Balance of the Microverse

What Balance of the Microverse does

Balance of the Microverse is a Cluster of Excellence (Exzellenzcluster) housed at Friedrich Schiller University Jena, Thuringia, Germany, and funded by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) under Germany's Excellence Strategy (EXC 2051, Project-ID 390713860). Founded in 2019, the cluster investigates microbial community dynamics — how microorganisms produce and decode signals, how microbial communities are structured across alpha-, beta-, and gamma-diversity levels, and how microbial communities transition between states. It integrates five university faculties (Biological Sciences, Chemistry and Earth Sciences, Medicine, Mathematics and Computer Science, Physics and Astronomy) with four Leibniz Institutes (HKI, IPHT, FLI), four Max Planck Institutes (Chemical Ecology, Biogeochemistry, Geoanthropology, Evolutionary Anthropology), and Jena University Hospital. The cluster's value proposition centers on transferring ecological concepts into medicine for targeted interventions in microbiome-related disease, with technology transfer outputs targeted at agriculture, environmental protection, and healthcare.

The cluster's research infrastructure includes the Microverse Imaging Center (advanced fluorescence microscopy for high spatio-temporal resolution imaging), a Research Data Management unit running BEXIS2 (FAIR data management) and OMERO (image data across 140+ file formats), and proprietary experimental platforms including high-throughput droplet microfluidics, the JenXplor robotics platform, organ-on-chip tissue-microbe models, and the Photonic Space initiative. The award-winning "Into the Microverse" 360-degree planetarium film (Janus Fulldome Audio Award 2024) supports science communication. The Jena School for Microbial Communication (JSMC) graduate school trains over 130 doctoral and postdoctoral scientists. Outputs are disseminated through publications, seminars, conference presentations, the Scientist Exchange Program, and a multi-channel outreach operation (Bluesky, LinkedIn, YouTube, newsletter, planetarium distribution).

The revenue model is a government research grant from the DFG Excellence Strategy (sole confirmed funding stream), with the cluster entering its second seven-year funding period in 2026 and additionally receiving Thuringia state funding for early-career researchers through 2028. There are no commercial customers, no disclosed pricing model, and no commercial product revenue. The go-to-market is community-led: collaborative research networks, publications, seminars, conferences, the Scientist Exchange Program, and technology-transfer partnerships with industry. The cluster is led by Spokesperson Kirsten Küsel (since 2022), with an Executive Manager (Angela Köhler) and a board including representatives from partner institutes, and operates as a unit within Friedrich Schiller University Jena rather than as a separate legal entity.

Name

Balance of the Microverse

Legal name

Exzellenzcluster »Balance of the Microverse« - Friedrich Schiller Universität Jena

Website

https://microverse-cluster.de

Company type

Private

Founded year

2019

Operating status

Operating

Headcount range

101–250 employees

Short description

Balance of the Microverse is a DFG-funded academic Cluster of Excellence at Friedrich Schiller University Jena that investigates microbial community dynamics across ecosystems, serving the scientific research community through multi-institutional collaboration, graduate training, and technology transfer.

Ownership category

akta.pro rank

Product category

Academic Microbiome Research

NAICS

Research and Development in Biotechnology (except Nanobiotechnology) (541714), Scientific Research and Development Services (5417)

SIC

Services-Commercial Physical & Biological Research (8731)

akta.pro primary industry

Microbiome & Metagenomics Services (HLAGANAH)

Keywords

• Microbiome research
• Microbial ecology
• Academic research cluster
• Microbial communication
• Biophotonic technologies

Headquarters

HQ city

Jena

HQ country

Germany

HQ region

Europe

Offices1 record

Markets served

GTM type

B2B

Offering type

Services

Cost components

Personnel, Technology or R&D, Infrastructure, Operations, Marketing or Sales

Revenue model

1. DFG Excellence Strategy Funding: Funded by Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (German Research Foundation) under Germany's Excellence Strategy - EXC 2051 - Project-ID 390713860. The cluster enters its next seven-year funding period in 2026.

