Recipe for Social Security Why a Universal Basic Income Could Be a Model for Germany

Special Topic: Sustainability

01 2017

The research magazine of the University of Freiburg | www.wissen.uni-freiburg.de

Recipe for Social Security Why a universal basic income could be a model for Germany

Setting the record straight: Shaping the future: Coordinating stimuli: Why a newly discovered virus Why citizens and researchers Why nerve cells have to in bats is not dangerous are brainstorming ideas for communicate closely to for humans > page 8 sustainability in Freiburg > page 20 trigger movement > page 40 01 2017 Bundesweit für Sie da: Mit Direktbank und wachsendem Filialnetz. Contents

Research A Model for Human Dignity 4 Karl Justus Bernhard Neumärker’s research suggests that a universal basic income would have a chance in Germany Who’s Afraid of Vampire Flu? 8

1 A newly discovered virus in bats Für mich: das kostenfreie Bezügekonto is not transmittable to humans All at the Same Time 12 1 Voraussetzung: Bezügekonto mit Online-Überweisungen; Genossenschaftsanteil von 15,– Euro/Mitglied. University of Freiburg psychologists are searching Banken gibt es viele. Aber die BBBank ist die einzige bundesweit tätige genossenschaftliche for strategies to facilitate multitasking Privat kundenbank, die Beamten und Arbeit nehmern des öffentlichen Dienstes einzigartige Angebote macht. Zum Beispiel das Bezügekonto mit kostenfreier Kontoführung.1 Special Topic: Sustainability Informieren Sie sich jetzt über die vielen weiteren Vorteile Ihres neuen Kontos unter An Interdisciplinary Thread 16 Tel. 0 800/40 60 40 160 (kostenfrei) oder www.bezuegekonto.de The University of Freiburg has teamed up with regional partner institutions to establish a research focus on sustainability Freiburg: City of the Future 20

A project is bringing citizens and researchers together to discuss how to make urban life sustainable 182x119_Dozent_Bezuegekonto_allgemein_4c.indd 1 22.03.17 13:19 Airborne Data Collectors 24 Remote sensing enables scientists to collect information on the environment and make more accurate assessments of geo-risks Maintaining Structural Diversity 28

Examples from Germany and Brazil demonstrate the impact of the logging industry on biodiversity Switched On 32

The project SusLight is developing better LEDs and therefore addressing the issue of sustainable lighting

Authority and Democratic Education 36 West Germany experienced dynamic educational change in the 1950s and 1960s – in contrast to France From Idea to Movement 40 Scientists are using a special blend of methods to investigate previously unknown methods of motor control Neue Teaching Produkte im Digitalized Dialects 44 Sortiment A team at the Department of English is pioneering research-based learning approaches with the linguistic database FREDDIE Learning Good Teaching 48

Educational scientists are using an educational research model to improve teacher education Produkte  nden Sie im Online-Shop: www.shop.uni-freiburg.de Ending the Illusion of Understanding 52 und in den Buchhandlungen Rombach und Walthari How the online training platform “ELIS” teaches learning strategies and helps students to apply them 01 2017 Bundesweit für Sie da: Mit Direktbank und wachsendem Filialnetz. Contents

Research A Model for Human Dignity 4 Karl Justus Bernhard Neumärker’s research suggests that a universal basic income would have a chance in Germany Who’s Afraid of Vampire Flu? 8

Examples from Germany and Brazil demonstrate the impact of the logging industry on biodiversity Switched On 32

The project SusLight is developing better LEDs and therefore addressing the issue of sustainable lighting

