The President of the Physikalisch-Technische Bundesanstalt
succeeds Lutz Schröter, who takes over the vice presidency in rotation /
Handover in turbulent times
Berlin, Bad Honnef, Germany,
1. April 2022 – On Friday, April 1, 2022, Joachim Ullrich will assume
the presidency of the German Physical Society (DPG). He succeeds Lutz
Schröter, who was president of the world's largest physics society with
around 55,000 members from April 2020 to March 2022 and will now become
DPG vice president by rotation. The previous vice president, Dieter
Meschede of the University of Bonn, is also leaving office by rotation.
"We
believe in the idea that science bridges cultures," says the new DPG
president, underlining a central guiding principle of the DPG. "Genuine
science only functions in the long term in freedom, in open discourse,
free of fear in pluralistic discussion."
The war in Ukraine makes
it abundantly clear how important it is for the DPG to devote all its
energies to maintaining bridges for the free exchange of scientific
knowledge and opinions across national borders and cultures. This
includes, in particular, concrete measures initiated by his predecessor.
An
important concern of the new DPG president is the promotion of young
people. "Promoting young talent also includes mitigating the negative
consequences of the Corona pandemic for young, school-age people, that
includes teachers," Ullrich emphasizes. Only recently, the DPG, together
with other mathematics and science societies, issued a position paper
on continuing education and training for teachers, calling for
participation in continuing education and training programs to be made
much easier.
Joachim Ullrich is convinced that a good education in
the natural sciences is the basis for social participation and a
discourse based on facts. "We have to support society and politics in
their decisions," says Ullrich, "and provide the scientific basis for
this." This applies not least to the challenges in the areas of climate
and energy supply.
Ullrich believes: "The DPG has to get involved,
more than ever! We have to support society and politics in finding the
right way without – and I think this is extremely important – becoming
political ourselves!"
For this involvement, he says, further
strengthening of DPG communications is necessary. This also includes
communicating how science works; there are still major
misunderstandings. In this communication, he also sees the DPG as having
a responsibility to support scientists who express themselves
scientifically on present topics, such as the pandemic or climate
change, and to protect them from hostility.
Joachim Ullrich is
convinced that the success of the DPG in all its activities is
indistinguishably linked to a lively, creative and inspiring association
culture: "Our members are the heart of our association, and
enthusiastic members are also the best ambassadors, the best source of
new members. I will therefore do everything I can to preserve, and even
increase, the attractiveness of the DPG for our members, and – above all
– to extend it to new groups."
About Prof. Dr. Dr. h. c. Joachim H. Ullrich
Joachim
Ullrich was born in Edenkoben, Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany, in 1956.
He studied Geophysics and Physics at the University of Frankfurt, where,
after receiving his diploma in 1983, he also received his doctorate and
habilitated on recoil ion pulse spectroscopy in 1994. From 1989 to 1997
he worked as a scientific employee at the Gesellschaft für
Schwerionenforschung (Society for Heavy Ion Research, GSI) in Darmstadt,
where he was active in the development of recoil ion spectroscopy.
After a research stay at Kansas State University and a visiting
professorship at the University of Missouri in 1995, he received an
appointment to a chair in experimental physics at the University of
Freiburg in 1997.
There he quickly brought his department to the
international forefront. In 1999, Joachim Ullrich was awarded the
Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Prize of the German Research Foundation.
With
his appointment as director at the Max Planck Institute for Nuclear
Physics (MPIK) in Heidelberg, he established the department of
"Experimental Multiparticle Quantum Dynamics" there from 2001. As
managing director of the MPIK from 2002 to 2006, he played a major role
in the institute's future-oriented scientific direction. In addition, he
has been actively involved in teaching at Heidelberg University as a
personal full professor since 2002.
Joachim Ullrich has made a
special contribution to the use of free-electron lasers (FEL) – sources
of X-rays of the highest intensity and quality. Since 2006, he has been
head of the Max Planck Advanced Study Group at the "Hamburg Center for
Free Electron Laser Science" (CFEL), which he helped to establish in
2008 as chairman of the CFEL Management Board. One of his
internationally significant achievements is the development of the CAMP
multifunctional measurement apparatus. This was used to perform
ground-breaking experiments at the world's first X-ray FEL at Stanford
to image increasingly complex systems ranging from molecules to
clusters, biomolecules and biological samples such as viruses.
Joachim
Ullrich has received numerous national and international awards for his
scientific work. In 2006, for example, he received the Philipp Morris
Research Prize together with Robert Moshammer, and in 2021 he received
the Stern-Gerlach Medal, the highest award of the DPG for outstanding
achievements in the field of experimental physics.
In 2012,
Joachim Ullrich was appointed President of the Physikalisch-Technische
Bundesanstalt (PTB). One year later, he was elected second deputy in the
presidium of the German Institute for Standardization (Deutsches
Institut für Normung e. V.) as well as a member of the German Academy of
Science and Engineering (acatech). Within the framework of the Metre
Convention, Joachim Ullrich became a member of the International
Committee for Weights and Measures (CIPM), has been its vice president
since 2015 and president of the Consultative Committee for Units (CCU)
since the beginning of 2014.
The new DPG president Prof. Dr. Dr. h.c. Joachim Ullrich © PTB
The German Physical Society
(Deutsche Physikalische Gesellschaft e. V.; DPG), which was founded way
back in 1845, is the oldest national and, with about 55,000 members,
also the largest physical society in the world. As a non-profit-making
organisation it pursues no economic interests. The DPG promotes the
transfer of knowledge within the scientific community through
conferences, events and publications, and aims to open a window to
physics for the curious. Its special focuses are on encouraging junior
scientists and promoting equal opportunities. The DPG’s head office is
at Bad Honnef am Rhein. Its representative office in the capital is the
Magnus-Haus Berlin. Website: www.dpg-physik.de
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