History
 

The cooperation between Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics (DICP) and Germany began in the 1980s and has continued from one generation to the next. The first bridges were established by Prof. Peizhang Lu and Prof. Yukui Zhang, members of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and Prof. E. Bayer and Prof. A. Kettrup from Germany.

Prof. Peizhang Lu was the first scientist to establish the cooperative research on chromatography with Germany through Prof. E. Bayer at the University of Tuebingen, in the early of 1980s. Then more and more Chinese scientists visited Germany, such as Prof. Yukui Zhang, Prof. Bingchen Lin, Prof. Guowang Xu, Prof. Dr. Xiangmim Zhang, Prof. Xinmiao Liang, Prof. Lihua Zhang and others. Prof. Yukui Zhang and Prof. Dr. Xinmiao Liang have established long-term cooperation with Prof. Kettrup in the research field of environmental chemistry, especially in the analysis of trace pollutants and the study of environmental behaviour of organic chemicals.

A pleasant increase in Chinese-German-cooperation has resulted from the work of the Sino-German Cooperation Research (SGCR) group for separation and analysis of complex samples, which was coordinated by Prof. G. Xu (DICP) and Prof. K.-S. Boos (LMU Munich) and which expired at the end of 2009. In the course of this project more than 30 publications in high-impact international scientific journals, two joint poster sessions (Shanghai 2008 and Dresden 2009) and two lecture sessions (Dalian 2007 and Shanghai 2008) at international conferences have been achieved. In October 2012 Prof. Xinmiao Liang and Prof. Oliver J. Schmitz organized a Sino-German workshop in Dalian and 2015 Prof. Lihau Zhang and Prof. Oliver J. Schmitz again another workshop at the University of Duisburg-Essen in Germany. After this successful workshop several bilateral cooperations and the formation of this Virtual Institute will guarantee a long-term cooperation between both countries.