High-Performance Center successful – research continues in the RNApp graduate program

The Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft’s High-Performance Center for Medical and Pharmaceutical Engineering has come to an end after a successful funding period from 2021 to 2024. The initiative involved the Fraunhofer Institutes ITEM in Hannover as the coordinating entity, IST in Braunschweig, and IMTE in Lübeck, bringing together expertise in implant technology, inhalation technology and pharmaceutical process engineering. As part of the program, testing laboratories for neuro and pharmaceutical technology, additive manufacturing and surface analytics were established, alongside the development of technologies such as 3D printing for pharmaceutical and medical applications and innovative approaches in robot-assisted surgery.

The cross-regional network and the capabilities of the participating institutes will continue, with further development driven particularly by the graduate program "RNApp – Applied Research for RNA-Based Drugs in Medical and Pharmaceutical Technology. " RNApp is an interdisciplinary collaborative project supported by the “zukunft.niedersachsen” funding program with 3.2 million euros from the Lower Saxony state government and the Volkswagen Foundation. A dedicated graduate school has been established for this purpose, and the overall project is coordinated by Hannover Medical School (MHH) and, on behalf of Fraunhofer, by Fraunhofer IST.

Even beyond the funding phase, the center’s key research topics will continue to be advanced through twelve doctoral positions at universities, focusing on drug formulation, drying processes, and functional implants. At Fraunhofer ITEM, research will specifically focus on tracking the specificity of drug carriers in inhalation therapy using magnetic particle imaging and the RNA coating of neuroimplants to improve long-term functionality by reducing tissue reactions.