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Franziska Gießler is to be honored as an outstanding master’s graduate of Heidelberg University. Her scientific potential with respect to the doctoral phase she has just begun, and to a subsequent career in academic research, has earned her the Marie-Luise Jung Prize. The award, jointly initiated by the university with the Constituted Student Body and the Doctoral Convention, is granted by the Faculty of Biosciences. Prize-winner Franziska Gießler studied biochemistry in Heidelberg and is now working on her doctoral thesis in Amsterdam. The academic ceremony to award the prize is to take place in the Great Hall of the Old University on 21 April 2026.
Press Release
Heidelberg, 14 April 2026
Award Goes to Outstanding Heidelberg Master’s Student
Biochemist Franziska Gießler receives fourth edition of Marie-Luise Jung Prize
Franziska Gießler is to be honored as an outstanding master’s graduate of Heidelberg University. Her scientific potential with respect to the doctoral phase she has just begun, and to a subsequent career in academic research, has earned her the Marie-Luise Jung Prize. The award, jointly initiated by the university with the Constituted Student Body and the Doctoral Convention, is granted by the Faculty of Biosciences; the prize commemorates the biology student killed during a shooting four years ago, whose express wish was to embark on such an academic career at Heidelberg University. Prize-winner Franziska Gießler studied biochemistry in Heidelberg and is now working on her doctoral thesis in Amsterdam. The academic ceremony to award the prize is to take place in the Great Hall of the Old University on 21 April 2026.
The key reason for selecting the prize-winner, alongside excellent achievements during her course with its focus on RNA nanotechnology, was the special quality of her master’s thesis, which Franziska Gießler wrote at the Center for Molecular Biology of Heidelberg University (ZMBH) in Prof. Dr Kerstin Göpfrich’s research group. It deals with certain nanostructures based on ribonucleic acid (RNA) and assembling into what are called droplets. The prize-winner was able to show that the dynamics of these structures can be controlled and genetically programmed through ribozymes. In addition, droplets can be produced from mixtures of various RNA molecules which divide into different populations after cleavage. “These findings open up new prospects of producing minimal artificial cell systems. It could be conceivable, for example, to use such RNA droplets in future as intelligent substance carriers in order to enable more precise and personalized therapies,” says Prof. Dr Walter Nickel, Dean of Studies at the Faculty of Biosciences. The results of these research studies at the ZMBH have been published in the journal “Angewandte Chemie”.
Franziska Gießler completed her bachelor and master’s course in biochemistry at Heidelberg University with a research period at ETH Zurich (Switzerland). She was supported by a qualification scholarship from the Carl Zeiss Stiftung in the last year of her program. For her master’s thesis Franziska Gießler has already received the Prize of the Biotechnology Future Forum. It is awarded by DECHEMA, the society for chemical engineering and biotechnology. In November 2025, Franziska Gießler began her doctoral work at the AMOLF research institute for the physics of functional complex matter in Amsterdam (Netherlands). There she is researching new methods for the construction of minimal biological systems.
Prof. Dr Frauke Melchior, Rector of Heidelberg University, will open this year’s academic ceremony to award the Marie-Luise Jung Prize. Sebastian Fath, chair of the Constituted Student Body, and Oliver Kübeck for the Doctoral Convention will bring greetings. The tribute to Franziska Gießler will come from the Dean of Studies of the Faculty of Biosciences. After Prof. Melchior has presented the award, the prize-winner will report on her scientific studies. Members of the Collegium Musicum, conducted by University Music Director Michael Sekulla, will provide a musical setting for the award ceremony.
In 2022, the Rectorate and the governing bodies of the Constituted Student Body and the Doctoral Convention decided, in consultation with the Faculty of Biosciences and the victim’s family, that a prize would be initiated in memory of the 23-year-old student who lost her life, and financed over a period of 20 years. The Marie-Luise Jung Prize comes with 1,500 euros in prize money and is awarded annually during an academic ceremony.
Note to newsrooms:
The academic award ceremony for the Marie-Luise Jung Prize is taking place on 21 April 2026 in the Great Hall of the Old University, starting at 6.30pm. Media representatives are invited to attend and report. Photos and videos are only possible by arrangement with the press office. Registration is requested by 20 April by email to presse@rektorat.uni-heidelberg.de
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