TRAINING

The Summer schools form the major part of the joint coursework within our International Research Training Group. All TransTiP members from China and Germany will meet annually at a jointly organized Summer School, which will be held in China in the first two years and in Germany in the third year.

Every second year the Summer School is organized jointly by TransTiP and the Third-Pole-Environment-Programme (TPE). These Summer schools already have a long history in Sino-German cooperation (starting during the Priority Programme TiP) and bring together students and researchers from various countries.

For our Summer Schools we invite international guest speakers, so our trainees will meet some of the world`s best researchers on Bio-Geosciences. In addition, hands on practical courses as well as field excursion allow for strengthened cross-discipline collaboration between the members of TransTiP.

The Research Seminars provide an important platform for internal information transfer between participants; PI’s and associated members of the IRTG.

Thesis Proposal Defense

During the first Research Seminar for each cohort, all doctoral and postdoctoral researchers have to give short talks to introduce all TransTiP members to their individual research topic. Assessment and recommendations are offered by the advisory teams as well as peers during lively discussions.

Research Seminars

In these seminars the doctoral researchers give poster presentations on the status of their research using the Marketplace Method (Marktplatz-Methode). This method allows at the same time training of presentation skills and intensive discussions with all participants, fostering the interconnectivity between individual projects. The quality of the presentation as well as discussion is assessed by the participating advisors and recommendations were given.

Scientific short courses include methodological workshops as well as practical training courses. The PI’s of TransTiP present overview lectures about their research to foster across discipline collaboration and discussion between the participants. Doctoral researchers participate as instructors in their respective field areas and research topics and present and discuss the methods required for their experiments with their colleagues. This will allow doctoral and postdoctoral fellows to broaden their horizon supporting their development and career.

Every participating lab will offer practical training courses where the graduates will learn new techniques and therefore gain knowledge beneficial for their projects and consistent with their special aptitudes. Of course, graduates may also attend practical courses and research visits in non-member-labs, if appropriate. 

TrasnTiP offers a diversified programme of state-of-the-art transferable skill courses, in collaboration with the university Graduate Schools GradTUBS and GRANAT, the university libraries and Research Services. Part of the transferable skill training is also included in the Summer Schools offered by TransTiP.

Courses organized by TransTiP are:

Rules on Good Scientific Practice  ▪  Research Data management  ▪  Introduction to R  ▪  Introduction to science communication  ▪  Scientific Writing  ▪  Graphic Design  ▪  Philosophy of Science  ▪  Proposal Writing  ▪  Funding opportunities for Postdoctoral Researchers

Doctoral researchers are also expected to propose additional events fulfilling their interests and requirements of their own.

Additional qualification courses

are offered by the Graduate Schools of TUBS, LUH and FSUJ. These may include courses such as Scientific Writing, Time and Self Management, Project Management, Communication, Moderation and Presentation Techniques, Conflict Management, Career Planning, University Didactics, Business Etiquette, Leadership Training,  Professional English etc.

Check out the respective websites for further information:
Graduate Academy GradTUBS, Braunschweig
GRANAT – The GRAduate School of NATural Sciences, Hannover
Graduate Academy, FSU Jena

Exchange of doctoral researchers between partner institutions is a mandatory part of the structured training programme.

Each participating working group in Germany has at least one working group in China with similar research interests and thus every doctoral researcher will be able to identify the appropriate lab for his/her research focus. Doctoral researchers of TransTiP will stay for at least six months within the Chinese partner institution. After the first fieldwork campaign to the Tibetan Plateau (4 weeks), doctoral researchers will stay in Lhasa / Beijing for two months in order to get to know the team as well as the complementary methods available at the partner institution. The second visit will be realized directly after the second fieldwork campaign.

The visits will be designed to provide sufficient time to learn specific research techniques and to allow the opportunity to experience research in a foreign environment. During their stay at the partner institution, doctoral researchers are part of the institutes training environment consisting of weekly research seminars and/or guest seminars and will be supervised by the respective Chinese advisor.

In addition to the exchange of doctoral researchers between partner institutions, the IRTG will support

• Research visits to national and international laboratories
• Participation in national or international congresses

The visiting researcher program allows doctoral researchers to invite guest scientists who they anticipate will support their own research / education. Doctoral researchers will be actively involved in the selection, invitation and on-the-spot support of the guests and we will create a wealth of interaction possibilities with the guests in order to establish new personal relations. We aim at inviting high-ranking scientists to our summer schools and for long-term visits (up to 1 month).
Our visiting researcher program will also contain “Alumni days”, inviting TransTiP-Alumni for talks and information on their career development.