The Leibniz Institute for Resilience Research (LIR) is a non-university research institute in which neurobiologists, physicists, physicians, and psychologists investigate the phenomenon of resilience, i.e. the ability to maintain or restore mental health during or after stressful life events, in an interdisciplinary manner. Its main goal is to understand resilience mechanisms from a neuroscientific point of view, to develop respective interventions to promote resilience, and to foster changes in living and working environments in such a way that resilience is strengthened. Thus, the LIR is addressing one of the currently most pressing societal questions and is the first institute of its kind in Europe.
Research at the LIR is interdisciplinary as well as translational and focusses on three research areas, with three to four research groups each: molecular and cellular resilience mechanisms, systemic mechanisms of resilience, and cognitive and behavioral resilience mechanisms. By these methodological approaches, research at the LIR makes is possible to decode the mechanisms underlying resilience at the molecular and cellular level as well as at the level of neuronal networks in humans and animals, and to develop interventions that promote resilience and to test their effectiveness. In line with the motto "theoria cum praxi", the LIR also makes this knowledge available to the society by offering training and advise on the subject of resilience, by developing target groupspecific resilience trainings, and by collecting and disseminating evidence-based knowledge on the topic of resilience.
The LIR cooperates closely with the University and University Medical Center in Mainz, and all group leaders are also professors at the University of Mainz. LIR scientists are involved in the DFG Collaborative Research Center 1193 "Neurobiology of Resilience" and in the EU research program "DynaMORE". The LIR also offers services by its platforms for external scientists in the area of conducting clinical studies as well as behavioral analyses and high-resolution imaging procedures in animals.
