Germany’s Helmholtz Zentrum München is one of the world’s leading research centers. The institute is part of the Helmholtz Association, a community of 18 scientific-technical and medical-biological research centers. Together, they are the largest scientific organization in Europe.
Helmholtz Zentrum München pursues the goals of preventing disease, alleviating suffering and protecting the environment by researching on health threats posed by climate change and environmental pollution. In addition, it develops new approaches to prevent diseases such as diabetes mellitus type 2 or Alzheimer’s disease.
The institute was founded in 1964 as GSF – Forschungszentrum für Umwelt und Gesundheit (Research Center for Environment and Health). It has been based in Neuherberg in Munich since 1972. With around 2,400 employees from 60 nations, Helmholtz Zentrum München is one of Germany’s large research institutions.
Most of its roughly 800 scientists work at two sites: The Environmental Health site focuses on environmentally induced diseases while the Diabetes & Obesity site works on metabolic disorders such as diabetes mellitus type 2. Both sites are located at the Research Campus Großhadern/Martinsried – one of Europe’s most modern biomedical campuses – which also accommodates other renowned institutes such as Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München (LMU), Max Planck Institutes and Deutsches Herzzentrum München (German Heart Center Munich).