The Leibniz Institute DSMZ - German Collection of Microorganisms and Cell Cultures GmbH (German: ''Leibniz-Institut DSMZ-Deutsche Sammlung von Mikroorganismen und Zellkulturen GmbH''), located in

Braunschweig Braunschweig () or Brunswick ( , from Low German ''Brunswiek'' , Braunschweig dialect: ''Bronswiek'') is a city in Lower Saxony, Germany, north of the Harz Mountains at the farthest navigable point of the river Oker, which connects it to the Nor ...

, is a research infrastructure in the Leibniz Association. Also the DSMZ is the world's most diverse collection of bioresources (status 2021: 75,000 bioresources). These include microorganisms (including more than 32,000

bacterial Bacteria (; singular: bacterium) are ubiquitous, mostly free-living organisms often consisting of one biological cell. They constitute a large domain of prokaryotic microorganisms. Typically a few micrometres in length, bacteria were among ...

strains, 690

archaeal Archaea ( ; singular archaeon ) is a domain of single-celled organisms. These microorganisms lack cell nuclei and are therefore prokaryotes. Archaea were initially classified as bacteria, receiving the name archaebacteria (in the Archaebac ...

strains, 7,000 strains of

yeasts Yeasts are eukaryotic, single-celled microorganisms classified as members of the fungus kingdom. The first yeast originated hundreds of millions of years ago, and at least 1,500 species are currently recognized. They are estimated to constitut ...

and fungi) as well as more than 840 human and animal

cell cultures Cell culture or tissue culture is the process by which cells are grown under controlled conditions, generally outside of their natural environment. The term "tissue culture" was coined by American pathologist Montrose Thomas Burrows. This te ...

, over 1. 500

plant viruses Plant viruses are viruses that affect plants. Like all other viruses, plant viruses are obligate intracellular parasites that do not have the molecular machinery to replicate without a host. Plant viruses can be pathogenic to higher plants. M ...

, over 940

bacteriophages A bacteriophage (), also known informally as a ''phage'' (), is a duplodnaviria virus that infects and replicates within bacteria and archaea. The term was derived from "bacteria" and the Greek φαγεῖν ('), meaning "to devour". Bacter ...

, and 250 plasmids (status 2021). Since 2010, the scientific director of the Leibniz Institute DSMZ has been Jörg Overmann, a microbiologist with a PhD. He holds a professorship in microbiology at the

Technical University of Braunschweig The Technische Universität Braunschweig (unofficially University of Braunschweig – Institute of Technology), commonly referred to as TU Braunschweig, is the oldest ' (comparable to an institute of technology in the American system) in Germany ...

. Since August 2018, he has led the institute in a dual leadership with Bettina Fischer as administrative director.

History

Structure

Nearly 200 scientists and technical staff currently work at the DSMZ. It is a company/non-profit organization recognized as a public benefit. In 2018, the Leibniz Institute DSMZ was recognized as the world's first registered collection under Directive (European Union) 511/2014, providing all users with the necessary legal certainty in the handling of their bioresources in accordance with the so-called Nagoya Protocol. The DSMZ is a partner in international organizations such as the European Culture Collections' Organisation (ECCO), the

World Federation for Culture Collections The World Federation for Culture Collections is an international body formed under the umbrella of the International Union of Biological Sciences and a Federation within the International Union of Microbiological Societies. The WFCC operates as a ...

(WFCC) and the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF).

Functions

DSMZ is a global service provider with more than 10,000 customers in over 80 countries and provides microorganisms and cell cultures for university, non-university and industrial research in the life sciences. It also serves as a patent and security depository for biological material (a total of over 11,700 bioresources) in accordance with the guidelines of the

Budapest Treaty The Budapest Treaty on the International Recognition of the Deposit of Microorganisms for the Purposes of Patent Procedure, or Budapest Treaty, is an international treaty signed in Budapest, Hungary, on April 28, 1977. It entered into force on A ...

. It is the only patent depository for bioresources in Germany. The DSMZ only holds bioresources in biosafety level 1 and 2. In 2012, the freely accessible database BacDive (The Bacterial Diversity Metadatabase) was established, which is maintained and curated by the DSMZ. The database contains information on a wide variety of strains of prokaryotes; in 2016, information on 53,978 strains could be found there, and by 2021, the number had increased to more than 82,000.

Departments

In addition to the research departments ''Microbial Ecology and Diversity Research'' and ''Microbial Genome Research'', the eight departments of the DSMZ include the collection departments ''Microorganisms'', ''Bioresources for Bioeconomy and Health Research'', ''Human and Animal Cell Lines'' and ''Plant Viruses'' as well as the departments ''Services'' and ''Bioinformatics and Databases''. The establishment of independent junior research groups (as of 2021: ''VirusInteract'' (interactions of plant viruses with their hosts) and ''Microbial Biotechnology'') provides qualification opportunities for young scientists conducting research on selected, current topics.

References

{{Leibniz Association Leibniz Association Organisations based in Braunschweig Medical research institutes in Germany Microbiology organizations Culture collections Medical and health organisations based in Lower Saxony Organizations established in 1969