hat would you do if you didn’t have to worry University of Freiburg. He is regarded as some- Wabout earning a living?” A roughly 30-year- thing of a rare bird by colleagues in his field in old man stares fixedly into the camera. The cor- Germany – topics like “social justice” or “social ners of his mouth turn up in a smile: “I’m Micha participation” are not exactly at the top of the list from Berlin, and that’s exactly what I’m trying to of research interests for economists. “When I find out for myself.” Micha, or more precisely Mi- predicted ten years ago at a conference that chael Bohmeyer, looks like a typical hipster from even democracies would soon call for caps on Friedrichshain or Kreuzberg, with a trendy dis- managers’ salaries and for the introduction of a tressed t-shirt, turquoise pants, and casually minimum wage, I was practically driven out the tousled blond hair. Walking down the streets of of the place,” he remembers with a laugh. A universal basic income his neighborhood, lined with blooming trees and could give employees the well-kept old buildings, he talks about his new chance to think about their life. His plan was originally to rest up and just be “There is evidently not only professional development lazy, he says, but now he feels a great urge to the argument of efficiency but and protect themselves get up and do things: “I feel free and relaxed, my from exploitation. head is full of business ideas, I do volunteer also that of fairness.” Photo: contrastwerkstatt/Fotolia work, have become a better father, and lead a more healthy lifestyle.” Neumärker thinks UBI would have a real chance. Even more, he sees it as a potential solution to Bohmeyer founded an association called future challenges that will bring about sweeping “Mein Grundeinkommen” (“My Basic Income”) in changes in the labor market, such as increasing 2014 as a means of testing out the “society of digitalization and robotization: “It is unrealistic to tomorrow.” The association collects donations expect that we will be able to find enough new on a website. As soon as 12,000 euros are work for the many people who will lose their jobs. raised, they are raffled off and given away. The After all, the purpose of developing humanoid recipient gets 12,000 euros for twelve months robots is to replace human workers, not – as in free from stress and worries. To date, the asso- the first digital wave – to make the work easier ciation has funded 94 basic incomes via crowd- for them.” funding and is now collecting for number 95. At the moment, Neumärker is conducting No Questions, No Requirements studies on the ways in which individuals with a UBI spend their time in comparison to those Universal basic income (UBI) is only the topic receiving benefits from state welfare programs of a private initiative in Germany, but in other like Germany’s so-called Hartz IV, on the decou- European countries it is already being negotiated pling of work and payment, and on the UBI as a at the state level: Switzerland held a referendum mechanism for reducing competition-induced on the issue in 2016, and Finland began testing forms of discrimination – such as that of women. several variants of UBI in 2017. The Federal The results of his research indicate that UBI A Model for Human Dignity Republic should also take the plunge, argues could serve as a foundation for justice and social Prof. Dr. Karl Justus Bernhard Neumärker: “If peace and guarantee both in the long term. The Karl Justus Bernhard Neumärker’s research suggests that a there’s a country that can afford to introduce UBI, researcher sees it as a model for human dignity: universal basic income would have a chance in Germany it’s Germany. Our state has a large amount of “It would no longer be possible to exploit people assets at its disposal, and our concept of social who work in the low-pay sector, for example. If market economy at least provides us with the your boss tried to introduce another pay cut, you right intellectual basis for it.” could just quit and think in peace about how to by Rimma Gerenstein best continue your professional development.” Neumärker heads the Department of Economic However, Neumärker stresses that this would Policy and Theory of Economic Order at the only work if the UBI were high enough. The 4 uni wissen 01 2017 5

amount currently under discussion in Germany is of dividing walls, because anonymity is key. The 1000 euros a month. participants have the task of negotiating the basic rules for society, but they do not know A Veil of Ignorance where they will later stand in the order they have established. The economist refers to his approach as “new ordoliberalism.” This places it in the tradition of “A large majority of the test subjects always the “Freiburg School,” which saw regulatory policy allowed themselves to be led behind the veil of as the precondition for a functioning society. To this ignorance when questions of social justice More time to relax? The researchers at the Department of Economic Policy and Theory of Economic Order are Prof. Dr. Karl Justus state the idea in simplified terms, a strong state were on the table,” reports Neumärker. “They studying how people would spend their time if they had a guaranteed basic income. To do so, they are adding Bernhard Neumärker maintains a constant level of competition in the selected models that incorporate a UBI rather new factors to the common work–life model, such as volunteering, leisure, and creativity. Photo: Syda Productions/Fotolia has served as professor of economy, thus guaranteeing its citizens freedom than the classical market economy model, in which economic policy and theory and stability. Neumärker adds a new component income level is determined by productivity. There of economic order at the to this theory: social justice. He is interested in is evidently not only the argument of efficiency University of Freiburg since questions that have been largely disregarded up but also that of fairness.” In other words, it was “The model could be used to calculate the wanted too much at once: The state set the UBI 2004. After completing a to now: What criteria does a society apply in important for the test subjects to first ensure that actual effects a lump payment would have on at the equivalent of 2,250 euros, and in the refer- degree in economics at the distributing its wealth, what conditions lead all members of society enjoyed a consistent level people’s behavior and the behavior they would endum it was only possible to vote yes or no. University of Hohenheim, political and economic actors to reassess their of security. Only then were they also prepared to exhibit under various conditions.” Although the “The sum was too high even for the Swiss. They he wrote his doctoral disser- behavior, and when should something be regarded accept low wages. researcher does not yet have conclusive results, were afraid it wouldn’t be possible to pay for it in tation and habilitation thesis as fair or unfair? he is convinced that a UBI would motivate peo- the long run and thus rejected the UBI.” The at the University of Bochum. Old Model, New Arguments ple to make different use of their time, that most Finns, on the other hand, were interested above Neumärker’s international The “social contract lab” is an experimental scarce of all resources. “That’s the theoretical all in lowering the country’s long-term unemploy- professional experience laboratory in which Neumärker has test subjects But what is the price of fairness? In other regulatory policy issue underpinning my research: ment figures, Neumärker suspects, and there- includes stints in Leicester, negotiate new social orders. The “lab” consists words, what consequences would it have for the What if it were not just the rich ‘leisure class’ that fore provided incomes of 650 euros a month England; Santa Barbara, of a lecture hall, computers for chatting, and a lot gross domestic product if everyone were provided could afford to work less and enjoy more free exclusively for unemployed people. However, USA; Mexico City, Mexico; with a basic income as a gift from birth? This time but also, for instance, employees from the this approach contradicts the basic idea of UBI. and Sofia, Bulgaria. His would be a horror scenario for advocates of low wage sector? That would lead to a real redis- Even so, Finland’s attempt at implementing the research interests are regu- classical competitive society, who warn that a tribution of free time and enable everyone to concept points the way to the future: “We shouldn’t latory policy, constitutional UBI would lull people into a state of chronic participate in social life.” forget that Finland is already much farther along economics and social con- laziness. If one believes the beaming faces on with digitalization than Germany,” says Neu- tract studies, the politics the “Mein Grundeinkommen” website, however, Experimentation Is Permitted märker, and the consequences this development of economic reforms, the the opposite appears to be the case. The winners will have on the labor market are already visible economics of social justice, of a basic income have been transformed into The idea of a UBI is not new in Germany: A there. “In the long run, a UBI would give us a and power and conflict veritable workhorses: Judy can finally put all her representative survey conducted by a large means of dealing with them where Hartz IV fails, economics.

