On 3 December 2025, our colleague Hauke Friehs successfully defended his Master's thesis entitled ‘Investigation of the steroid alkaloid solanidine and its derivatives for improving solubility in aqueous systems’. We congratulate him warmly on this great achievement.Hauke had already been with us at the institute as part of the ‘Natural Product Synthesis’ module and now returned to us for his Master's thesis. In recent months, he has devoted himself to the exciting field of steroidal alkaloids and investigated strategies to improve the solubility of solanidine derivatives in aqueous media – a question of high relevance for biochemical and pharmaceutical applications.Unfortunately, he will now be leaving us to pursue his doctorate. We wish him all the best for his future endeavours.
