Born September 12, 1941 in Berlin, married, three children
Professional Career:
1965 Diplom in Forestry, University of Göttingen, Germany
1966 M.A. in Botany, University of California, Los Angeles, USA
1969 Dr. rer.nat. University of Würzburg, Germany
1969 - 1973 Wissenschaftlicher Assistent (Assistant Professor), Würzburg, Germany
1973 Habilitation, University of Würzburg, Germany
1974 Associate Professor (HS 2), University of Würzburg
1975 Associate Professor (HS 3), Technical University Munich, Germany
1975 Full Professor (HS 4), University of Bayreuth, Germany
1989 - 1993 Head of the Bayreuth Institute of Terrestrial Ecosystem Research (BITÖK)
1997 Founding Director of the Max-Planck Institute for Biogeochemistry, Jena, Germany
1997 – 1998, 2002 – 2004, 2006 – 2008 Managing Director of the MPI Biogeochemistry
2009 Emeritus Professor at the Max Planck Institute for Biogeochemistry, Jena
2016 Guest at the Max Planck Institute for Biogeochemistry, Jena
University and Professional Appointments:
1983 – 1989 Member of the German Advisory Board on Forest Decline
As Member of this Advisory Board I was able to establish Ecosystem Research in Germany by founding TERN (Terrestrial Ecosystem Reseach Network) with major research centers in Bayreuth, Göttingen, Kiel and Weihenstephan. The Bayreuth Center developed into BITÖK.
1997 – 2004 Member of the German Federal Advisory Board on Global Change (WBGU)
1998 – 2001 Lead author of IPCC Working Group II and of the IPCC, Special Report on land use and forestry, Member of the German Delegation at UNFCCC-COP6 and COP6+
1998 Honorary Professor at the University of Jena
2001 Scientific Advisory Board of the Potsdam Institute of Climate-mitigation (PIK), Appointed expert at the International Court for Oceans
2016 – 2018 Advisory board of the Austrian Government on Bioeconomy
Major Research Activities
1967 – 1986 Member of the German IBP (International Biological Program) Solling Project
1971 – 1992 Run-off farming in the Negev Desert with Prof Evenari, Hebrew University, Israel
1981 – 1992 Head of the Collaborative Research Center 137 of the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft DFG (SFB): Flux Control in Ecological Systems
1983 – 1987 Head of the Bavarian Research Group on “Forest Toxicology” (Bayerische Forschungsgruppe Forsttoxicologie)
1990 – 2016 Member of the scientific advisory group on the environmental agreement between Germany and the Soviet Union, including visits to Baikal, Kaukasus, Kirgisia, and European Russia
1990 – 1996 Treasurer of IUBS (International Union of Biological Sciences). In this function I gave the start-up financial support to the establishment of the first global biodiversity initiative: Diversitas.
As member of the steering committee of IUBS I meet Prof VE Sokolov, Russian Academy of Sciences to initiate Research activities in Siberia.
1994 – 1999 Member of the steering committee of the IGBP (International Geosphere Biosphere Program) Core project GCTE (Global Change and Terrestrial Ecosystems) and BAHC (Biosphere Atmosphere Hydrological Cycles). It was GCTE that established the global ecosystem transects
1995 Contribution to the Global Biodiversity Assessment
2000 – 2003 Coordinator and Member of various EU Projects: Niphys, Forcast, Euroflux, Biodepth, TCOS and others
2000 - 2009 Establishing and Co-Organizer of the “Jena Experiment”, a biodiversity experiment in grassland
2000 - 2009 Establishing the “BioTree” experiment, a biodiversity experiment in forests
2003 – 2008 Coordinator of the CarboEurope, an Integrative Project of the EU to establish the greenhouse gas balance of Europe
2007 - 2009 Initiator and Co-Organizer of the large scale Ecosystem Exploratories of the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft to investigate interactions between biodiversity, landuse and ecosystem functions
2008 – 2019 Establishing the BeLongDead Experiment, a large-scale and long-term Experiment on wood decomposition
2009 - 2017 Establishing ICOS, an Integrative Carbon Observation System, Advisor of ICOS-Sweden
2010 – 2016 Grant of the Government of the Russian Federation to support research at Russian institutions of higher education
2012 – 2019 Member of iDiv, the German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity Research, a Project of the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft
2015 – 2019 Initiating a sequencing project on the evolution of the Genus Quercus and Fagus
2012 - 2019 Member of the panel on Bioenergy of the German National Akademie of Science and the German Academy of Technical Sciences
Special Honors
1990 "Bayerische Staatemedaille in Silber" for his achievements in the field of forest decline
1990 Member of the German Academy of Science, Leopoldina
1992 Max-Planck-Forschungspreis jointly with Prof. Dr. H.A.Mooney
1993 Honorary Vice-President of the XV. International Botanical Congress in Tokyo
1993 Honorary Member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences
1997 Charles Bullard Fellowship in Forest Research, Harvard University
2002 , 2016 ISI Highly Cited Researcher
2002 Certificate for the contribution to the Nobel Peace Award of the IPCC
2004 Vernadsky Medal of the European Geophysical Union
2006 Deutscher Umweltpreis (German Environmental Award)
2008 Bundesverdienstkreuz 1. Klasse (Federal Cross of Merit)
2011 Honorary Member of the Portuguese Academy of Sciences
2012 Honorary Professor in Forestry of the Federal Siberian University at Krasnoyarsk, Russia
2013 Ernst-Haeckel Prize of the European Ecological Federation
2018 Honorary Doctor of Forestry at the University of Göttingen, Germany
2023 ThüringenForst Medal 2023 for special contributions to the forest and the forest management