Projects, Prices & Professorships
Your commitment creates change, drives progress, and inspires: thanks to the contributions of our donors, we support projects in research, teaching, talent development, and campus life: from co-funding the “Climate Informed Engineering” Research Training Group to the WorkINGLab and the student robot football team.
Science awards such as the Karl H. Ditze Prize and the Science Award of the Gisela and Erwin Sick Foundation recognise outstanding ideas and final theses. Endowed professorships and junior research groups strengthen profile-shaping topics and foster the next generation of engineers in the long term.
On this page, we present a selection of funded projects, awards, and endowed professorships.
Our sincere thanks go to everyone who makes this impact possible.
Endowed Professorships
An endowed professorship makes it possible to establish new research areas and teaching priorities at TU Hamburg in a targeted manner.
There are currently four endowed professorships made possible through the commitment of our donors.
For donors, they offer the opportunity to sustainably support relevant research topics, provide impulses for innovation, and create a visible link between their engagement and the academic development at TU Hamburg.
In this way, they make a direct contribution to the future of science, industry, and society.
Endowed Science Awards
Each year, research and science awards funded by donors are awarded at TU Hamburg.
The most prominent awards are the Science Awards of the Gisela and Erwin Sick Foundation, which recognise excellent final theses (doctoral dissertations, master’s theses, and bachelor’s theses), as well as the Karl H. Ditze Prize, awarded annually in two categories: Innovative Student Ideas and Initiatives and Outstanding Final Theses.
e-gnition - Electric Racing Cars Made by TUHH Students
Designing, building, and bringing an electric race car across the finish line on Europe’s racetracks within just one year – that is the mission of Formula Student. Since 2012, e-gnition, the TU Hamburg team consisting of nearly 60 students from all degree programmes, has taken part in this competition every year with great success.
In 2017, the team achieved ninth place at Formula Student Germany, which is held annually at the Hockenheimring and is considered the most prestigious Formula Student event worldwide. They also won the coveted Autonomous Design Award, presented to the team with the best concept for autonomous functionality.
The students work with new and alternative materials as well as state-of-the-art manufacturing technologies. In addition to the main sponsor, NXP Semiconductors Germany GmbH, e-gnition is supported by Dow Deutschland Anlagengesellschaft mbH and the Foundation for the Advancement of the Hamburg University of Technology.
HULKs – The TUHH Robot Football Team
Enthusiasm, diligence, commitment, and perseverance are essential for success. That is why joint projects are so important—projects in which these qualities are combined with both theory and practice. Since 2013, the HULKs have exemplified this principle in an outstanding way.
Their goal is to participate in national and international robot football competitions, such as the RoboCup. For a commercial robot hardware platform, NAO, the team developed its own custom software framework. Working in groups, students tackle a wide range of challenges in the fields of robotics, artificial intelligence, computer science, electrical engineering, and mechanical engineering.
In 2017, the HULKs won the world championship title in the “Mixed Team” category at the 21st international RoboCup World Championship in Nagoya, Japan. Beyond competitions, the HULKs are actively involved in STEM outreach across the Hamburg Metropolitan Region, offering young people insights into computer science and humanoid robotics.
With their strong motivation and expertise, the HULKs also inspire their supporters: Alfons Haar Maschinenbau, ibeo Automotive Systems, IAV Automotive Engineering, freiheit.com, Hamburger Sparkasse, Dow Deutschland, and TUHH.
Supporting Mobility to the USA
Both the University of California, Berkeley, and the University of Waterloo are among the leading universities in North America. TU Hamburg has maintained partnerships with both institutions for more than 20 years. Through exchange programmes funded by the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD), high-achieving TU Hamburg students have the opportunity to study in Berkeley and Waterloo, gain new insights, and gather valuable experience. A key requirement for DAAD funding is active exchange in both directions.
Thanks to contributions from Cylad Consulting GmbH, several students from Berkeley have already been able to spend time at TU Hamburg at the Institute for Mechanics and Ocean Engineering. This generous support was initiated by Dr. Steffen Petersen, a TU Hamburg alumnus and former participant in this exchange programme. In addition, several TU Hamburg institutes across different departments offer research internships for students from Waterloo.
KinderForscher at TUHH
Hardly any professional group in Germany is as sought after as engineers, computer scientists, and natural scientists. What began in 2007 with 125 pupils has since inspired more than 5,500 children from 91 schools across the Hamburg Metropolitan Region. This refers to the project KinderForscher at TUHH, initiated by Gesine Liese and Prof. Dr. Andreas Liese.
Since then, together with their team, they have been providing schools with experiment kits containing materials on exciting everyday science topics, enabling teachers to offer customised courses. Demand for these kits continues to grow and now exceeds the available supply.
Other initiatives—such as Experimenting and Exploring, in which primary school pupils conduct experiments in their classrooms on a weekly rotation and visit various TU Hamburg institutes, or the Nachwuchscampus, which aims to spark interest in STEM careers among students from grades 7 to 11 through collaborations with companies—are becoming more popular every year.
Thanks to the support of Airbus Operations GmbH and the Sigma Aldrich Foundation, children can develop an interest in STEM subjects at an early age.
WorkINGLab
The WorkINGLab is the place where students can realise their projects, whether as part of a course or independently.For instructors, it offers the opportunity to design inspiring, practice-oriented teaching. The workshop provides a wide range of machines, 46 fully equipped workbench stations (across the wood, metal, and mechatronics work areas), as well as a teaching room for larger events equipped with a projection screen for presentations. Students can book workspaces and receive support in carrying out their projects from a workshop manager and student assistants.
The WorkINGLab is funded by the Gisela and Erwin Sick Foundation.
Campusperle
Campusperle is the brewing collective of the Hamburg University of Technology, where students and staff brew beer together and engage with the technology and processes of brewing.
Its activities are funded by the TU Hamburg Foundation. The beer brewed by Campusperle is served at campus events—such as alumni gatherings like Homecoming—and is very popular.
As a community-oriented project, it strengthens exchange and networking on campus.
Junior Research Group on Nanofluidic Energy Materials
The junior research group “Nanofluidic Energy Materials” will be funded by the Joachim Herz Foundation from 2025 within the BlueMat Cluster of Excellence. It is part of Research Area D: Energy Materials and follows the guiding principle: “If it can be done with water, then do it with water.”
The group focuses on water-based energy storage and conversion processes in nanoconfined and porous structures. Its work includes developing supercapacitors and batteries with safe, sustainable aqueous electrolytes and investigating hydrovoltaic effects for harnessing humidity and low-temperature heat. In addition, the group conducts research on photo- and electrocatalysis for water splitting and CO₂ reduction.
The goal is to develop scalable electrode materials and energy-efficient systems.
Research Training Group "Climate Informed Engineering"
The “Climate Informed Engineering” (CIE) Research Training Group, funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG), will train a new generation of engineers at TU Hamburg from October 2025 onwards who integrate climate information directly into technologies and materials.
The funding will run for an initial period of five years with a total of around €7 million; in total, approximately 20 early-career researchers will be trained. The goal is to use up-to-date climate data to develop robust infrastructures, climate-adapted materials, and sustainable processes—closely interlinking engineering with climate science.
The research and training are carried out in cooperation with leading partners, including the Max Planck Institute for Meteorology and the United Nations University (UNU-INWEH). In addition to the DFG, the Gustav-Polensky Foundation co-funds the programme, thereby strengthening the establishment of this new research area at TU Hamburg.
