About us
The Graduate School
The Bonn and Melbourne Research and Graduate School (Bo&MeRanG) delivers basic and applied science through innovation, international engagement and training of the next generation of scientists.
The Bo&MeRanG is a joint PhD training program in immunology between the University of Melbourne and the University of Bonn. Our PhD candidates are embedded in a structured program with scientific mentors at both locations. The students will spend 2 years at home and 1 year abroad.
Institutes: The University of Melbourne
Established in 1853, the University of Melbourne is an institution that makes distinctive contributions to society in research, learning and teaching, and engagement. It is consistently included among the leading universities in the world, with international rankings of world universities placing it as number 1 in Australia and number 33 in the world (Times Higher Education World University Rankings 2015-2016). The University of Melbourne is located within a cluster of collaborating medical research institutes, including the Royal Melbourne Hospital, the Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre, the Florey Institute of Neuroscience and Mental Health, Walter and Eliza Hall Institute and the Peter Doherty Institute for Infection and Immunity. Currently, there are over 10,000 scientists, doctors, technicians, and nurses and this is expected grow over time.
Faculties are the primary academic bodies of the University, often comprising multiple departments, schools and centres or institutes.The Faculty of Medicine Dentistry and Health Sciences (FMDHS) includes the School of Biomedical Sciences (SBS), of which the Department of Microbiology and Immunology (DMI) is the strongest performing member. Herein more than 120 academic staff, including 18 full Professors, 80 graduate students and around 30 research groups are actively involved in microbiology and immunology research and teaching.
The Department prides itself on excellence in teaching, offering state of the art training in microbiology and immunology using superb training facilities for undergraduate and graduate students. Research in the Department is focused on mechanisms of infection and immunity and the development of new ways to control and treat infectious diseases. The Department is recognised internationally for scientific excellence and leadership across the fields of immunology and microbiology and is home to a number of Australia's most respected biomedical scientists including Nobel Laureate, Professor Peter Doherty AC. Each year the Department attracts around $20 million in competitive grant funding for its research programs. The Department is housed in the Peter Doherty Institute for Infection and Immunity, a state-of-the-art facility that combines research and training in infectious diseases and immunology with diagnostic laboratory services, clinical services and infectious diseases surveillance and epidemiology. The Doherty is home to over 700 staff across six departments.
Institutes: The University of Bonn
The University of Bonn was founded almost 200 years ago and considered to be amongst the most important institutions for higher education in Germany and indeed Europe. The University of Bonn is one of the world's leading research-based Universities with particular focus on research and teaching and this has led to us evolving into the position of a truly prominent international institution.
The University is organized into several Faculties with a large number of institutes, departments and clinics. The Institute of Experimental Immunology (IEI) was founded in 2002. Its scientific mission is to understand the molecular and cellular mechanisms controlling the immune response. Comprehensive knowledge about the physiological regulation of immune tolerance is required to understand the immuno-pathology of chronic inflammation, autoimmunity and perhaps even failure of the immune response to eliminate tumors. Research groups at IEI also join forces to develop novel methods to modulate cell function within tissues using laser-assisted nanoparticle-mediated strategies. Ultimately, we intend to develop new strategies to modulate local immune responses for therapeutic purposes.
The IEI is located in the direct vicinity of the Department of Surgery and Internal Medicine. This allows for efficient interaction with clinician scientists and clinicians, actively contributing to the research topics "Immunology and Infectiology", "Neuro-Sciences" and "Gastrointestinal and Liver Disease". Research group leaders at the IEI join forces not only in pursuing common research projects but to collaborate and develop novel cooperative teaching activities. The Institute of Molecular Medicine and Experimental Immunology is involved in teaching programs for Medical Students such as lecture series, seminars, tutorials and elective periods in the laboratory. The core facility Flow Cytometry at IEI provides extensive state of the art teaching for postgraduates in the latest developments of flow cytometry. The Institute further participates in the novel interdisciplinary study program "Molecular BioMedicine". This program not only entails lectures, seminars and tutorials but also aims to provide students with comprehensive training on well-established and cutting-edge technologies in the laboratory. Since 2006, IEI also participates in the Harvard summer school program where students from Harvard spend an elective period in the Institute.