Priority Programmes are funded for a period of six years.

The new Priority Programmes in detail

(in alphabetical order of the coordinators’ higher education institutions):

• Priority Programme Rethinking Disinformation (Re:DIS) (Spokesperson: Dr. Romy Jaster, HU Berlin)
• Priority Programme Holistic Design of Molecular Communication Systems (Coordinator: Professor Dr.-Ing. Robert Schober, University of Erlangen-Nuremberg)
• Priority Programme New recyclable composites (Spokesperson: Professor Dr.-Ing. Bodo Fiedler, TU Hamburg)
• Priority Programme Sustainability and Resilience of Agri-Food Chains in Times of multiple Crises? Towards a joint and critical understanding (Spokesperson: Professor Dr. Peter Dannenberg, University of Cologne)
• Priority Programme Artificial Intelligence for Protein Function (AI4PF) (Spokesperson: Professor Dr. Jens Meiler, University of Leipzig)
• Priority Programme Unconventional Magnetism: Beyond the s-wave magnetism paradigm (Spokesperson: Professor Dr. Jairo Sinova, University of Mainz)
• Priority Programme SEXandGLIA: Sex-dependent mechanisms of neuroglial cell functions in brain health (Spokesperson: Professor Dr. Julia M. Schulze-Hentrich, Saarland University, Saarbrücken)
• Priority Programme Robust Assessment & Safe Applicability of Language Modeling: Foundations for a New Field of Language Science & Technology (LaSTing) (Spokesperson: Professor Dr. Michael Franke, University of Tübingen)

Further Information

Information is also available from the coordinators of the new Priority Programmes.

For further details of DFG Priority Programmes, see: www.dfg.de/spp/en(interner Link)