The Deutscher Zukunftspreis from the Federal President goes to Siemens Healthineers
Berlin, 22 November 2023
This evening in Berlin, the German Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier distinguished the researchers Stephan Biber and David M. Grodzki from Siemens Healthineers, as well as Michael Uder from Uniklinikum Erlangen, with the 27th Deutscher Zukunftspreis, the prize from the Federal President for technology and innovation. Biber, Grodzki and Uder have developed a significant innovation in the area of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI).
The prize winners have developed a novel platform for MRI which delivers high-resolution images for medical diagnoses even from a comparably weak magnetic field. This enables a more compact design and a significantly more cost-effective deployment in clinics and doctors’ surgeries. At the core of the innovation is, amongst others, a strongly reduced magnetic field strength, AI-based algorithms for evaluating the images produced, and a cooling system which works with a reduced amount of liquid helium as a coolant. This development paves the path for a broader and more affordable medical use of MRI technology worldwide.
The National Academy of Science and Technology – acatech sincerely congratulates the winners!
We congratulate our Senate’s company Siemens Healthineers on this meaningful prize and are delighted about this acknowledgement of the team’s excellent research and development work. The prize underscores once again the significance of innovation as key to securing the o future of our country.”
acatech President Thomas Weber
Magnetic resonance imaging has been around for a good 40 years in clinics, and ever since there has been the trend to want more and more and more technology. We then noticed that for technological reasons alone, half of the earth’s population cannot have access to this medical care, and even in Western countries not all patients can benefit from it. We want to stop this trend. So we came up with the idea – for the first time in the history of MRI technology – to purposefully build a system which has a weaker setting specification; one that is weaker than previous devices. This allows us to counteract this trend.”
Prize winner David M. Grodzki
With the Deutscher Zukunftspreis, Germany’s Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier honoured the scientists and engineers who have developed solutions for the urgent challenges that society is facing by providing their excellent fundamental and top-class research – solutions which have the potential to be economically successful and tap into new growth fields. The prize is endowed with 250,000 euros.
Also nominated for the Deutscher Zukunftspreis 2023 were: Antje Bulmann, Viktor Fetter and Tobias Horn from Airbus Operations in Hamburg with their project “Dem Klimawandel entgegenwirken – CO2 aus der Atmosphäre herausfiltern und vielfältig nutzbar machen” (“Counteract climate change – Removing CO2 from the atmosphere and making it useful”). Along with Jens te Kaat, Bernd-Henning Feller and Dan-Adrian Moldovan from Kueppers Solutions from Dortmund with their work on the project “Resilienz für die Gasversorgung – 3-D-Reku-Brenner senkt Erdgasverbrauch und eröffnet die Zukunft mit Wasserstoff für die Industrie” (“Resilience for the gas supply – 3D Recu burner lowers natural gas consumption and opens up a future for hydrogen in industry.”)
Germany’s Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier honoured them with a certificate, and the jury accepted them into the “Kreis der Besten” of the Deutscher Zukunftspreis.
Further information on the Deutscher Zukunftspreis
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