Senior Fellows

Responsibilities

Hans Adler was at the Zukunftskolleg from 01/2013 to 03/2013. He was affiliated with the Department of Literature and had been invited by Gunhilde Berg.

During his stay at the Zukunftskolleg, he worked on one of his book projects on the history of the aesthetics as a philosophical as well as a literary phenomenon that deals with the epistemological relationship of sensations, perceptions, and cognitions (“Die Erfindung der Ästhetik”). He focused questions such as how to provide and to gain knowledge through specific strategies of both philosophy and the arts.

Responsibilities

Irene Albers was at the Zukunftskolleg from 02/2010 to 06/2010. She was affiliated with the Department of Literature and had been invited by Johanna Kißler.

Irene Albers used her time in Konstanz to complete a monograph, which deals historically and systematically with the relationship between Affect Psychology and Literature. The focus was on three topics: 1) the modeling of affect through literary genres, 2) the literary reflection theories of the somatic dimensions of affect, and the discourse-historical embedding of the novellas in the various discourses on affects (medical, moral philosophical, theological, moralistic, etc.), 3) the implicit and explicit poetological reflections on the affective and physiological effects of narration, reading and speaking.

Responsibilities

Jeffrey Alan Barrett was at the Zukunftskolleg from 12/2011 to 07/2012. He was affiliated with the Department of Philosophy and had been invited by Franz Huber.

Jeff Barrett's interests are in Philosophy of Science and Epistemology and Logic generally, but a strong focus of his research has been in the Philosophy of Physics. His background in Physics and the natural sciences in general made him a valuable Senior Fellow for the Physics and Science fellows at the Zukunftskolleg. His specialisation in logic allowed him to be a competent discussant for the computer scientists and mathematicians at the Zukunftskolleg. And his specialisation, the philosophy of science, generally made him a valuable colleague for all members of the Zukunftskolleg.

Responsibilities

György Buzsáki was at the Zukunftskolleg from 06/2011 to 07/2011. He was affiliated with the Department of Psychology and had been invited by Nathan Weisz.

György Buzsáki worked together with the group of Nathan Weisz and helped in conceptually increasing the understanding which fundamental mechanisms might underly brain rhythms recorded non-invasively using MEG nad EEG. This was important in sharpening ideas regarding the functional meaning of certain brain Rhythms (e.g. alpha rhythm as indicating an inhibitory state).

Responsibilities

Alex Byrne was at the Zukunftskolleg from 06/2014 to 08/2014. He was affiliated with the Department of Philosophy and had been invited by Julia Langkau and Magdalena Balcerak Jackson.

During his stay at the Zukunftskolleg, Alex Byrne worked on imagination – the main research focus of his fellowship - with Julia Langkau and Magdalena Balcerak Jackson, whose research projects are directly connected. Andrea Lailach talked to him about his well-known work on self-knowledge that iss highly relevant to her research interests. And, the interdisciplinary DFG research group “What
If” hosted by the University of Konstanz exchanged ideas with him on the relations between counterfactual claims and the cognitive capacity of imagination.

Responsibilities

Yoram Carmeli was at the Zukunftskolleg in the following months/years: 07-10/2011, 03-05/2012, 08-10/2012, and 10/2013. He was affiliated with the Department of History and Sociology and had been invited by Anna Lipphardt.

Yoram Carmeli collaborated with the Emmy Noether Group "Cultures of Mobility". Especially in the initial period of the project he served as an important consultant. In the context of the preparation for the doctoral students for their fieldwork a joint methodology workshop was conducted, where he gave a session on research ethics and participant methodology when working with travellers. Yoram Carmeli is the leading expert in these methodological issues.
With his studies on and in the circus, Yoram Carmeli allowed the members of the Zukunftskolleg unconventional insights into the field of cultural and social athropology and contributed to a better understanding of the importance of qualitiative and explorative methods in the analysis of cultural and social phenomena.

Responsibilities

Gloriana Chaverri joined the Zukunftskolleg in 08/2024. She is affiliated with the Department of Biology and collaborates with Gabriella Gall.

Project: "Group Cohesion in Animal Societies“

Gloriana Chaverri's work seeks to understand how the environment influences social aggregations, from how groups are formed, how they are maintained, and the patterns of associations and interactions among group members. She is also interested in understanding how habitat influences acoustics, and the strategies employed by organisms to exploit the acoustic properties of their habitats.

Responsibilities

Brett Clementz was at the Zukunftskolleg from 06/2010 to 07/2010. He was affiliated with the Department of Psychology and had been invited by Johanna Kißler.

The immediate goal of his residency was to work together on the meaningful integration of data from temporal (EEG/MEG) and spatial (fMRI) high resolution neuroscience techniques. Beyond this immediate methodological goal, there were links to various other topics of Zukunftskolleg colleagues, e.g. aging research, neuronal oscillations, auditory processing. There were also clear links to the Department of Psychology where neuronal markers for schizophrenia had been intensively researched for years.

Responsibilities

Cleo Condoravdi was at the Zukunftskolleg from 04/2011 to 10/2011. She was affiliated with the Department of Linguistics and had been invited by Gerhart von Graevenitz.

Cleo Condoravdi has been nominated for the Zukunftskolleg Award by the members of the Department of Linguistics at the University of Konstanz. They aimed to further collaborate on existing joint projects, and to benefit from her broad expertise in the central research areas of current linguistic research in Konstanz (formal semantics, computational linguistics, language change). Cleo Condoravdi´s research in the area of computational semantics at Palo Alto Research Center (PARC) has centered on the general enterprise of enabling computers to extract information from non-structured texts. In this domain, she worked on the implementation of the semantic component in a question-answer system, designed to improve the technology of web search engines. The combination of application-oriented research with theoretical expertise in Cleo Condoravdi’s profile contributed not only to the interdisciplinary but also to the interinstitutional exchange at the Zukunftskolleg.

