On the shoulders of giants

In the presence of the Prime Minister of Saxony, Michael Kretschmer, the Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf (HZDR) bid farewell to its former Scientific Director, Prof. Roland Sauerbrey, at a special laser conference today, Monday 6 February 2023. The physicist headed the Dresden research facility from 2006 to 2020, during which time he managed the centre's transition from the Leibniz Association to the Helmholtz Association, established new sites, further developed the large-scale research facilities and strengthened technology transfer. Around three years ago, Roland Sauerbrey resigned from his position as planned in order to subsequently establish the Centre for Advanced Systems Understanding (CASUS) for the HZDR in Görlitz. The guest of honour at the symposium was the Nobel Prize winner in Physics, Prof. Donna Strickland.

When Roland Sauerbrey took over as Scientific Director of the Rossendorf Research Centre in 2006, today's HZDR looked very different - and it wasn't just the name that changed during his time in office. Even then, with around 550 employees and a total budget of around 60 million euros, it was already one of the largest non-university research institutions in the new federal states. During his 14 years as Scientific Director, however, the numbers increased massively once again. Today, around 1,500 people work at the six HZDR sites. The budget now totals around 157 million euros (as of 2021). An important milestone was the transfer of the centre to the Helmholtz Association at the beginning of 2011, which the native of Coburg played a major role in driving forward.

In the course of the transfer, the Free State of Saxony provided considerable investment funds, which, among other things, enabled the expansion of the high-field magnetic laboratory and the construction of powerful laser systems at the ELBE Centre for High-Power Radiation Sources. Together with the Ion Beam Centre, the two large-scale research facilities attract numerous researchers from all over the world to Dresden every year who want to make use of this unique infrastructure. The HZDR thus also owes its international appeal to the strategic decisions of the former Scientific Director, as the President of the State of Saxony, Michael Kretschmer, emphasised in his tribute.

„Roland Sauerbrey has built up and developed the Saxon research landscape with a great deal of passion and dedication. Through his efforts, numerous research institutions in Saxony have become known for their excellence beyond the borders of the Free State, including the Helmholtz Centre Dresden-Rossendorf. The expertise of the Helmholtz Institute Freiberg, which he founded, on recycling, the circular economy and the sustainable extraction of raw materials is also in demand internationally. As interim director of the CASUS digitalisation institute in Görlitz, he has actively contributed to the success of structural change in Lusatia and the Dreiländereck region. The high level of national and international recognition for Saxony as a centre of research and science is largely thanks to him. I would like to thank Roland Sauerbrey for his commitment, his courage to break new ground and his work in the Free State of Saxony.

„With strategic foresight, Roland Sauerbrey successfully shaped the transition of the research centre into the Helmholtz Association,

said Oda Keppler, Chair of the HZDR Board of Trustees, in her welcoming address, praising the achievements of the former Scientific Director. The Ministerial Director of the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) emphasised that the HZDR's focus on the research fields of matter, energy and health was the key to its successful positioning in the Helmholtz Association. The centre, which has a broad scientific base and combines interdisciplinary basic research with a strong focus on application, has achieved considerable transfer successes: „Roland Sauerbrey – s speciality of ultra-short pulsed high-power lasers as accelerators in proton therapy – is an impressive example of this. Only thanks to the collaboration between physicians and physicists was it recently possible to successfully irradiate a tumour in an animal model with laser-accelerated protons for the first time.“

Through the decision to establish the Centre for Radiopharmaceutical Tumour Research on the Rossendorf campus and to co-found the National Centre for Tumour Diseases Dresden (NCT / UCC) and the Centre for Radiation Research in Oncology OncoRay, the HZDR is now also an important partner in German health research. These collaborations underline Roland Sauerbrey's role as a bridge builder - across both specialist and national borders," explained the President of the Helmholtz Association, Prof. Otmar D. Wiestler, during the ceremony. Wiestler, during the symposium: „The Helmholtz International Lab WHELMI with the Weizmann Institute in Israel and the Helmholtz International Beamline for Extreme Fields HIBEF at the European XFEL are just two of the many successful international collaborations initiated by Roland Sauerbrey. They lay the foundation for attracting specialists from all over the world to Saxony.“

His successor, Prof Sebastian M. Schmidt, has built on this broad foundation: „When I took over the position of Scientific Director about three years ago, I found a centre that was ideally positioned. This allowed me to concentrate on strategically developing our three research areas of Matter, Health and Energy from the outset. On behalf of the HZDR, I would like to thank Roland Sauerbrey for his many years of work and his great achievements and wish him all the best for the future.

Press release of the HZDR from 06/02/2023