energy into running her ice cream parlor, because German cashback website in 2017 found that 73 because in a world in which human workers are Photo: private she has paid off the loan she took out to open it. percent of all Germans have heard of UBI and being replaced by machines, even the best and Hildegard has realized a lifelong dream and 75 percent wish one would be introduced. In ad- fairest initial and further training can only get a staged a play. Christoph has quit his job at a call dition, German politicians of various leanings few of them off the unemployment rolls.” center and started studying to become a kinder- have been discussing the idea for decades, and garten teacher. So what is realistic? several variants have been suggested by the www.pr.uni-freiburg.de/go/grundeinkommen CDU, the FDP, the Greens, and the Left. “Our Neumärker is investigating how people with a constitution already allows for the introduction of UBI organize and spend their time. He and a a UBI as an element of the welfare state today, doctoral student are developing a formula that and experimentation is also permitted,” Neumärker adds new factors to the common work–life model. emphasizes. That’s where he sees the key to Further Reading In its current form, this model only takes account success: “We need to test different variants of of the time in which an individual works – that is, UBI to determine which model succeeds in be- Neumärker, B. (2017): Ordnungspolitik und „Neuer Ordoliberalismus“ im earns money – and the time in which he or she coming accepted. It’s not a matter of taking a Verhältnis zum wirtschaftswissenschaftlichen Mainstream. In: WISU 7/2017. does not work and is therefore unproductive. gamble, however, but of being realistic and There is no place in this binary formula for volun- involving the people in the process.” Neumärker, B. (2017): Bedingungsloses Grundeinkommen aus ordnung- The increasing digitalization and robotization will bring about sweeping changes teer work or hobbies. Neumärker is now adding spolitischer Sicht. In: WISU (in preparation). in the labor market. Karl Justus Bernhard Neumärker thinks it is unrealistic to factors like volunteering, leisure, and creativity There is much to learn from the attempts in believe that it will be possible to find paid jobs for the many laid-off workers. to the model. Switzerland and Finland, because neither of Van Parijs, P. / Vanderborght, Y. (2017): Basic income: a radical proposal for Photo: Nataliya Hora/Fotolia them were particularly successful. The Swiss a free society and a sane economy. Cambridge, Massachusetts/London. 6 uni wissen 01 2017 7

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Who’s Afraid “Zoonoses are infections that can be of Vampire Flu? transmitted to humans from animals.” A newly discovered virus in bats is not transmittable to humans ats are great,” fi nds Prof. Dr. Martin Schwemmle. es derive originally from animals,” the Freiburg by Jürgen Schickinger BThe nocturnal flyers helped the researcher virologist estimates. In pigs and bats, which only from the Freiburg University Medical Center’s In- seldom bite humans, the infectious contact occurs stitute of Virology to achieve a scientific break- via excreta, says the expert. Bats, whose viruses through, but that’s not the only reason he likes he is studying, eat fruit, but they are unhygienic Bats are regarded as hosts for them. In fact, they are bound by a relationship in and leave waste matter on it. A human who comes infectious diseases that can be which both sides benefit: Schwemmle’s research along later and eats the fruit could contract a dangerous for humans. cleared bats of a nasty suspicion. They are not “vampire fl u” – assuming that there is such a thing.