Responsibilities

Nathaniel Dominy joined the Zukunftskolleg from 06/2022 until 08/2022. He is affiliated with the Department of Biology and collaborates with Gisela Kopp.

Project: "Using primate population genetics to map ancient trade routes"

Nathaniel Dominy is an anthropologist and evolutionary biologist. He studies the behaviour, ecology and functional morphology of humans and nonhuman primates. His research philosophy is to integrate tropical fieldwork with mechanical, molecular, and isotopic analyses in order to better understand how and why adaptive shifts occurred during primate evolution.

Responsibilities

Mark Dykman was at the Zukunftskolleg in 2018. He was affiliated with the Department of Physics and had been invited by Gianluca Rastelli.

The first contribution of Mark Dykman as Senior Fellow was his collaboration to one of Gianluca Rastelli´s main projects on which he was working within the SFB-767 collaborative research center, about nano-electro-mechanical systems (NEMS). They jointly worked on a theory to explain the experimental observations realized in nanoscale nonlinear resonators, based on dielectric forces, and which were carried out by the group of Eva Weig at the University of Konstanz. Mark Dykman´s stay in Konstanz was a great opportunity for the entire Department of Physics. Having him as a honorary guest was important for scientific discussions and future collaborations with many of the groups in the department (W. Belzig, G. Burkard and A. Leitenstorfer). In particular, nanoscale mechanical resonators and phonon dynamics at the nanoscale are two main research topics of the department and in the SFB-767 (experimental group of E. Weig, E. Scheer and T. Dekorsy, theoretical groups of G. Burkard and F. Pauly).

Responsibilities

Marcia Esparza was at the Zukunftskolleg from 06/2014 to 07/2014. She was affiliated with the Department of History and Sociology and had been invited by Nina Schneider.

Together with Nina Schneider, Marcia Esparza was coediting the volume “Transitional Justice and the legacies of State Violence in Latin America.“ Her stay at Konstanz was scheduled for the period when the editors had to discuss the manuscripts of the volume and negotiate with university presses, subjects that had to be discussed in person and required a significant amount of time. The proposed book was a groundbreaking effort that seeked to challenge theoretical frameworks disguising larger dialogues, like the proposed in this book effort.
Marcia Esparza´s work was of particular interest to numerours scholars in Konstanz working on human rights, violence, and crime in Latin America and globally, including Kirsten Mahlke (Literature/Roman Languages) and her colleagues from the ERC project "Narratives of Terror", Aleida Assmann (Literature/North American Studies), Britta Weiffen (Political Science), as well as Boris Barth and Sven Reichardt from the History Department.

Responsibilities

Alexander Etkind joined the Zukunftskolleg from 04/2022 until 08/2022. He is affiliated with the Department of History and collaborates with Gruia Badescu.

Project: "Surviving the Anthropocene: The Political Economy of Coloniality of Virtual Space"

In his book, the 2021 "Nature’s Evil: A Cultural History of Natural Resource", Alexander Etkind examines the history of extracting and trading resources. He discusses also the perspectives of humanity facing climate catastrophe. In his analysis of state and economic power, Etkind argues that it is not the powerful who control the resources, but the resources that control the powerful. This is a key in his discussion of climate change. Beyond his work on Russia and the theory of memory, Prof. Etkind´s work responds to many of the research interests at the Zukunftskolleg, and particularly to the theme of sustainability. Discussing the vision for his time at the Zukunftskolleg, Alexander Etkind outlined his plan to develop a thread that came from this research into a new project. The theme is virtual space as a resource, testing his key tenets from his self-colonization book with the discussion of political economy of resources, and exploring the relationship between digital space and survival in the age of the Anthropocene.

Responsibilities

Christoph Fehige was at the Zukunftskolleg from 01/2012-12/2012. He was affiliated with the Department of Philosophy and had been invited by Attila Tanyi.

During his stay in Konstanz, Christoph Fehige worked together with Atilla Tanyi. They focused on Atilla Tanyi’s main project “Peace and Tolerance in Consequentialist Ethics”. Christoph Fehige has already acted as a kind of mentor to Attila Tanyi since 2009, first informally and then in the context of the Zukunftskolleg "Mentorship Programme". Christoph Fehige also interacted with a wide range of thinkers from various disciplines at the University of Konstanz, including economists, historians of ideas, philologists, and psychologists.
In summer term 2012 Christoph Fehige took part in the interdisciplinary public lecture series "Philosophy Beyond Borders", and in winter term 2012/13 he was awarded the Zukunftskolleg Lecture. The prize honors Senior Fellows who are closely related to and associated with the Zukunftskolleg and who fit perfectly into the interdisciplinary spirit.

Responsibilities

Bernard Frischer was at the Zukunftskolleg from 10/2010 to 07/2011. He was affiliated with the Department of Informatics and had been invited by Karsten Lambers.

During his stay at the Zukunftskolleg, Bernard Frischer worked on a book on the topic of his research: "The Art of Science, the Science of Art". This study grew out of a lecture he was asked to give to the academic community of the University of Virginia in September 2008. In his talk, he traced the changing meaning of the words "art" and "science" in Greek, Latin, and modern European languages. He placed these shifts in meaning of the words into the evolution of scientific and artistic methods, which - applying the paradigm theory of Kuhn - he saw as progressing from one based on logic alone (the "Ancient Model" of Louis Dupré) to others that add other tools of discovery, including quantitative analysis (the "New Model" of Alfred W. Crosby, which developed in the High Middle Ages), visualization (the "Modern Model," exemplifed by Leonardo, Copernicus, and Galileo), and heuristics based on modeling often undertaken in a ludic and, increasingly, interactive-dialogical spirit (the "Postmodern Model," theorized by Gadamer).

Responsibilities

Raghavendra Gadagkar was at the Zukunftskolleg in spring 2023 and spring 2024. He is also a member of the Scientific Advisory Board of the Zukunftskolleg. He is affiliated with the Department of Biology and has been invited by Giovanni Galizia.

