Current News

On April 18 and 19 the new members of the Scientific Advisory Board of the Zukunftskolleg held their first meeting in Konstanz. The first day started in the evening with a guided tour by historian Harald Derschka through the historic premises of the Steigenberger Inselhotel, a former cloister. On Friday morning the rector of the University of Konstanz, Ulrich Rüdiger, opened the meeting in the Senatssaal and welcomed the new board members as well as the director and the Fellows of the…

Associated Fellow Roland Weierstall was involved in a study that analysed the attractiveness of veterans. For this he and his colleagues interviewed more than 1.000 women, which type of man - out of four different types with and without posttraumatic stress disorder and aggression - they would prefer for a long-term or short-term relationship.

The study was published in the journal “Evolutionary Psychology”. Read more about it in the press release (in German).

On April 15, the Recruitment Committee held its first meeting to select new Fellows for the Zukunftskolleg. In its most recent call for proposals (closing date for applications was March 15, 2013), the Zukunftskolleg received more than 180 applications for the 2-year Postdoctoral and 5-year Research Fellowships, as part of the Marie Curie Zukunftskolleg Incoming Fellowship Programme (ZIF) supported by the European Union COFUND Programme. The Recruitment Committee chose 35 finalists for the…

We welcome Martin Elff (Politics and Public Administration), Philip Leifeld (Politics and Public Administration), Elena Rosseeva (Chemistry) and Filip Wojciechowski (Chemistry) at the Zukunftskolleg. Elena Rosseeva is one of the new 5-year Research Fellows, the three men are new 2-year Postdoctoral Fellows. All were selected in the last call for applications and started their Fellowship in April.

Spiegel Online published an interview with Giovanni Galizia entitled “Die Trägheit der Veränderung” („Inertia of Change“). He talked about the perspectives of young researchers at German universities, the attractiveness of the Zukunftskolleg and the tenure track model.

The original interview was conducted and published by the university magazine „duz“ in March:

http://www.duz.de/duz-magazin/2013/04/das-prekariat-ist-hier-gesichert/166

We welcome Daniele Brida (Physics), Torsten Pietsch (Physics) and Nils Weidmann (Politics) at the Zukunftskolleg. As the first of a total of eight 5-year Research Fellows that were selected in the last call for applications, they started their Fellowship. All three newcomers are not totally new at the University of Konstanz: Torsten Pietsch has been a Postdoctoral Fellow in the Department of Physics since September 2009. Daniele Prida has been working as group leader in the Department of Physics…

We congratulate Philip Leifeld who won the Südwestmetall prize 2013. Philip Leifeld is one of our new 2-year Postdoctoral Fellows. He starts working at the Zukunftskolleg in April. With the Südwestmetall prize the Baden-Württemberg Employers’ Association of the Metal and Electrical Industry honors outstanding young researchers of the state´s universities. The awarding will take place on April 25 in Fribourg.

We welcome Tamir Hassan (Computer and Information Science), Gianluca Rastelli (Physics) and Julia Boll (Literature) at the Zukunftskolleg. As the next of a total of 16 2-year Postdoctoral Fellows that were selected in the last call for applications, they started their Fellowship in March. 10 further new Postdoctoral Fellows will come in the course of the next months.

The Zukunftskolleg welcomes new Associated Fellows: Stephan Hacker (Chemistry) and Johanna Kastl (Biology) are members of the Graduate School “Chemical Biology”; Tahmina Sadat Hadjer (Politics and Public Administration), Karsten Wasiluk (Economics) and Katarina Zigova (Economics) are members of the Graduate School “Decision Sciences”. They received a Doctoral Fellowship from the Zukunftskolleg to finance the last year of their dissertation.

Attila Tanyi´s temporary professorship at the University of Bayreuth was prolonged for six months. He will hold his position in the “Philosophy and Economics program” also in the summer term 2013.

Thomas Voigtmann is one of this year´s 142 Outstanding Referees nominated by the American Physical Society (APS). The editors of the APS journals have selected them out of more than 60.000 currently active referees. Initiated in 2008, the Outstanding Referee program recognizes scientists who have been exceptionally helpful in assessing manuscripts for publication in the APS journals. Selections are based on two decades of records on the number, quality, and timeliness of referee reports. The…

We congratulate Zukunftskolleg Alumnus Rudolf Bratschitsch who accepted a professorship at the Physical Institute at the University of Muenster. Rudolf Bratschitsch was a Fellow from December 2007 until October 2010 as well as a member of the Board of Directors from October 2008 until September 2009. We wish him all the best!

From February 21 until March 8, 2013, erg’s gallery in Brussels shows a solo exhibition of Senior Fellow Alexander Schellow, which is dedicated to the city of Tirana. Based on the artist´s practice to reconstruct experiences through drawings from memory, the installation features drawings, animation films, texts and other materials related to the Albanian city, and testifies the work in progress that the former Artist in Residence is devoting to it.

More information about the exhibition: http:/…

Ulrich Sieberer has been offered a Substitute Professorship in “Comparative Politics” at the University of Konstanz in summer term 2013. He will substitute for Prof. Dr. Christian Breunig who holds the chair since August 2012. The Zukunftskolleg congratulates Ulrich Sieberer and wishes him all the best.

