Blog post

Monday, May 9th

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May 10, 2016

1st  day of the PhD trip to Germany and Switzerland

In the early morning, about 30 scientists were waiting in front of the X-axis till the building opened at 7 a.m. After the doors opened, the PhD trip committee got the last stuff, our beloved PhD trip booklets, and our journey could start with, first stop Aachen University (RWTH). Before arriving at RWTH, we made a nice unplanned touristic tour around Aachen, after which we arrived exactly on time.

At RWTH we were warmly welcomed by an old PhD colleague of professor Remko Boom, professor Mathias Wessling, who now is professor of the chemical process engineering department at RWTH. He introduced RWTH and his department to us, thereby making some nice comments that were especially appreciated by the PhD at RWTH. Subsequently, Remko introduced Wageningen University and our food processing department. Followed by a presentation session, where Anja, Kelly, Martijn, Anton and Izabella presented their PhD topics. After a nice lunch, we got a small lab tour, which was unfortunately due to time limitation a little bit shorter than planned. However, the program had to continue, because still three PhD from RWTH had to present. All three presentation were focused on membranes, thereby showing the expertise RWTH has on that topic. This expertise is of course a nice basis for collaboration, which immediately happened as there were some ratchets prepared with a 3D printer for Jaap to use. After this nice and generous surprise, we had to leave Aachen to continue our journey to Karlsruhe.

After a 4.5 hour bus drive we arrived in Karlsruhe, where we again had a nice unplanned touristic tour around the city. However, now we had a local in our bus who, with a lot of patience, kindly helped the bus driver to find the hostel. At the hostel, dinner as already waiting for us and subsequently the group enjoyed the city center of Karlsruhe with an ice cream in the last bit of sun.