Project: "Can we understand an insect society?“

_{Raghavendra Gadagkar obtained B.Sc (Hons) and M.Sc. in Zoology from Bangalore University and Ph.D. in Molecular Biology from the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, India. During the past 40 years he has established an active school of research in the area of Animal Behaviour, Ecology and Evolution.  The origin and evolution of cooperation in animals, especially in social insects,  such as ants, bees and wasps, is a major goal of his research. By identifying and utilizing crucial elements in India’s biodiversity, he has added a special Indian flavour to his research.}

Responsibilities

Julian Gale was at the Zukunftskolleg from 06/2015 to 07/2015. He was affiliated with the Department of Chemistry and had been invited by Denis Gebauer.

Julian Gale’s scientific contribution was manifold. First, the existing close collaboration between Julian Gale and Denis Gebauer could be intensified, and focused on the resolution of central scientific problems. The theoretical research was crucial for the understanding of Denis Gebauer’s experimental work, and Julian Gale’s stay was an invaluable contribution to Denis Gebauer’s Zukunftskolleg project. Second, the expertise of Julian Gale was central to Christine Peter’s (Department of Chemistry, Theoretical Chemistry) research interest, and collaborative projects were developed, initiated and advanced. Third, the theory and modeling expertise of Julian Gale helped to initiate and strengthen collaborations for further colleagues in the Department of Chemistry and the Department of Physics. Thus, fourth, Julian Gale’s stay also distinctly strengthened the planned CRC (Sonderforschungsbereich) initiative of the Department of Chemistry (chaired by Helmut Cölfen).

Responsibilities

Daniel Gamelin was at the Zukunftskolleg in the following months/years: 03-06/2009 and 07/2010. He was affiliated with the Department of Chemistry and had been invited by Rudolf Bratschitsch.

Previous experiments involving the collaboration between the laboratories at the University of Konstanz and the Gamelin laboratories at the University of Washington had exposed a broad range of previously unexplored physical phenomena in colloidal semiconductor nanostructures that could be observed only by applying the sophisticated spectroscopic techniques available at the University of Konstanz. These collaborative experiments have successfully bridged the interface of chemistry and physics, and have resulted in two groundbreaking publications in high-profile international research journals. Overall, the ability to combine the unique synthetic capabilities of the Gamelin research group with the unique photonics capabilities of the Bratschitsch group could be anticipated to lead to the discovery and development of new materials and new phenomena of potential interest for future spin-based information processing technologies.

Responsibilities

Peter Gärdenfors was at the Zukunftskolleg from 11/2014 to 12/2014. He was affiliated with the Department of Philosophy and had been invited by Brendan Balcerak Jackson.

The research project that Peter Gärdenfors pursued during his senior fellowship at the Zukunftskolleg was to develop a mathematical model for our mental representations of events, using his general theory of conceptual spaces as the foundation. Further, he worked together with Brendan Balcerak Jackson on developing the cognitive theory of events and integrating it with established results from linguistics and the philosophy of language on the grammatical role of events. Gärdenfors also worked with Wolfgang Spohn and other members of the interdisciplinary "What If?" research group in order to study how representations of events help shape conditional and counterfactual reasoning (reasoning about what would or could have happened if things had been different in such-and-such ways).

Responsibilities

Dimitri Ginev was at the Zukunftskolleg from 12/2011 to 08/2012. He was affiliated with the Department of Philosophy and had been invited by Jeff Kochan.

During Dimitri Ginev´s stay in Konstanz, Jeff Kochan completed the manuscript of a book which brings Heidegger’s philosophy of science into dialogue with analytical philosophy of science and science and technology studies (STS). Thus, Dimitri Ginev proved an immensely helpful interlocutor as Jeff Kochan prepared to submit the manuscript for publication. Moreover, Dimitri Ginev’s presence in Konstanz benefitted to the fellows of the Zukunftskolleg, as well to members of the Excellence Cluster "Cultural Foundations of Social Integration" and the university in general. Dimitri Ginev’s work as a philosopher of science spans a broad range of issues of potential interest to practicing scientists, including the nature of scientific reason, the interpretation of experimental data, the role of idealization in science, and the epistemological and metaphysical significance of technological intervention (i.e. experimentation) as a method for gaining knowledge of nature.

Responsibilities

Leonid Glazman was at the Zukunftskolleg in 09/2014. He was affiliated with the Department of Physics and had been invited by Gianluca Rastelli.

Leonid Glazman is know as one of the best international experts in the theoretical quantum condensed matter and in the "Quantum Transport and Interactions in Nano-Electronic Systems" (which is exactly the title of Gianluca Rastelli´s project). Moreover his interests are largely devoted to the study of superconducting qubits and this topic corresponds to one of Gianluca Rastelli´s research projects. With Leonid Glazman´s support, Gianluca Rastelli tackled this subject. Specifically, he aimed to realize with him a short-term project on the theoretical study of quantum circuits formed by superconducting Josephson junctions devices. For this reason, Gianluca Rastelli also nominated him as mentor and visited him at Yale University for one month during the year 2014.

Responsibilities

Adelheid Godt was at the Zukunftskolleg from 06/2013 to 08/2013. She was affiliated with the Department of Chemistry and had been invited by Malte Drescher.

Adelheid Godt is an organic chemist working in the field of synthesis of molecular rulers for spectroscopy. In collaboration with Gunnar Jeschke she developed rigid molecules with spin labels attached as a ruler for distance measurements in EPR spectroscopy. Within the DFG priority programme SPP 1601 "New frontiers in sensitivity for EPR spectroscopy: from biological cells to nano materials" she collaborated with Malte Drescher to further develop intracellular EPR spectroscopy approaches. Daniel Summerer and his research group were developing artificial aminoacids carrying a spin labeled moiety and also benefitted from Adelheid Godt’s expertise. Filip Wojciechowski was synthesizing spin labeled DNA sequences and could directly insert a spin labeled DNA building block which had been developed and was available in the Godt group. Adelheid Godt also synthesized molecular rulers with FRET labels attached. Those samples served as model systems for a systematic study on distance measurements with FRET in the Wöll group.