What happened in 2012 at the Zukunftskolleg? Which Fellows were successful and which Senior Fellows visited us? − Answers to these and much more questions you will find in the Annual Report 2012 of the Zukunftskolleg that was published now and will be distributed by mail. You can also download it here: http://www.zukunftskolleg.uni-konstanz.de/downloads/

Due to her research on age-related diseases, chemist Marilena Manea was interviewed for the university magazine Uni´kon, as well as psychologist Simon Hanslmayr who analyses deliberate forgetting processes in the brain. The current Uni´kon issue is entitled “Research in every phase of life”. Published in the same edition you can read an article about the awarding of the Manfred Ulmer Scholarship to philosopher Lena Dreher, doctoral student and Associated Fellow of the Zukunftskolleg. The Uni´kon…

We welcome Denis Gebauer (Chemistry), Nina Schneider (History) and Ilja Serzants (Linguistics) at the Zukunftskolleg. As the first of 16 2-year Postdoctoral Fellows that were selected in the last call for applications, they started their Fellowship in February. The other 13 new Postdoctoral Fellows will come in the course of the next months.

The Zukunftskolleg is warmly welcoming Artist in Residence Patrick Tresset from the Computing Department at Goldsmiths College, University of London, UK. He has been nominated by Oliver Deussen from the Department of Computer and Information Science at the University of Konstanz and by Giovanni Galizia, and will be our guest for 9 months.

Patrick Tresset's main internationally recognised achievements are in the field of computational aesthetics, computational creativity and arts. As Artist in…

David Ganz has been offered a professorship in Art History at the University of Zurich. “This means for me that a long standing dream comes true as the scientific conditions there are very attractive for my work”, says David Ganz. He also thanks the Zukunftskolleg for its support in achieving this success. David is a Fellow of the Zukunftskolleg since December 2007.

Common project by Artist in Residence Alexander Schellow and Senior Fellow Klaus von Heusinger

It began with an encounter at the Zukunftskolleg and now resulted in a conference on “Memory and Meaning between Dynamic and Stability”. When Artist in Residence Alexander Schellow and Senior Fellow Klaus von Heusinger met at the Zukunftskolleg about two years ago they had the idea of a common project with artists and linguists. In cooperation with the department of German Linguistics at the…

In the final Workshop on Future Research Directions, held on 10-11 January 2013, the Recruitment Committee decided to offer nine candidates applying for the 5-year Research Fellowships a position at the Zukunftskolleg. Three of them are co-funded by the ZIF-Marie Curie-programme of the EU and six by the German Excellence Initiative. The Zukunftskolleg welcomes its new members.

For further information visit http://zukunftskolleg.uni.kn

The Zukunftskolleg is warmly welcoming Senior Fellow Hans Adler from the Department of Comparative Literature at the University of Wisconsin, USA. He has been nominated by Gunhild Berg and will be our guest until March 23, 2013.

The Zukunftskolleg congratulates Doris Penka who has been offered a Substitute Professorship in “General Linguistics with Semantics as Main Focus” at the University of Konstanz in summer term 2013. She will teach four courses for Bachelor and Master students and substitute for Prof. Maribel Romero, who will be on sabbatical.

Margaret Thomas can stay at the Zukunftskolleg for 3 more years. The DFG is providing funding for her project “Parameterization and Algebraic Points in O-Minimal Structures”. We congratulate Margaret and wish her all the best.

On November 26th and 27th Giovanni Galizia was invited to present the Zukunftskolleg at the symposium “Das deutsche Wissenschaftssystem und seine Postdocs: Perspektiven zur Gestaltung der Qualifizierungsphase nach der Promotion”. The event was held on the occasion of the opening of “Zur Rosen – Haus für den wissenschaftlichen Nachwuchs” at the Friedrich-Schiller-University in Jena. Giovanni Galizia took part in a panel discussion entitled „Postdoc-Phase als Qualifizierungsphase: Verlust oder…

Sarang Dalal received a 3-year grant together with his partners Jean-Philippe Lachaux and Philippe Ryvlin (Lyon Neuroscience Research Center in France) and Gustavo Deco (Center for Brain and Cognition, University Pompeu Fabra in Barcelona, Spain). Their project “SEMAINE: Simultaneous MEG or fMRI and Intracranial EEG” will be funded through the European Commission's Network of European funding for Neuroscience Research (ERA-NeT NEURON).

In its second pre-selection, held on the 5^th of November, the Recruitment Committee decided to invite 18 candidates applying for the 5-year Research Fellowships to the Workshop on Future Research Directions. The workshop will take place on 10-11 January 2013 at the University of Konstanz. As the Zukunftskolleg will be offering thirteen 5-year positions it will be an exciting competition between the young researchers.

During the Jour Fixe on the 8th of November the Fellows elected Margarita Stolarova as a new member of the Executive Committee. She replaces Martin Bruder who will leave the Zukunftskolleg at the end of the year. He has accepted a position as head of the department of “evaluation and statistics” at the DAAD in Bonn, starting on January 1, 2013. We would like to thank Martin Bruder for his work as an Executive Committee member and look forward to Margaritas contributions.

The Zukunftskolleg is warmly welcoming Senior Fellow Irene Heim (Cambridge, USA). She has been nominated by Doris Penka. Her last stay at the Zukunftskolleg was in spring. Now she will be our guest until 24 November.