Excellent performance: This certainly applies to the scientific work of the two young Jülich scientists Nina Richter and John Kettler. On Saturday, in recognition of their work they were awarded this year's Excellence Prize of Forschungszentrum Jülich with prize money of € 5,000 each. The award was presented at an event in Forschungszentrum Jülich for Jülich's PhD students (JuDocs) who completed their dissertations in 2010/2011. At the same time, the JuDocs event marked the official launch of Helmholtz Interdisciplinary Doctoral Training in Energy and Climate (HITEC). This graduate school offers early-career scientists optimum conditions for working on a PhD in the highly topical field of energy and climate research.