Responsibilities

Joachim Gross was at the Zukunftskolleg from 07/2010 to 06-07/2012. He was affiliated with the Department of Psychology and had been invited by Nathan Weisz.

The themes of Nathan Weisz´ workgroup had large overlaps with those of Joachim Gross, such as localization of brain rhythms, modeling of functional connectivity as well as the neuronal basis of conscious perceptions. Deepening the collaboration via a Senior Fellowship gave important impulses to the research of Nathan Weisz´ team. Yet, also other fellows of the Zukunftskolleg working with MEG / EEG methodology could greatly profit from Joachim Gross´ outstanding expertise. His research focus on the neuroscience of conscious perception lies at the heart of mind-body interaction, a topic that sparked broad interest among several researchers within the Zukunftskolleg.

Responsibilities

David Gugerli was at the Zukunftskolleg from 12/2008 to 07/2009. He was affiliated with the Department of History and Sociology and had been invited by Gerhart von Graevenitz.

His research projects focus on the history of energy supply, the techno-scientific recording of spaces, the development of digital modes of telecommunication, and the genesis of the engineered human body.

Responsibilities

Joseph Halpern was at the Zukunftskolleg in the following months/years: 06-07/2011 and 06-07/2012. He was affiliated with the Department of Computer Sciences and had been invited by Franz Huber.

Joseph Halpern´s research is genuinely inter- and transdisciplinary, covering topics that belong to areas such as mathematics, economics, computer science, and philosophy. This made him ideally suited for the senior fellowship of the Zukunftskolleg: His advice was of value not only for formal epistemologists such as Fran Huber, but also for the mathematicians and computer scientists as well as the economists and other philosophers at the Zukunftskolleg. He was also an asset to members of the department of philosophy, especially Wolfgang Spohn and the members of his ANR-DFG research group "Causality and Probability".

Responsibilities

Irene Heim was at the Zukunftskolleg in the following months/years: 01/2010, 05-06/2010, 11-12/2011, 05-06/2012, 05-06/2014, 11/2014, and 05-06/2015. She was affiliated with the Department of Linguistics and had been invited by Doris Penka.

The work of Irene Heim formed the basis for Doris Penka's project "Quantors in Natural Language". Of particular importance was Irene Heim's work on the semantics of comparative and superlative constructions, the results of which were to be transferred to quantifiers with comparative and superlative morphology in the project. During her time in Konstanz, Irene Heim also collaborated with other members of the Department of Linguistics, in particular with the Chair of General Linguistics with a focus on semantics (Maribel Romero).

Responsibilities

Klaus von Heusinger was at the Zukunftskolleg in the following months/years: 01-06/2010 and 08/2011. He was affiliated with the Department of Linguistics and had been invited by Gerhart von Graevenitz.

During his time in Konstanz, Klaus von Heusinger realized an interdisciplinary project with his wife, Sabine von Heusinger. The project aimed to investigate the connection between social structures in the historical context and linguistic forms of expression for the constitution of social groups. Besides the historical and linguistic methods, additional approaches from network analysis (in cooperation with sociology and computer science), the analysis of names and social identities in texts (literary medieval studies) and the linguistic-philosophical meaning of proper names (philosophy) were integrated into the project which thus pursued an interdisciplinary approach. For the realization of the project the Zukunftskolleg offered an ideal location.

Responsibilities

Sabine von  Heusinger was at the Zukunftskolleg in the following months/years: 01-06/2010 and 08/2011. She was affiliated with the Department of Literature and had been invited by Gerhart von Graevenitz.

During her time in Konstanz, Sabine von Heusinger realized an interdisciplinary project with her husband, Klaus von Heusinger. The project aimed to investigate the connection between social structures in the historical context and linguistic forms of expression for the constitution of social groups. Besides the historical and linguistic methods, additional approaches from network analysis (in cooperation with sociology and computer science), the analysis of names and social identities in texts (literary medieval studies) and the linguistic-philosophical meaning of proper names (philosophy) were integrated into the project which thus pursued an interdisciplinary approach. For the realization of the project the Zukunftskolleg offered an ideal location.

Responsibilities

James Higham joined the Zukunftskolleg from 05/2022 until 08/2022. He is affiliated with the Department of Biology and collaborates with Gisela Kopp.

Project: "Expanding baboon studies in Konstanz via new collaborations"

James Higham is an internationally-leading academic, whose research aims to understand the evolution and maintenance of diversity among primates. His research is focused on understanding how sexual selection and other evolutionary processes act on multiple interacting aspects of primate biology to generate and maintain phenotypic variation, both within and between species. His work sits at the intersection of social behavior and biology, communication and sensory ecology, and cognition and the brain. He takes a broad multidisciplinary approach, linking variation in phenotypes such as soft and hard tissues, and behavior, to evolutionary fitness, while assessing underlying mechanisms via endocrinology and immunology, and increasingly, aspects of the omics (genomics - the study of the genome; transcriptomics - the study of transcribed gene products; and metabolomics - the study of the downstream metabolic products of biological systems).

Responsibilities

Giora Hon was at the Zukunftskolleg in the following months/years: 07-09/2012, 07-09/2014, 08-09/2017, 08-09/2018, and from 07-09/2021. He is affiliated with the Department of Philosophy and had been invited by Samuel Schindler, Helen Gunter, and Julia Jones.

