Top funding for research on memory traces
Freiburg, 13/11/2025
Freiburg neuroscientist Prof. Dr. Marlene Bartos has been awarded a Reinhart Koselleck Project Grant for particularly innovative research projects worth €1.25 million.
The German Research Foundation (DFG) has awarded Freiburg neuroscientist Prof. Dr Marlene Bartos a Reinhart Koselleck Project Grant. The DFG is thus supporting her research into the formation of new memory traces during learning in the entorhinal cortex and hippocampus. The interaction between these two brain regions plays a central role in the formation of memories of experiences that are necessary for adapting our decisions and behaviour to current life situations. Disruptions to this interaction can lead to serious diseases of the nervous system involving memory loss, such as Alzheimer’s disease. The funding will run for five years and amounts to 1.25 million euros.
„I am particularly looking forward to this technically highly demanding project because it offers a unique opportunity to explore the fascinating processes of learning and memory in the brain on a new level.“
Prof. Dr. Marlene Bartos
Head of Institute of Physiology, University of Freiburg
Learning and remembering
The Koselleck Programme aims to give researchers with outstanding academic credentials the opportunity to pursue particularly innovative and high-risk projects with high knowledge potential. The funding programme is named after the renowned historian Reinhart Koselleck, who died in 2006. The funds can be used flexibly for research purposes. “I am particularly looking forward to this technically highly demanding project because it offers a unique opportunity to explore the fascinating processes of learning and memory in the brain on a new level,” says Bartos.
About the Person
Bartos heads the Institute of Physiology, Department I, at the Medical Faculty of the University of Freiburg. She is spokesperson for the Transregional IN-CODE Collaborative Research Centre “Inhibitory neurons – shaping the cortical code,” a member of the supraregional research group “Prefrontal Flexibility” and the “BrainLinks–BrainTools” centre, the Bernstein Centre Freiburg and the Spemann Graduate School of Biology and Medicine at the University of Freiburg. Her research has been recognised with the Lichtenberg Endowed Professorship from the Volkswagen Foundation and an Advanced Grant from the European Research Council (ERC).