A leading German scientist has become the first recipient of a new research professorship programme which is designed to bring world-class researchers to the Republic.
The €3.5 million award runs for five years, with the scientist taking up a post at the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland.
Prof Jochen Prehn comes to Dublin as Professor of Physiology. He is an international authority on the processes which control the natural death of nerve cells.
Funding comes from Science Foundation Ireland, which has a €646 million budget to support research under the National Development Plan 2002-2006.
The programme is the latest in a series of SFI funding initiatives aimed at boosting the Republic's ability to conduct world-class research. It is intended to help Irish bodies, including the universities, to attract outstanding researchers from outside the State.
SFI is providing €650,000 a year for five years to support Prof Prehn and his research team and to cover associated research costs. Prof Prehn will assemble a research team within the RCSI which will include a wide range of specialisations, according to the foundation.
Prof Prehn was recruited to the Republic from a position as Professor of Experimental Medicine at the Johann Wolfgang Goethe University Clinic in Frankfurt. Before this appointment he was a German Research Foundation research fellow at the University of Chicago.
The chief executive of the RCSI, Prof Kevin O'Malley, welcomed the appointment, saying that Prof Prehn's research expertise would match research already under way at the college.
The SFI director-general, Dr William C. Harris, also welcomed the appointment, saying that outstanding people would help to bolster outstanding science here.