Although Giora Hon's research is well-founded in historical details, his research is driven by general (philosophical) questions and concerns about science, which are of interest to any methodologically alert scientist. In particular, Giora Hon's research interests include the concept of experimental error, instrument and experiment, and the concept of symmetry. His first research visit at the Zukunftskolleg particularly benefitted Samuel Schindler who had been awarded a DFG Emmy-Noether grant with the title "Towards a New Epistemology of Science".
In 2014, in collaboration with Julia Jones and Helen Gunter, Giora Hon planned to implement a workshop aimed at connecting the natural sciences with philosophy, united under the umbrella of methodologies for investigating empirical scientific questions. Through preparing and participating in the workshop, the fellows were in a position to evaluate their day to day research practices through new eyes.

Responsibilities

Gunnar Jeschke was at the Zukunftskolleg from 04/2010 to 09/2010. He was affiliated with the Department of Chemistry and had been invited by Malte Drescher.

During his stay in Konstanz, Gunnar Jeschke was responsible for the organizational and financial support of the international summer school under the auspices of the European Federation of ESR Groups (EFEPR) and the EU COST Action ("Next Generation Nanometer-Distance Measurements in Complex Biomolecules"). In cooperation with Malte Drescher, he also carried out a research project on linking near and far information in distance measurements using combined ESR and NMR spectroscopy.

Responsibilities

Viktor Kabanov was at the Zukunftskolleg in the following months/years: 02-09/2009, 5/2010, 06-08/2010, and 05-06/2013. He was affiliated with the Department of Physics and had been invited by Jure Demsar.

Viktor Kabanov is known as one of the leading experts in the theory of non-equilibrium superconductivity. During his visits to Konstanz, he collaborated with experimentalists on a number of ongoing projects in the field of studies of order parameter dynamics in superconductors. These include studies of relaxation phenomena in conventional and high-Tc superconductors
performed in Jure Demsar's research group as well as recent collaborative research with the Emmy Noether group Tera (Rupert Huber) and the group of Alfred Leitenstorfer on first studies of dynamics in cuprates in the multi-THz range. Secondly, during his visits to Konstanz, Victor Kabanov and Jure Demsar designed (and executed) experiments aiming at studies of novel phenomena related to dynamics of phase of the order parameter in superconductors.

Responsibilities

Paul Kiparsky was at the Zukunftskolleg from 04-08/2011. He was affiliated with the Department of Linguistics and had been invited by Chiara Gianollo.

Paul Kiparsky’s participation in the research project “The history of the genitive: Paths of development in Indo-European nominal syntax” created a research group (formed by Chiara Gianollo and two doctoral students) at the University of Konstanz. It focused on investigating the interaction between morphology and syntactic rules in the expression of nominal arguments (genitives) in a number of ancient Indo-European languages (Sanskrit, Greek, Latin, Gothic, Old Church Slavonic). Paul Kiparsky participated in the elaboration of the framework of analysis, to offer his advice on data interpretation, and to help supervise the doctoral students in the various project phases.

Responsibilities

Arthur Kramer was at the Zukunftskolleg in 04/2010. He was affiliated with the Department of Psychology and had been invited by Iris-Tatjana Kolassa.

Arthur Kramer’s research field tied in with other projects of fellows of the Zukunftskolleg such as the project “Neuroplasticity and Immunology in healthy aging and dementia”, which was funded by the WIN-Kolleg of the Heidelberg Academy of Sciences, and in which the fellows Iris-Tatjana Kolassa (Psychology) and Marilena Manea (Chemistry) were involved. Arthur Kramer supported the establishment of a new interdisciplinary research center on "Neuroplasticity in Aging and Dementia" at the University of Konstanz. This research center was aimed to cooperate with the existing research focus in the Department of Psychology "Social Science of Stress" (DFG Forschergruppe, Elbert, Rockstroh, Kissler, Neuner, Groettrup, Schupp), to investigate the role of stress in the etiology and progression of dementia.

Responsibilities

Peter Krapp joined the Zukunftskolleg from 10/2022 until 11/2022. He is affiliated with the Department of Literature and collaborates with Eduardo Luersen.

Project: "The Internet as Museum of Computing"

Peter Krapp is a full professor of Film & Media Studies at the University of California, Irvine, where he is also affiliated with Informatics, English, and Music. His research interests encompass cultural memory and the media history of games and simulations, the history of computing and secret communications, and aesthetic communication (title design, film music). See https://krapp.org

Responsibilities

David Leep was at the Zukunftskolleg in the following months/years: 05-08/2011 and 01-08/2012. He was affiliated with the Department of Mathematics and had been invited by Karim Becher.

David Leep works in algebra and number theory. He succeeded in giving a final answer to the long-standing open problem of determining the value of the u-invariant of finitely generated field extensions of a local field. During his stay in Konstanz, David Leep devoted himself to do research together with Karim Johannes Becher‘s group. His stay at Konstanz further permitted him to finish off several ongoing projects.

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Eric Lott joined the Zukunftskolleg from 05/2022 until 06/2022. He is affiliated with the Department of Literature and collaborates with Jacob Bloomfield.

Project: "If Hooks Could Kill: Urban Soundscapes; and Marx in Texas: Slavery, Capital, and the "Revolutionary Turn"

Eric Lott is seen as a towering figure in the field of American Studies: his work "Love and Theft: Blackface Minstrelsy and the American Working Class" has become a touchstone for recent generations of scholars on matters of popular culture, race and class in the nineteenth-century United States, music and performance, and archival methodologies.

Responsibilities

Yaron Matras was at the Zukunftskolleg from 01/2012 to 05/2012. He was affiliated with the Department of Linguistics and had been invited by Eleanor Coghill.

Yaron Matras contributed to the multi-disciplinary/inter-disciplinary atmosphere of the Zukunftskolleg. His work bridges the divide between the fields of Language Contact and Second Language Acquisition, which also is the research topic of fellow Tanja Rinker. His research into multi-lingualism and language contact, and experiences with minorities such as the Romani in Europe and the Domari in Jerusalem, was of general interest to the Zukunftskolleg fellows, not just to the linguists. Eleanor Coghill valued his advice and collaboration on her project "Neo-Aramaic morphosyntax in its areal-linguistic context", especially given his experience of running several projects of his own. He had also agreed to share with her some valuable recordings of endangered Jewish Neo-Aramaic dialects that he had made.

