Who are the DFG?
The Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Foundation) is Germany‘s main self-governing research funding organisation – a science-led institution that allocates state funds to promote research projects and is set up and registered as an association under German law. DFG members are for the most part universities but also include other "research institutions of general importance".
What are the DFG review boards?
The DFG review boards evaluate project applications based on external reviews. They also check for compliance with uniform standards in their assessment. In addition, they provide the DFG's statutory bodies with strategic advice in the form of proposals on how to optimise the funding instruments, for instance. In view of the election in autumn, the DFG Senate revised the configuration of the subject area structure and made changes where necessary (Related press release).
Who has a say in the composition of the DFG review boards?
On the one hand, candidates are nominated by the DFG’s official members, in other words by universities, academies of sciences and humanities as well as scientific associations of general importance. On the other hand, they are proposed by scientific/academic societies, faculty associations and by Stifterverband für die Deutsche Wissenschaft. The spectrum thus extends from direct subject-specific interests represented by scientific/academic societies with the right to nominate candidates and the cross-disciplinary concerns of organisations that combine several subject areas, such as academies and faculty associations, all the way to independent institutions such as universities and science policy players.
Why is the election running from 23 October important?
"By voting, every researcher at the University of Passau gets to have a say in who serves on the DFG review boards. This is an opportunity no one ought to miss," says innovation researcher Professor Carolin Häussler. She is DFG liaison officer at the University of Passau and serves as a point of contact – along with the Research Services Division – for first-time applicants, representing the university in matters needing clarification and in conflicts with the DFG. She finds: "DFG funding is enormously important for the advancement of research activities at universities." That is precisely the reason a high voter turnout is so important: voters will be deciding on a number of matters, including whether the entire compass of their discipline will be represented in the review board.
Who is up for election?
The list of candidates for 2023 comprises 1,631 researchers from across Germany. They will be electing 649 members into forty-nine review boards who are responsible for a total of 214 subject areas.
The candidates from the University of Passau standing for election are:
Professor Stefan Katzenbeisser
How can critical infrastructures in a networked world be protected against cyber attacks?
How can critical infrastructures in a networked world be protected against cyber attacks?
Professor Stefan Katzenbeisser holds the Chair of Computer Engineering at the University of Passau. He conducts research on cyber security in embedded systems, on secure critical infrastructures and on technical data protection. He is spokesperson of the new research cluster "ForDaySec - Security in everyday digitalisation", which is funded by the Bavarian Science Ministry and where researchers from computer science, law and sociology have come together to develop new types of technical procedures to provide security in day-to-day digital life. Besides participating in research projects on secure mobility, he is also involved in the research initiative "6G Research and Innovation Cluster (6G-RIC)" which is coordinated by Fraunhofer HHI and aims to develop mobile telecommunication systems of the sixth generation by pushing back the limits of technology.
Professor Johann-Mattis List
How to compare the over 6 000 languages spoken around the world, and how do computer-based methods help?
How to compare the over 6 000 languages spoken around the world, and how do computer-based methods help?
Comparative Linguist Johann-Mattis List has held the Chair for Multilingual Computational Linguistics at the University of Passau since January 2023 and heads the ERC-funded research group "ProduSemy". Before that, he served as stand-in professor at Bielefeld University and as senior researcher at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig and the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History in Jena where he headed another ERC-funded research group on computer-assisted language comparison. Professor List earned his doctorate at the Heinrich Heine University in Düsseldorf and wrote his habilitation at the Friedrich Schiller University in Jena.
Professor Joscha Prochno
How do geometrical structures behave when the spatial dimension tends to infinity?
How do geometrical structures behave when the spatial dimension tends to infinity?
Professor Joscha Prochno was awarded his doctorate in 2011 at Kiel University, where he had previously earned his Diplom degree. His academic career then took him to the University of Alberta in Canada, the Johannes Kepler University of Linz in Austria and the University of Hull in England. He has been professor at the University of Passau since April 2021 and holds the Chair of Functional Analysis. Professor Prochno also serves as co-editor of the two journals Mathematische Nachrichten and Journal of Complexity. In 2021, Professor Prochno was awarded Austria's most prestigious mathematics prize.
Professor Stefanie Scherzinger
How to bring order to large data volumes?
How to bring order to large data volumes?
Professor Stefanie Scherzinger holds the Chair of Scalable Database Systems at the University of Passau. Passau is where she had studied Computer Science and embarked on her academic career. After gaining experience in the field as a software developer with IBM and Google, she was professor at OTH Regensburg for eight years before she was offered a position at the University of Passau in April 2020.
Professor Katzenbeisser (subject area: Security and Dependability, Operating, Communication, Database and Distributed Systems) and Professor Scherzinger (subject area: Data Management, Data-Intensive Systems, Computer Science Methods in Information Systems) are both running for the 4.43 Computer Science review board; Professor Prochno is running for 3.31 Mathematics. Professor List is also a candidate - for 1.14 Linguistics review board (subject area: 1.14-01 General and Comparative Linguistics, Typology, Non-European Languages). He has stood for the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology (MPI EVA), Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution in Leipzig Leipzig.
Candidates can be elected regardless of their affiliation with a subject area. Professor Häussler says: "I'm delighted that we have such outstanding scientists on the list of candidates. Their election to the review boards would certainly be a great gain for the University of Passau“.
Who can vote?
The roughly 150,000 researchers who are currently eligible to vote include:
- researchers who have successfully passed their oral doctoral exam before the first day of the voting period, and
- professors (including junior professors)
if they are working in scientific or academic research, on, but not limited to, the first day of the voting period.
In addition, candidates must be affiliated with a voting centre. The University of Passau has set up such a voting centre: Julia Maly is in charge, voting centre supervisor at the German Funding Section in the Research Services Division at the University of Passau.
You will find more information at the DFG website or the website of the Research Services Division.
How does the election work?
The election is scheduled to take place online from 23 October, 2:00 pm, to 20 November, 2 pm.
Every person who is eligible to vote gets six votes to cast. They can give a candidate up to three votes. Votes can be split up among candidates from different review boards, which means that voters can cast votes at their own discretion regardless of their affiliation with a particular review board.
Researchers who are eligible to vote will receive a letter with their personal access credentials in good time before the election. The respective voting centre will register the researchers eligible to vote and send them the voting documentation.
If you have any questions, please contact: Julia Maly, Research Services Division at the University of Passau
Explanatory video (German)
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