Long-standing cooperation between Dnipro University of Technology in Ukraine and TU Bergakademie Freiberg in Germany was expanded, with support of the DAAD Eastern Partnership Programme, even during the war.
Text by Prof. Oleksandr Kovrov, Dnipro University of Technology.
The collaboration between TU Bergakademie Freiberg (TUBAF) and Dnipro University of Technology (DUT) has evolved into a meaningful and resilient academic partnership built on shared expertise in mining, environmental protection, and sustainable land-use solutions. Its roots lie in earlier joint work that was extended through the DAAD Programme “Eastern Partnerships” in 2025. Across these stages, the partnership has moved from bilateral academic contact to a broader, structured collaboration that integrates education, research, mobility, and long-term institutional development.
The DAAD Funding Programme “Eastern Partnerships”
For the diverse range of cooperation between German higher education institutions and partner institutions in our eastern neighboring regions, the DAAD has been providing flexible support for more than 50 years through the programme “Partnerships with higher education institutions in Central, South-Eastern and Eastern Europe, as well as the South Caucasus and Central Asia”, with funds from the German Federal Foreign Office.
The programme is announced annually for funding periods of three years each and supports reciprocal exchanges among students, lecturers, researchers, and even administrative staff from German higher education institutions and their partner institutions in the target region. In doing so, it makes a significant contribution to the development and expansion of subject-specific and regional expertise, as well as to international teaching and research cooperation.
Currently, more than 60 German higher education institutions receive funding through the Eastern Partnerships programme. The projects cover a wide range of topics, formats, and target groups. Some have been developing for decades thanks to the programme, while others were only admitted to funding this year.
This month, three Eastern Partnership projects focusing on cooperation with Polish or Ukrainian universities offer insights into their work in very different ways.
A major milestone in this cooperation was the “EcoMining: development of integrated PhD program for sustainable mining & environment” project. The project pursued two central goals: first, to create a graduate program in the field of responsible mining and environmentally relevant activities for doctoral students at DUT and associated partner universities; and second, to build a network linking DUT, partner universities, and industry stakeholders for joint supervision of doctoral candidates and the development of dissertation topics. The concept combined new courses, workshops, excursions, research placements, and summer-school formats with the broader objective of modernizing doctoral training and embedding it in international academic exchange.

For DUT, the added value of EcoMining was substantial. The cooperation resulted in the development and accreditation of 11 PhD-level courses, with 5 of them integrated into the PhD specialization “Environmental Technologies.” These modules covered topics such as biological technologies in mineral raw materials processing, environmental technologies in mining and metallurgy, environmentally friendly use of water resources, innovative technologies for soil protection, phytoremediation of mining lands, environmental monitoring, atmospheric air protection, and waste processing technologies. This was not only a curriculum achievement; it represented the introduction of new interdisciplinary educational content that expanded DUT’s capacity in environmental technologies, biomining, reclamation, and responsible mining.
The EcoMining project demonstrated that the cooperation strengthened DUT’s competitiveness in several ways. It improved the university’s doctoral training structure, introduced modern and partly English-language teaching formats, and opened new perspectives for European academic integration and future participation in international calls and mobility schemes. The project explicitly notes that the new modules and teaching approaches increased the scientific visibility of DUT and improved professional opportunities for doctoral graduates. This is especially important for a technical university in a large industrial region such as Dnipro, where environmental transformation, mine reclamation, and post-industrial land recovery are not abstract academic themes, but urgent practical challenges.
Another important result was the strengthening of research capacity and laboratory infrastructure. Even under the severe disruptions caused by COVID-19 and later by Russia’s full-scale war against Ukraine, the partners found ways to preserve the project’s core objectives. Travel funds that could no longer be used for mobility were reallocated to equipment and consumables, including a thermocycler and PCR primers for doctoral research and laboratory practicals at DUT. This made it possible to continue experiments in environmental biotechnology and microbial analysis at DUT when mobility to Germany had become impossible. In practical terms, this support mattered greatly for researchers working under everyday constraints such as air-raid alarms, interrupted field access, unstable electricity supply, and the constant need to adapt laboratory schedules to security conditions. The improvement in laboratory infrastructure therefore not only enhanced doctoral research conditions, but also helped to protect the continuity of scientific work in wartime.

