Awards and Distinctions

The many research prizes and awards conferred upon scholars and scientists of Cologne University testify to the excellent work done there. The most prominent include the following:

Nobel Laureates

The Nobel Prize, named after Alfred Nobel, is endowed annually by the Nobel Foundation in five categories. The prize is awarded in recognition of outstanding contributions to science and culture.

So far, two Nobel Laureates have come from the University of Cologne:

Nobel Prize in Physics
Peter Andreas Grünberg
Adjunct Professor
2007

Nobel Prize in Chemistry
Professor Dr. Kurt Alder
Chair in Chemistry
1950

Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Prize

Germany’s most prestigious research prize awarded by the German Research Foundation (DFG) aims to improve the working conditions of outstanding scientists and scholars, expand their research opportunities, ease their administrative burden, and help them to employ particularly qualified young researchers. Since the programme was launched in 1985, nine Cologne University researchers have received the Leibniz Prize in support of their work.

2012 Prof. Dr. Achim Rosch
Institute of Theoretical Physics – Faculty of Mathematics and Natural Sciences
2009 Prof Dr. Martin Zirnbauer
Institute of Theoretical Physics – Faculty of Mathematics and Natural Sciences
2007 Prof. Dr. Jens Claus Brüning
Institute for Genetics – Faculty of Mathematics and Natural Sciences
2006 Prof. Dr. Thomas Mussweiler
Institute of Psychology – Faculty of Education
2005 Prof. Dr. Axel Ockenfels
Department of Political Economics – Faculty of Management, Economics and Social Sciences
2001 Prof. Dr. Martin Krönke
Institute for Medical Microbiology, Immunology and Hygiene – Faculty of Medicine
1997 Prof. Dr. Andreas Kablitz
Department of Romance Studies – Faculty of Arts and Humanities
1996 Prof. Dr. Ulf-Ingo Flügge
Botanical Institute – Faculty of Mathematics and Natural Sciences
1995 Prof. Dr. Thomas Schweizer
Institute of Ethnology – Faculty of Arts and Humanities
1992 Prof. Dr. Peter Schneider
Mathematics – Faculty of Mathematics and Natural Sciences

Humboldt Research Award

The Physics Institute of the Mathematics and Natural Sciences Faculty has been honoured with several Humboldt Research Awards.

In 2003, for instance, Professor Valerii Vinokur from the Argonne National Laboratory, Chicago, was granted the award to finance research stays at the Institute of Theoretical Physics and to sustain collaboration with the working group of Professor Nattermann and Dr. Stefan Scheidl.

Further Humboldt Research Award winners at the Institute of Theoretical Physics:

Professor Ora Entin-Wohlmann, Tel Aviv University (2002, in collaboration with Professor Müller-Hartmann)
Professor Amnon Ahorony, Tel Aviv University (2002, in collaboration with Professor Nattermann)
Professor Valery Pokrovsky, Texas A+M University and Landau Institute Moscow (2000, in collaboration with Professors Müller-Hartmann, Nattermann and Zittartz)

Sofja Kovalevskaja Prize

One of the prestigious Sofja Kovalevskaja Awards granted by the Humboldt Foundation to successful top junior researchers from all countries and all disciplines went to the Czech geneticist Mirka Uhlirova in 2008. The grant serves to support her five-year project of building up her own working group at the Cologne Institute for Genetics and the Cluster of Excellence CECAD (host: Prof. Maria Leptin).

Further award winners include, in 2004, Dr. Mark Depauw from the Institute of Egyptology on the subject of “Multilingualism and multiculturalism in Graeco-Roman Egypt” and, in 2002, Professor Dr. Joachim Schultze from Department I of Internal Medicine and Professor Dr. Manuel Koch from the Institute for Biochemistry II, both of the Medical Faculty.