History of the FriMat

2006: Founding of FriMat by funding of the first two groups in the Physics Department of the University of Fribourg by Dr. h. c. Adolphe Merkle for research on hard and soft materials.

2007: The University of Fribourg sets a research focus on Nano-Materials. FriMat increases by several new members of the Geosciences, Physics and Chemistry Departments of the University of Fribourg. Donation of 100 Mio CHF by Adolphe Merkle into the Adolphe Merkle Foundation, strongly supporting research in the field of Nano-Materials.

2008: FriMat increases to seven members, all research groups are involved in materials research. In parallel, a new Institute, the Adolphe-Merkle-Institute (AMI) is founded.

2009: FriMat runs with nine members in total, two of which are involved in AMI. FriMat gets its statutes and has a budget of ca. 8 Mio CHF/year, provided by the University of Fribourg, third party funding and a contribution by the Adolphe Merkle Foundation.

2011: Two new members joined the FriMat, Prof. Joseph Brader from the department of Physics and Prof. Andreas Kilbinger from the departement of Chemistry.

2012: One new member joined the FriMat, Prof. Marco Lattuada from the Adolphe-Merkle-Institute (AMI), now in the Chemisty Department.

2015: Three new members joined the FriMat, Prof. Antoine Weiss from the department of Physics, Prof.  Nico Bruns and prof. Ullrich Steiner from the Adolphe-Merkle-Institute (AMI).

2016: One new member joined the FriMat, Prof. Andreas Zumbühl from the department of Chemistry.

2017: One new member joined the FriMat, Prof. Michael Mayer from the AMI.

2018: Four new members joined the FriMat, Prof. Ali Coskun from department of Chemistry, Prof. Claude Monney, Prof. Ana Akrap and Prof. Guillermo Acuna from the department of Physics. Two members leave the FriMat Prof. Antoine Weiss and Prof. Andreas Zumbühl.