Berlin Science Week 2025 x Berlin University Alliance

What holds us together?

Our societies are changing: migration is reshaping communities, global inequalities persist, our digital and physical worlds are merging, and trust in democracy is waning. As a result, the bonds that keep us connected are under pressure. Social cohesion — the invisible thread that shapes our everyday lives in schools, neighbourhoods, online, and at work — is being put to the test. As our societies grow more diverse, and as inequalities and global shifts continue to shape our lives, a pressing question emerges: how do we live together across difference, and what does it take to create lasting unity?

Through the Grand Challenge on Social Cohesion, the Berlin University Alliance brings together researchers, artists, and thinkers from across disciplines to unravel the histories, conditions, and forces that hold us together or pull us apart.

Learn more here. 

How can we improve health beyond borders?

Health is about more than medicine. It is shaped in the homes we live in, the air we breathe, and the water we drink. Social, political, and environmental forces create vast differences in health conditions across the globe, with consequences that cross borders. Infectious diseases spread rapidly through travel and trade; the over- and misuse of antibiotics is generating global antibiotic resistance, making infections more difficult to treat; vaccines remain far more accessible in the global North than the South.

In the gap between need and access, a new kind of health thinking must emerge. Improving well-being worldwide means combining insights from medicine, environmental science, social sciences, law, engineering, and more. The Berlin University Alliance’s Grand Challenge on Global Health unites researchers, policymakers, and practitioners across disciplines to develop new approaches to prevention, treatment, and health systems working toward a healthier future for all. 

Learn more here. 

How do we adapt when water changes?

Water runs through everything: ecosystems, cities, economies, daily life. It sustains health, biodiversity, agriculture, and industry. But as climate change intensifies, water is no longer a stable resource. 

Droughts, floods, and degraded water quality aren't distant risks: they’re altering lives and landscapes now. These changes intersect with urban infrastructure, rural livelihoods, political borders, and ecological systems in ways that test our ability to respond. To navigate these converging pressures, we need more than technical fixes. By consulting the natural and social sciences, as well as engineering, we can understand how water circulates not only through natural systems but also through institutions, policies, and power structures.

In the Berlin-Brandenburg region, researchers from the Berlin University Alliance are tackling these questions through concrete case studies: from flood management to wastewater systems to the preservation of ecosystems and their services. Their work spans three major fronts: understanding the changing drivers of water risks, evaluating the consequences across sectors, and building strategies for implementation. This work is not just about reacting to crisis but about reimagining how we live with water in a climate-altered world.

Learn more here. 

How will quantum technologies change what’s possible?

The invention of the computer has transformed our world, and the digital revolution is still unfolding. But what happens when information technologies begin to rely not only on 1s and 0s, but on the strange rules of quantum physics?

Quantum technologies go beyond classical computation: they could help design catalysts for green energy, simulate proteins for drug discovery, or develop unhackable communication systems. Quantum computers, quantum sensors, and quantum communication networks don’t play by the usual rules. They exploit superposition, entanglement, and quantum interference to process and transmit information in ways that defy classical physics.

For a long time, this was the realm of theory. Today, quantum technologies are becoming real. Now, questions emerge: Which problems in science, industry, or society could only quantum technologies solve? What happens when these new tools leave the lab and enter the wider world? How do we ensure that quantum breakthroughs benefit society broadly, not just a few powerful players? 

In Berlin, researchers of the Berlin University Alliance are joining forces — physicists, computer scientists, mathematicians, social scientists, philosophers, engineers, and entrepreneurs — to explore the potential of the quantum-digital revolution and what it could mean for science, society, and the future of intelligence itself.

Learn more here. 

How do we invent without losing our way? 

Transformation marks our era. As we navigate change, new technologies hold the promise of solutions to major challenges. From care robots supporting the elderly to plant-based proteins building a more sustainable global food system, creative ideas are emerging in many fields to meet the moment. But while innovation is often assumed to be inherently positive, it can also disrupt, exclude, and harm. In a world where developments like artificial intelligence fundamentally alter how we relate to one another innovation carries a profound social responsibility to be sustainable and inclusive. 

This Grand Challenge is about the how: How can innovations at the interface of science and society be designed through participation? How can people be supported in overcoming resistance to change during transformation processes? And which innovations can truly change the game and move us forward?
 

Since its inception, the Grand Challenge Responsible Innovation in Times of Transformation has embraced a participatory approach. Through a collective ideation process, scientists, artists, and Berliners of all ages were invited to co-develop the focus of this research field. Today, researchers from across disciplines of the Berlin University Alliance are working together to place responsibility at the very heart of innovation – developing policy frameworks, shared definitions, guidelines, and methods that make responsible innovation tangible and practicable.

Learn more here.