Go-to-market motion1 record

Distribution channels2 records

Marketing channels7 records

Core offering

Balance of the Microverse is a DFG-funded Cluster of Excellence that conducts interdisciplinary research on microbial community dynamics across ecosystems (soils, oceans, host-associated systems) and translates ecological concepts into targeted medical interventions. Its portfolio includes research services, advanced imaging and data management infrastructure, graduate training through the Jena School for Microbial Communication, technology transfer, and science communication products such as the award-winning planetarium film »Into the Microverse«.

Product overview

Balance of the Microverse is a Cluster of Excellence at Friedrich Schiller University Jena focused on microbiome research. It is NOT a product company but rather an academic research institution. The organization offers a portfolio of research services and infrastructure including: the Microverse Imaging Center providing advanced fluorescence microscopy; Research Data Management platforms (BEXIS2, OMERO) supporting FAIR data principles; the award-winning planetarium film 'Into the Microverse'; and the Jena School for Microbial Communication (JSMC) for graduate training. The portfolio centers on exploring microbial interactions across ecosystems to understand and maintain essential microbial balance, with applications in environmental and human health.

Differentiator

Problem solved

Functional benefit

Brands

• Microverse Center Jena: New research building for the Balance of the Microverse cluster, with official opening scheduled for October 5.
• Microverse Imaging Center
• Jena School for Microbial Communication (JSMC)

Products and services

• Microverse Imaging Center Central microscopy support facility providing advanced fluorescence microscopy for highly sensitive imaging at high spatio-temporal resolution, serving researchers within the Microverse Cluster.
• Research Data Management Service (BEXIS2 and OMERO) Data management service supporting FAIR data principles, including BEXIS2 for research data FAIRification and OMERO for image data management supporting over 140 image file formats, for researchers in the cluster.
• Jena School for Microbial Communication (JSMC) Graduate Program Doctoral training program focused on chemical communication of microorganisms, offering interdisciplinary research opportunities spanning biology, chemistry, medicine, geology, opto-physics, and bioinformatics.
• »Into the Microverse: Journey through the Amazing World of Microbes« Planetarium Film Award-winning 360-degree full-dome planetarium film available in English and German, illustrating the importance of microorganisms for health of living beings and ecosystems, distributed for science communication and educational use.
• Photonic Space Initiative connecting scientific prototypes developed in Jena with users and their biological samples, complementing commercial microscopes at the Imaging Center with supervised measurement slots.

Quantifiable outcome

• New framework concept on microbial frugality explains changes in groundwater
• +2 more outcomes

Segments3 records

Ideal customer profiles3 records

Technology focussed No

API detail

Has API

No

API docs

API detail

Core technology

AI maturity

App detail

Feature7 records

Partnerships

Eleven partnerships are on record, tiered core, supporting and minor.

• Jena University HospitalcoreStrategic or Co-development PartnerThe only university hospital in Thuringia with 26 clinical centers and 25 institutes providing care for 53,000 inpatients and 275,000 outpatients annually. Scientists work on fundamental biomedical research and patient-related clinical research.
• Leibniz Institute for Natural Product Research and Infection Biology – Hans Knöll Institute (HKI)coreStrategic or Co-development PartnerInvestigates communication between microorganisms to develop innovative components for diagnosis and therapy of diseases. Contributes to systems biology of infection research.
• Leibniz Institute of Photonic Technology (IPHT)coreStrategic or Co-development PartnerInvestigates photonic and biophotonic processes addressing issues in medicine and life/environmental sciences. Develops new photonic procedures and transfers them into innovative application-oriented systems.
• Leibniz Institute on Aging – Fritz Lipmann Institute (FLI)coreStrategic or Co-development PartnerFirst national research institute in Germany focusing on biomedical research on human aging, investigating environmental and genetic factors in aging processes.
• Max Planck Institute for Chemical EcologycoreStrategic or Co-development PartnerInvestigates role, diversity and characteristics of chemical signals controlling interactions between organisms and their environment, focusing on co-evolution of plants and insects.
• Max Planck Institute for BiogeochemistrycoreStrategic or Co-development PartnerConducts research into global material cycles and associated chemical and physical processes, studying interactions between soil organisms and greenhouse gases.
• Max Planck Institute of GeoanthropologycoreStrategic or Co-development PartnerExamines fundamental dynamics of climate change, biodiversity crisis, and overexploitation of natural resources through model-based and interpretive approaches.
• Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary AnthropologycoreStrategic or Co-development PartnerBrings together scientists to investigate history of humankind using comparative analyses of genes, cultures, cognitive abilities, languages and social systems.
• Jena School for Microbial Communication (JSMC)coreStrategic or Co-development PartnerGraduate school supporting doctoral candidates with excellent training, interdisciplinary research opportunities, and vibrant international community for microbial communication research.
• Graduate Academy Jena (GA)supportingStrategic or Co-development PartnerCentral institution supporting doctoral candidates across different research fields with workshops, courses, and advisory services on scientific writing, career planning, and soft skills.
• Tara Ocean FoundationminorStrategic or Co-development PartnerInternational partnership for ocean research. Research from Jena joined an 18-month arctic mission coordinated by Tara Ocean Foundation.

