University LEMS Building: “Spatial Expression of a Scientific Idea”
12 November 2025
New research building for the engineering of life-inspired molecular systems – ceremony marks official launch of a groundbreaking large-scale scheme
“What is emerging here is far more than a building. It is the spatial expression of a scientific idea that arose from our university’s Excellence Strategy.” Prof. Dr Frauke Melchior, Rector of Ruperto Carola, made this statement at the launch of a groundbreaking large-scale scheme at the university. To advance the development of innovative engineering science strategies and technologies based on life-inspired molecular systems, Heidelberg University is set to get a new research facility. The building for “Life-inspired Engineering Molecular Systems” (LEMS) is being constructed on the Im Neuenheimer Feld campus and will, in future, provide both workspaces and large-scale instruments for an interdisciplinary research program at the interface of engineering sciences, natural sciences and life sciences.
The German Science and Humanities Council had previously recommended the research building for funding to the Joint Science Conference, rating it as “outstanding”. The large-scale scheme, financed by the Federal Government and the State of Baden-Württemberg, has a total budget of approximately 70 million euros. Just under 58 million euros of this is allocated to construction costs, one quarter of which will be covered by the university. Around 12 million euros will go into infrastructure, in particular into equipping the facility with various large-scale research instruments. Construction is scheduled to be completed by July 2028, which will allow the LEMS building to be commissioned and officially inaugurated in December 2028. A ceremony for the unveiling of the construction sign took place on 11 November 2025 to mark the official launch of the project, which is attached to the Faculty of Engineering Sciences.
In the Rector’s words, the LEMS building is “in a direct line of strategic developments that have turned a scientific vision into a lasting structure – and, at the same time, it stands at the start of a new phase in which this research is gaining ground and taking shape”. With the nationally and internationally trailblazing research field of Engineering Molecular Systems, the university has established a new interdisciplinary focus priority within the Excellence Strategy, which, as a driver of innovation, offers high potential for transfer and translation. Prof. Melchior: “The LEMS idea is characteristic of Heidelberg University. We understand ourselves a comprehensive research university, deriving its strength precisely from the variety and interlinking of its subjects. We know about the potential to be found at the interface of disciplines.”
During the ceremony, Prof. Dr Christine Selhuber-Unkel and Prof. Dr Peer Fischer, members of the Board of Directors of the Institute for Molecular Systems Engineering and Advanced Materials (IMSEAM), explained the content of the research program. Here researchers from materials science, physics, chemistry, biology, medicine and artificial intelligence will collaborate with the goal of investigating artificial cell systems that respond autonomously and dynamically, and developing micro- and nanosystems inspired by nature. Life-inspired systems of this kind are not in thermal equilibrium; they change actively, can repair themselves and respond to external stimuli. This new form of “engineering” is also intended to be translated into novel applications such as energy-efficient technologies, examples being 3D-printed sensors or medical diagnostics. Hence there will also be close cooperation with scientists from the Medical Faculties in the context of LEMS.
The “Life-inspired Engineering Molecular Systems” building is going up on a building site adjoining IMSEAM and Heidelberg University’s physics institutes. The five-storey complex with a usable floor area of around 3,600 square meters marks the starting point of the “next major development stage”, explains Marco Grübbel, head of the Mannheim and Heidelberg office of the state assets and construction company Vermögen und Bau. Numerous sustainability aspects will be taken into account in the construction of the LEMS building. The façade will be constructed using timber framing and equipped with semi-transparent photovoltaic modules. Besides generating electricity, they will also provide protection from the sun and heat. There are also plans to use rainwater for evaporative cooling. Additionally, a green roof – also equipped with photovoltaics – will serve as a retention area during heavy rainfall. In his greeting, First Mayor of the City of Heidelberg Jürgen Odszuck stressed that it was the first building to follow the master plan for the Neuenheimer Feld.