Annual Cluster Retreat

Last week, we attended the annual inflammation at interfaces cluster retreat in Bad Segeberg. The retreat was divided in two parts, the Post(doc)-retreat (for the young scientist) and the main meeting. The young scientist arrived at the beautiful hotel at the lake on Wednesday.

Ingrid, Sahar and Mariana enjoying the lake

The first day we learned how to present and moderate (scientific) talks and on Thursday we actually tested our new skills. In our own modest opinion, we think we were quite successful. We were standing straight, facing towards the audience, smiling and trying not to speak too fast. The latter is not easy when you are nervous.

Krishan giving a perfect presentation

Mariana who unfortunately did not have a talk, became the expert in giving feedback. Have you heard about the sandwich principle? Mariana managed to take it to a whole new level.

Mariana giving sandwich feedback

In the evenings, we also had time to practice our networking skills. An easy task with a beer or a cocktail. On Thursday night, after the keynote lecture, we had a drink with two of the cluster advisory board members. One from industry and one from academia. In a fun discussion, they told us the pros and cons of each field. Every medal has two sides it seems.


On Friday the PIs also joined the meeting. In the morning sessions we heard talks about the different cluster labs, and in the afternoon talks about the actual research progress. Now being experts in presentation skills, we noticed that despite the PIs giving good talks, there are still minor things they could improve, nobody is perfect though. (Did you notice the sandwich?).

Maria and Ingrid happy after their talks

On Monday, Jeanette told us, that the cluster and also our project was positively evaluated. So we'll be back next year.


 MK, MSP, IB