Top marks for research and development in the PTB

Wissenschaftsrat issues its scientific and political statement on the Physikalisch-Technische Bundesanstalt

This release is available in German.

By order of the German Federal Government, the Wissenschaftsrat evaluates all the federal institutions with research and development assignments. Today the Wissenschaftsrat presented its scientific and political statement about the Physikalisch-Technische Bundesanstalt (PTB) to the public.

The Wissenschaftsrat assesses the R&D work of the Physikalisch-Technische Bundesanstalt as well as its science-based services overall as very good, in places even as excellent. The Bundesanstalt is positioned scientifically and technologically at the forefront of internationally leading national metrology institutes.

The Federal Minister of Economics and Technology, Michael Glos, commented: "I am extremely pleased about the result of the evaluation. The PTB is a flagship for successful technology policies. Now we have to secure this excellence through sustainable forward-looking framework conditions. We will fall back on the competence of the Bundesanstalten (Scientific-technical Federal Institutes) more strongly in the future for our technology policy work, as the Wissenschaftsrat recommends."

The Wissenschaftsrat emphasises thematic focal points of the PTB like precision measuring techniques, medicine, electrical engineering or optics as particularly economically relevant. At the same time, it stresses the model character of the PTB in its close co-operation with other European institutes.