Responsibilities

Jennifer McDowell was at the Zukunftskolleg from 06/2010 to 07/2010. She was affiliated with the Department of Psychology and had been invited by Johanna Kißler.

In collaboration with Johanna Kißler, Jennifer McDowell further developped methods for integrating functional data from temporal (EEG/MEG) and spatial (fMRI) high resolution neuroscience techniques. In collaboration with her husband, Brett Clementz, the direct integration of EEG and fMRI data was implemented. The basic technical possibilities for this had been available, but the implementation was completely new territory.

Responsibilities

Amanda Melin joined the Zukunftskolleg from 05/2022 until 08/2022. She is affiliated with the Department of Biology and collaborates with Gisela Kopp.

Project: "Enhancing methods and theory in primate genomics and foraging decisions"

Amanda Melin is nationally and internationally recognized for her research on primate genomics, sensory biology, and behavioural ecology. She addresses key areas of debate concerning the adaptation and evolution of primates by creatively uniting comparative genomics and field study of wild, longitudinally tracked individuals. Notably, she is developing novel methods that are revolutionizing non-invasive DNA and RNA collection from wild animals. Her research improves understanding trait evolution in a highly radiational and variable order of mammals, and contributes to conservation biology by revealing how primates cope with changing environments through dietary and behavioural plasticity, and symbiosis with microbial communities. Amanda Melin's approach to science is highly collaborative and she is involved in several international collaborations, including playing a leading role in a consortium on capuchin genomics that includes faculty and trainees from institutions in Brazil, Canada, Costa Rica, Japan, Spain, the United Kingdom, and the United States.

Responsibilities

Randolf Menzel was at the Zukunftskolleg from 10/2015 to 12/2015. He was affiliated with the Department of Biology and had been invited by Andreas Thum.

Andreas Thum's aim to invite Randolf Menzel was to contrast the results on the neuronal circuits underlying learning at single cell level in honeybees and Drosophila larvae. He wanted to compare the findings of Randolf Menzel obtained in the past 20 years on the honeybee brain with the latest results of his group. In addition, Andreas Thum had obtained funding from the DFG to establish a standard atlas for the larval brain, and Randolf Menzel pioneered the construction of a honeybee brain atlas. Moreover, Andreas Thum aimed to support Randolf Menzel to complete his latest approach to add a new set of data into the honeybee standard atlas. The results were organized in Konstanz to be published in a high ranking journal.

Responsibilities

Gregory Miller was at the Zukunftskolleg in the following months/years: 0-11/2009, 12/2009, 05/2010, 06-07/2010, 10/2010, 03-04/2012, and 05-06/2012. He was affiliated with the Department of Psychology and had been invited by Johanna Kißler, Iris-Tatjana Kolassa, and Nathan Weisz. 

In research and teaching, Gregory Miller combines substantive and methodological expertise in two central research areas, clinical psychology and psychophysiology, in a research concept for understanding human experience and behavior and its pathological deviations. He communicated paradigmatic models of thought, methodological approaches to, and insights into clinical psychophysiology. As a former president of scientific societies and as editor of the international journal "Psychophysiology", Gregory Miller also had a large network of scientific connections that made it easier for fellows of the Zukunftskolleg to establish international scientific contacts.
For many years there had been a cooperation between Gregory Miller and the Department of Psychology of the University of Konstanz which was honored with the award of an honorary doctorate.

Responsibilities

Mostafa Minawi will be at the Zukunftskolleg in summer 2024 as well as in winter 2025/26. He is affiliated with the Department of History and Sociology and has been invited by Gruia Badescu.

Project: „Ottoman-Ethopian Relations and the Geopolitics of Imperialsim in the Horn of Africa“

Responsibilities

Paul Mulvaney was at the Zukunftskolleg from 06/2016 to 08/2016. He was affiliated with the Department of Chemistry and had been invited by Klaus Boldt.

The aim of inviting Paul Mulvaney to Konstanz was to build on existing links between researchers at the Department of Chemistry and Bio21 at the University of Melbourne with a focus on nanoscale materials, self-assembly and novel photovoltaics. He worked with the groups of Klaus Boldt, Helmut Cölfen and Lukas Schmidt-Mende on a better understanding of the role of intercrystal forces on self-assembly at the nanoscale.

Responsibilities

Robert Philibert was at the Zukunftskolleg from 02/2011 to 04/2011. He was affiliated with the Department of Biology and had been invited by Helen Gunter.

The inclusion of Robert Philibert as a Senior Fellow 1) helped Helen Gunter to develop high throughput techniques for the detection of DNA methylation, a skill that was useful for two of her projects in Konstanz; 2) enabled collaboration with other Zukunftskolleg fellows such as Iris-Tatjana Kolassa, whose research is very closely aligned with that of Robert Philibert and 3) allowed Robert Philibert to interact with the members of the MemoStress excellence cluster. In addition to his skills in high throughput epigenetics research, Robert Philibert was the principal investigator in the Iowa Adoption Studies Project, which included several thousand participants, an invaluable tool for comparative research.

Responsibilities

Wilson Poon was at the Zukunftskolleg from 04/2012 to 05/2012. He was affiliated with the Department of Physics and had been invited by Thomas Voigtmann.

Wilson Poon is an interdisciplinary researcher, whose day-to-day work sits on the border between Physics and Biology. Besides this, he regularly pursues projects in Philosophy and History of Science, as well as in Theology. Wilson Poon´s group experiments on micro-rheology of colloidal suspensions have been performed and were compared to similar experiments done in Konstanz and to the theory work of Thomas Voigtmann. 

