Rostock

Rostock is the largest city in Mecklenburg Western Pomerania, with around 210,000 residents and situated where the Warnow river meets the Baltic Sea. A member of the Hanseatic League since 1283, the city still carries that legacy in its striking brick-Gothic churches, the historic Kröpeliner Tor gate, and the lively harbour along the Warnow. Beyond its maritime and merchant history, Rostock today is a green, youthful city — nowhere more so than in the Kröpeliner-Tor-Vorstadt (KTV), the artsy, student-driven neighbourhood built around the old gate, known for its cafés, street art, and relaxed atmosphere.

Warnemünde, Rostock's seaside district, began as a small fishing village over 800 years ago and has been part of the city since 1323. Its landmark is the roughly 37-metre lighthouse, completed in 1898, standing right next to the distinctive curved "Teepott" building. The "Alte Strom," a historic waterside promenade lined with fishing boats, cafés, and gabled houses, is perfect for a stroll, and the district's wide sandy beaches make it one of the most popular seaside resorts on the German Baltic coast. 

Founded in 1419, the University of Rostock is the oldest university in the Baltic Sea region and one of the oldest in Germany. Guided by its motto "Traditio et Innovatio," it combines more than 600 years of academic tradition with present-day research, currently enrolling around 12,800 students across more than 100 degree programmes in ten faculties. Among the notable figures linked to its history is Albert Einstein, who received one of his honorary doctorate here in 1919. The university's main building, completed in 1870 in the Mecklenburg Renaissance style, remains a striking architectural landmark in the city centre. 

The Institute of Chemistry at the University of Rostock builds on the scientific tradition of the university itself, the oldest in the Baltic Sea region, and has grown into a research-driven institute at the interface of chemistry, physics, and materials science. A flagship of its research profile is work on reactive pnictogen (phosphorus/nitrogen) chemistry, which has produced some of the first isolable, stable biradicals — a discovery distinctive enough that the institute's own logo depicts this landmark biradical structure.

The institute offers Bachelor's and Master's degrees in Chemistry and Business Chemistry, with strong integration of research into teaching and specialization tracks across inorganic, organic, physical, analytical, and technical/environmental chemistry. Additionally, a state examination for a chemistry teaching degree may be undertaken as well. Research is organized around several core strengths: in inorganic and synthetic chemistry, research groups investigate pnictogen and phosphorus chemistry, biradicaloids, and the activation of small molecules; in physical and theoretical chemistry, work focuses on ionic liquids and hydrogen-bond networks using NMR relaxometry and vibrational spectroscopy; and in analytical chemistry, research groups develop mass spectrometry and ion-mobility methods for characterizing aerosols and complex environmental samples. The DFG-funded Research Training Group GRK 2943 "SPECTRE" further anchors the institute's expertise in spectroscopic and mass-spectrometric method development.

Rostock's chemistry also thrives on close ties to two Leibniz Institutes: LIKAT, the Leibniz Institute for Catalysis located directly on campus, one of Europes leading centers for applied catalysis, and IOW, the Leibniz Institute for Baltic Sea Research in nearby Warnemünde. Both provide chemistry students and researchers with direct access to applied, large-scale research infrastructure. Chemistry is additionally embedded in the university's interdisciplinary Department of Life, Light & Matter (LLM), which brings together chemists, physicists, engineers, and biomedical researchers in a shared research building to study processes at the atomic and molecular level — from light–matter interaction to functional materials and biohybrid systems — fostering exactly the kind of cross-disciplinary collaboration that defines Rostock's approach to chemistry today.