Scale indicators4 records

Recent moves7 records

Expansion highlights6 records

Emerging players

• CosmosID: CosmosID provides commercial microbiome analytics, metagenomics sequencing services and a bioinformatics platform for microbial community characterization. It is an emerging commercial analog to the cluster's microbiome analytics and bioinformatics capability.
• Clinical Microbiomics: Clinical Microbiomics offers end-to-end microbiome research services including sample-to-analysis pipelines, metagenomics, and biostatistics for academic and industry clients. It overlaps directly with the cluster's microbiome and metagenomics services offering.

Broad incumbents

• Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard (Microbiome Program): The Broad Institute hosts an established microbiome program combining sequencing, analytics, and translational research across microbial communities. Its scale, technology stack, and translational orientation make it a direct functional peer to Balance of the Microverse.
• Joint Genome Institute (JGI): JGI is a U.S. Department of Energy user facility providing large-scale metagenomics, sequencing and microbiome analytics to a global scientific community. Its mandate to deliver microbiome and metagenomics services to external researchers mirrors the cluster's service-oriented research mission.
• European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL): EMBL operates multi-site life science research infrastructure with strong microbiome, metagenomics and imaging capabilities across its Heidelberg and other nodes. Its cross-disciplinary, multi-institutional model is structurally similar to the Jena cluster's consortium approach.
• Wellcome Sanger Institute (Microbiome Research): The Wellcome Sanger Institute runs large-scale microbiome sequencing and metagenomics programs with comparable omics and bioinformatics infrastructure. It is a global leader in microbial community research and the closest scale-comparable academic peer to the Jena cluster.
• Eurofins Scientific (Microbiome Services): Eurofins operates a global commercial microbiome testing and analytics service business alongside its broader life sciences lab portfolio. As a scaled commercial provider of microbiome analytical services it is the broadest incumbent peer in the same service category.

Regional players

• Tara Ocean Foundation: Tara Ocean Foundation is an international partner of the Microverse cluster and runs global ocean microbiome and plankton expeditions. It overlaps with the cluster's environmental microbiome and ocean microbial ecology work as a scientific collaborator and complementary international program.

Direct peers

• Max Planck Institute for Biology Tübingen: The Max Planck Institute for Biology Tübingen runs a Department of Microbiome Science and adjacent microbial ecology research. As a sister Max Planck society institute it is the most direct functional peer within the German microbiome research landscape.
• Leibniz Institute for Natural Product Research and Infection Biology – Hans Knöll Institute (HKI): Leibniz-HKI is a core partner of the Microverse cluster and itself conducts research on microbial communication, natural products and infection biology. It is a closely comparable German research institute operating in the same microbiome and infectious disease domain.

Market position

Strengths4 records

Weaknesses4 records

Competitive moat5 records

Key risks5 records

Key highlights6 records

Customer concentration

• YouTubeyoutube.com/playlist?list=PLQ1J5GPwhJdh0PpHx7vHJ3eo9PKTmPE4C
• LinkedInlinkedin.com/company/excellence-cluster-balance-of-the-microverse

Revenue estimate

Valuation estimate

Number of profiles

Profiles11 records

Funding overview

Funding rounds

Investors

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M&A

Investments

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Frequently asked questions about Balance of the Microverse