Responsibilities

Paul Rozin was at the Zukunftskolleg in 07/2016. He was affiliated with the Department of Psychology and had been invited by Gudrun Sprösser.

Paul Rozin provided his expertise in the cross-cultural investigation of eating behaviour, which greatly facilitated the success of the project „Why people eat in a traditional or modern way: A cross-country study“ by Gudrun Sproesser of the Department of Psychology. Paul Rozin’s expertise in the mechanisms underlying eating behaviour was highly valuable for the research projects “SmartAct: Individual and context-based real-time interventions promoting normal eating and physical activity through mobile technology” (PIs Britta Renner, Harald Schupp; funded by the BMBF) and “DEDIPAC: Determinants of Diet and Physical Activity” (Britta Renner; funded by the BMBF).

Responsibilities

Konrad Schmüdgen will join the Zukunftskolleg from 01/2024 until 03/2024. He is affiliated with the Department of Mathematics and Statistics, and collaborates with Philipp di Dio.

Project: "Moments, non-negative Polynomials and Partial Differential Operators"

Konrad Schmüdgen main research is in "Operator Theory", a central area in modern analysis, deeply related to mathematical physics. A major breakthrough was achieved in the late 1990s by the solution of Schmüdgen to the "Moment Problem for compact semialgebraic sets", in which the "Positivstellensatz" of real algebraic geometry played a surprisingly essential role. This connection between functional analysis and real algebra was discovered by Prof. Dr. Alexander Prestel from the University of Konstanz, who actively communicated it to the real algebra community. Decades of very fruitful interactions between the two communities followed this spectacular discovery, with important ramifications into "polynomial optimisation", exploiting "semidefinite programming".

Responsibilities

Valerie Shafer was at the Zukunftskolleg from 04/2009 to 09/2009. She was affiliated with the Department of Linguistics and had been invited by Tanja Rinker.

Valerie Shafer collaborated with Tanja Rinker on a project examining the relationship between speech perception and language development in bilingually-exposed preschoolers. She also developed collaborations that focused on the types of training that facilitate second-language learning in children and adults.
For several years, Valerie Shafer also has been serving as member of the Recuitment Committee to select new Postdoctoral and Research Fellows for the Zukunftskolleg.

Responsibilities

Brian Smith was at the Zukunftskolleg in the following months/years: 03-05/2015 and 07-09/2015. He was affiliated with the Department of Biology and had been invited by Andreas Thum.

Brian Smith brought his expertise in behavioral mechanisms to Andreas Thum's project. His goal was to develop protocols for the fruit fly designed to explore a richer repertoire of learning mechanisms; e.g. signaled avoidance and conditioned inhibition, both of which Brain Smith has reported in the honey bee. This work interfaced with, and helped to extend to important new directions, laboratory research programmes of two fellows of the Zukunftskolleg (Andreas Thum and Wolf Hütteroth) who investigated the cellular and molecular bases of learning and memory in the fruit fly. Based on the unique expertise of Brian Smith and the scientific expertise of the two fellows it was possible, for the first time, to challenge the fruit fly and its larval counterpart with behavioral tasks that allow for a more direct comparison with vertebrate systems and even humans.           

Responsibilities

David Sobel was at the Zukunftskolleg from 06/2014 to 08/2014. He was affiliated with the Department of Philosophy and had been invited by Attila Tanyi.

David Sobel’s presence helped along Attila Tanyi's research since their primary philosophical interests are quite similar. David Sobel worked on the research project "Values and Preferences", the primary focus of which were subjectivist theories of reason and value. Since one of the major lines of inquiry in Attila Tanyi's research projects on demandingness concerned such subjectivist theories, David Sobel's presence was an invaluable asset for achieving his aims. 

Responsibilities

Patrick Speissegger was at the Zukunftskolleg in the following months/years: 07-08/2015 and 08/2016-07/2017. He was affiliated with the Department of Mathematics and had been invited by Margaret Thomas.

Patrick Speissegger has made many important contributions to the field of ominimality. Among his most significant contributions has been the development of new methods for constructing o-minimal structures, with some important examples obtained in this way. One of these, the real field expanded by classical Gevrey functions, is one of the key o-minimal structures being studied by the Margaret Thomas in her DFG-funded research project on “Parameterization and Algebraic Points in O-Minimal Structures”.
Several other members of the Department of Mathematics and Statisticsthe also benefitted from Patrick Speissegger's stay in Konstanz, in particular those in the Real Geometry and Algebra research focus. His presence enhanced the activities of the Model Theory Working Group, and his research activities had connections to the work of Salma Kuhlmann and Pantelis Eleftheriou.

Responsibilities

Vinod Subramaniam was at the Zukunftskolleg in the following months/years: 10/2011, 12/2011, and 06/2012. He was affiliated with the Department of Chemistry/Physics and had been invited by Malte Drescher.

Vinod Subramaniam’s stay in Konstanz was based both on a Senior Fellowship and a “Gastprofessur” of the Ministerium für Wissenschaft, Forschung und Kunst Baden-Württemberg (MWK). Main goal of the Gastprofessur was to support the university in preparing its next application for the excellence initiative in 2012. Vinod Subramaniam’s expertise was valuable for the Zukunftskolleg, the Graduate School „Chemical Biology“, and in particular for the – at that time planned - Collaborative Research Center 969 „Chemical and Biological Principles of Cellular Proteostasis“, in which malte Drescher and Marilena Manea were participating.
During his stay in Konstanz, Vinod Subramaniam conducted a research project on “Intrinsically disordered proteins in proteostasis”. In the course of the Gastprofessur he supervised two PhD students working partly in Konstanz, partly in Twente. This close collaboration between the Zukunftskolleg and an internationally distinguished scientist significantly increased the international visibility of the Zukunftskolleg and the University of Konstanz.

