The Cologne Excellence Cluster on Cellular Stress Responses in Aging-associated Diseases (CECAD) will be the unifying driving force bringing together researchers and clinicians at the University of Cologne with researchers at the new Max Planck Institute for Biology of Aging in a unique research venture to advance understanding in this field. The mission of CECAD will be to unravel the molecular mechanisms underlying lifespan regulation and aging-associated diseases to set the ground to achieve its long-term objective of developing novel therapeutic interventions.

Directed towards gifted physics students with a Bachelors degree in physics, the Bonn-Cologne Graduate School of Physics and Astronomyis a 5-year graduate honors program leading directly to the PhD. The Graduate School is proud to be among the winners of the German Excellence Iniative as of October 2007.