From the DUT perspective, one of the most valuable dimensions of this partnership has been the combination of academic modernization and solidarity. TUBAF has not only shared expertise in sustainable mining and biosciences, but has also remained a reliable partner during extremely difficult years for Ukraine. The cooperation should therefore be seen not as one-sided support, but as a genuine partnership shaped by trust, continuity, and shared intellectual effort. It has produced not only courses, equipment, and mobility, but also a strong sense of academic community and mutual respect.
The next phase, represented by the continuous DAAD “Eastern Partnerships” projects, shows that the partnership is no longer only about one completed project, but about a sustainable framework for future collaboration. The programme aims to deepen cooperation between TUBAF and a broader Ukrainian alliance including DUT, Dnipro State Agrarian and Economic University (DSAEU), and Dnipro National University (DNU), with a focus on reconstruction, internationalization, young researcher mobility, and the long-term integration of Ukrainian universities into the European Higher Education Area. This new phase reflects an evolution from project-based cooperation to a more strategic university network.
The activities of DAAD Programme “Eastern Partnerships” in 2025 demonstrate that DUT remains an active and visible contributor. Researchers and students from DUT carried out work in the Biology Lab of TUBAF on topics directly relevant to the ecological challenges of industrial and war-affected landscapes. In the Dnipro region, these challenges include contamination of soils by heavy metals and other pollutants, disturbance of topsoil, dust formation on technogenic surfaces, altered hydrological conditions, and, in some cases, damage associated with military attacks. The joint work therefore addressed not only academic questions, but also broader issues of environmental recovery, including the assessment of technosols, the study of biocrust algae communities, plant stress responses, and nature-based solutions for restoring disturbed land. Such research themes are highly relevant for southeastern Ukraine and align closely with DUT’s expertise in environmental technologies, reclamation, and sustainable land management.

A particularly strong feature of the recent collaboration is the intention to transfer acquired methods and skills back into teaching and student training in Ukraine. The methods learned at TUBAF are integrated into teaching at DUT and partner universities, including practical work, environmental monitoring courses, and student research projects. For young Ukrainian scientists, research stays in Freiberg were especially valuable because they provided direct access to modern laboratory equipment, stable working conditions, international scientific communication, and everyday experience of how research and teaching are organised in a German university environment. This kind of transfer is exactly what makes international academic cooperation sustainable: mobility is transformed into institutional capacity and individual training becomes part of the curriculum and future thesis work.
For the future, the partnership offers several promising directions. One is the further development of joint research on nature-based solutions, technosols, phytoremediation, biocrusts, and sustainable rehabilitation of degraded and war-affected lands. Another is the expansion of joint doctoral supervision, short-term research stays, and staff mobility. A third is the gradual institutionalization of a broader German-Ukrainian academic network involving DUT, TUBAF, and additional Ukrainian partners in teaching, research, and innovation. Given the urgent reconstruction needs of Ukraine, such cooperation could also contribute to new international projects focused on environmental restoration, sustainable resource management, circular economy, and green transition.
From a personal and institutional perspective, the cooperation with TUBAF has shown DUT that international partnership is not only about funding or exchange visits. It is about creating shared intellectual space, opening opportunities for young researchers, and demonstrating that even under conditions of war, Ukrainian universities remain capable of high-level scientific work, curriculum innovation, and meaningful international engagement.
For many participants, one of the most important lessons has been that academic exchange also strengthens morale: it gives young researchers confidence, professional visibility, and a sense that their work remains connected to a wider European scientific community despite the pressures of daily life in Ukraine.
***Disclaimer
The views and opinions expressed in the blog posts are solely those of the respective authors and do not necessarily reflect the position of Entanglements. Polish and Ukrainian Studies blog or its team. The authors of the texts bear full responsibility for the accuracy of the facts presented in the publications and the correctness of the quotations.