Responsibilities

Babu Thaliath joined the Zukunftskolleg from 06/2021 until 05/2022. He is affiliated with the Department of Philosophy and collaborates with Carolin Antos-Kuby.

Project: "The Historicity of Axioms. The historicising effect of mathematical formalism on the axiomatisation of early modern sciences."

_{Babu Thaliath's current research mainly examines the historical influence of the mathematical formalism on the axiomatisation or axiomatic development of early modern mathematical sciences, especially mechanics. The theoretical framework of the research is based on identifying and studying the complementarities between the otherwise historically and theoretically opposed formalism of Hilbert and Kant's intuitionism. This requires an extensive investigation of the genesis and development of synthetic and analytic approaches in the axiomatisation of mathematics, particularly geometry, in the modern age. From his previous postdoctoral research in Berlin and Cambridge, Babu Thaliath is familiar with the synthetic framework of the historic axiomatisation of early modern mathematical sciences. However he yet has to procure sufficient knowledge of the analytical frameworks of axiomatics, as is particularly evident in the context of logical empiricism in the 20th century, represented in the works of Rudolf Carnap, Herbert Feigl, Hans Reichenbach, Moritz Schlick, Otto Neurath, Carl G. Hempel, W.V.O. Quine, Kurt Gödel et al. The seminal works of these philosophers are available in the Philosophical Archive of the University of Konstanz. Therefore, the Senior Fellowship enables Babu Thaliath to find the necessary materials for his research in the archive, university library and the seminar libraries in Konstanz. Moreover, the research collaboration with Carolin Antos-Kuby will give him an adequate opportunity to become more familiar with the interdisciplinary research at the Zukunftskolleg - between philosophy and mathematics with regard to its theoretical-axiomatic foundations and their historical development.}

Responsibilities

Jean-Pierre Tignol was at the Zukunftskolleg in the following months/years: 04/2010, 09/2010-01/2011, and 08/2011-01/2012. He was affiliated with the Department of Mathematics and had been invited by Karim Becher.

Together with Karim Becher and Nicolas Grenier-Boley Jean-Pierre Tignol has found a new approach to define the first cohomological invariant of involutions of various types using multiplicative quadratic forms, irrespectively of the characteristic. A joint paper has been drafted and was published. During his stay in Konstanz, Jean-Pierre Tignol had numerous discussions with the junior members of the research team headed by Karim Becher, and was able to comment on their research work and to second Karim Becher in advising them and suggesting new research directions. As a result of these discussions, one of them applied for a one-year postdoctoral research grant under Jean-Pierre Tignol's advisorship. This grant was awarded by the research council of the “Louvain” academy. Moreover, with partial support from the Zukunftskolleg, Jean-Pierre Tignol was able to invite the members of his UCL team to Konstanz. They each benefited enormously from meeting the members of Karim Becher’s team: Karim Becher and Mélanie Raczek wrote a joint paper, which has been accepted for publication in Pacific Math. Journal.

Responsibilities

Graham Underwood joined the Zukunftskolleg from 06/2021 until 05/2022. He is affiliated with the Department of Biology and collaborates with Bernard Lepetit.

Project: "Investigating the role of light and endogenous rhythms on the motility behaviour of benthic diatoms."

_{Graham Underwood's specialism is microbial biogeochemistry, particularly the interaction between microbial activity and the external environment (dissolved organic matter, inorganic nutrients, spatial and temporal variability), the physiology of diatom biofilms, and their associated bacterial assemblages. During his Senior Fellowship, Graham Underwood will collaborate with Bernard Lepetit and his team to investigate the factors regulating diatom motility behaviours, addressing questions concerning the links to photosynthesis, circadian rhythms and genetic controls. This work will contribute to an unresolved debate, ongoing since Perkins (1960) about what are the key controls of diatoms rhythmic motility, and also addresses deeper questions about how individual behaviours contribute to population-level responses, how microscale actions influence macroscale ecological functioning, and the extent to which behaviours are controlled by gene activity.}

Responsibilities

Sandeep Verma was at the Zukunftskolleg in the following months/years: 05-07/2011 and 05-07/2013. He was affiliated with the Department of Chemistry and had been invited by Jörg Hartig.

The utilization of nucleobases, nucleotides, as well as oligonucleotides provided a direct link to Jörg Hartig's research endeavours. Moreover, the even more frequent use of peptides as building blocks provided an interesting connection to Marilena Manea who is working with peptide conjugates. Alexander Titz profited from Sandeep Verma´s vast knowledge in organic synthesis. On the other hand, Sandeep Verma has been mastering several technologies in order to characterize structural properties such as X-ray crystallography, atomic force microscopy and sophisticated fluorescence techniques (such as life-time measurements), which made him very interesting to the physico-chemists Malte Drescher and Dominik Wöll. In addition, he manipulated the generated structures by electron- and ion-beams, these endeavours raised great interest of fellows from the Department of Physics.

Responsibilities

Philip Welch joins the Zukunftskolleg from 04/2023 until 06/2023. He is affiliated with the Department of Mathematics and collaborates with Carolin Antos.

Project: "Second order aspects of multiversism"

The project lies at the intersection of set theory and its philosophy. Here, the universe/ multiverse debate has been of major importance in the last decades. It investigates the question if there is a unique model of set theory (and, taking set theory as foundation for mathematics, a model for the whole of mathematics) where all mathematical sentences are true or false. The existence of such a model has been called into question since the discovery that for every axiomatization of mathematics there are mathematical sentences that cannot be proven or disproven in this axiomatization (Gödel, 1931) and it has gained major importance since set theory developed new methodologies to investigate this phenomenon by building a vast array of different models. The multiverse view takes this mathematical research as evidence for the fact, that there is no such unique model and instead we should look for a foundation in the existence of many different models, thereby propagating a pluralistic view in the foundation of mathematics. The project investigates this view on a very fundamental level by considering a different logical framework for such models.