Lange Nacht der Forschung (Long Night of Science) 2014

(Vienna, 4 April 2014) Counting more than 135.000 visitors of all ages the ‘Lange Nacht der Forschung’ (Long Night of Science) 2014, a joint initiative of the Federal Ministry of Science, Research and Economy (BMWFW) and the Federal Ministry for Transport, Innovation and Technology (BMVIT), took place on Friday 4^th April, at several locations throughout Austria. CeMM´s booth at the Aula der Wissenschaften in Vienna’s first district with about 3.200 visitors was a significant success. CeMM was represented with an information stand that also included a ‘hands-on’ science parcours with stations that allowed visitors to extract DNA from strawberries, learn how to build a DNA double helix with gummi bears and toothpicks, a pipetting competition and a microscopy station. The CeMM Management and CeMM scientists, among them Principal Investigators Joanna Loizou, Andreas Bergthaler, Kaan Boztug and Christoph Bock were present on site and excited by the overwhelming interest. “The last teenagers, who still wanted to look through the microscope, literally had to be politely rejected at 10 past midnight – what a night, what a sight!”, Bergthaler summed up. Last but not least the good news of the evening rounded up the successful event, when the Federal Minister for Science, Research and Economy, Reinhold Mitterlehner, announced that basic science in Austria is not threatened by budget cuts.