Photo: Juan Cruzado Cortés responsible for transmitting a “vampire flu,” contrary to a claim advanced by the German news- Does the Virus Exist at All? paper Bild. “Bats carry a number of viruses and can transmit them to humans,” says the virolo- Bats are regarded as reservoirs, long-term gist. These include rabies, mumps, Ebola, and hosts for infectious diseases that can be danger- severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS). The ous for humans. Experts have succeeded in announcement that American researchers had tracing quite a few different diseases back to discovered a new pathogen in bats that is similar bats – but not flu. Schwemmle is concentrating to flu viruses therefore caused a great stir. But his efforts especially on pathogens of the genus Schwemmle succeeded where his American col- influenza virus A. They are responsible for cata- leagues had failed: He and his team managed to strophic pandemics like the Spanish flu of 1918– produce and study functional bat flu viruses. 1919 and the Hong Kong flu, which raged from While it is true that the viruses can infect human 1968 to 1970. Since influenza A viruses often cells, says the researcher, “it is extremely unlikely mutate and can exchange genetic material with that they could become dangerous for humans.” each other, they change very quickly. It is there- Now he is investigating H18N11, as the virus is fore necessary to develop a new vaccine each called, for zoonoses. flu season. The various strains of the influenza A virus are named according to the types of two Tick and Mosquito Bites proteins present in them, hemagglutinin (H) and neuraminidase (N). The virus that caused the “Zoonoses are infections that can be transmit- Spanish flu, for instance, was from the H1N1 ted to humans from animals,” explains Schwemmle. strain, while that responsible for the Hong Kong There are more than 200 known zoonoses. Two flu belonged to the H3N2 strain. that are familiar in Southern Germany are Lyme disease and tick-borne encephalitis (TBE), both Until 2012 it was believed that all influenza of which are transmitted to humans by infected A viruses originated in wild birds. But then ticks. Others that are common in the tropics include researchers from the US Centers for Disease malaria and yellow fever. They are transmitted Control and Prevention (CDC) detected the ge- by mosquito bites. The swine flu, which spread nome of a new virus in bats. Its genome consists throughout the world in 2009 and 2010, even of RNA, the same material as in the influenza A bears its origin in its name. “The vast majority of virus. It contains eight segments, as is typical of the pathogens responsible for human viral diseas- influenza A viruses, it has the right size, and it

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But what does H18 from the flu-like bat virus so easy to infect. Only a few weeks later, the been possible so far to isolate H18N11 from bat bind to? To find out, the researchers from CDC team had succeeded in reconstructing the virus. cells? What surface molecule does it bind to on attempted to isolate the virus from bat cells – in Schwemmle and Prof. Dr. Martin Beer, director of human cells? Does this receptor also play a part vain. They attempted to produce it from genetic the Friedrich Löffler Institute in Greifswald, are in the transmission of other zoonoses? Would it material in a test tube – in vain. “The scientists currently studying H18N11 with ferrets: “They be a worthwhile target for vaccines? “Identifying were suddenly presented with the question of have similar flu symptoms as humans and can the docking site would be like hitting the jackpot,” whether the virus existed at all or was just a also pass on viruses by sneezing.” Ferrets thus says Schwemmle. Time is short: “The newcomer phantom,” reports Schwemmle. Without a concrete provide a good picture of how an epidemic would H18N11 is spreading fast in the world of virus Prof. Dr. Martin Schwemmle virus to point to, they were incapable of answer- spread among humans. In addition, Schwemmle research – faster than you can look.” Thus, if a studied biology at the Uni- ing the most important questions: Can humans is testing the probability of such a scenario feverish “vampire flu” is really catching, it’s prob- versity of Freiburg and together with his Freiburg colleague Prof. Peter ably only among the virologists themselves. completed his PhD in 1992. Staeheli, who has developed a mouse system for Schwemmle emphasizes again that the health His doctoral dissertation “No one needs to determining zoonosis potential. risk posed by H18N11 is very low. He also comes focused on cell biology and to the defense of the carriers: “No one needs to virology. These were also be afraid of bats.” the areas he concentrated The Right Docking Site be afraid of bats. Just avoid choosing a bat cave on while conducting re- as a place to have a picnic.” search in California, USA, Schwemmle has found out quite a few things and in Switzerland. He be infected with H18N11? Does the “vampire about H18N11, for instance that the virus does wwww.pr.uni-freiburg.de/go/schwemmle earned his habilitation quali- flu” described in Bild present a real danger? not exchange any gene sequences with influ- ﬁ cation in molecular virology Schwemmle was very interested in answering enza A viruses: “It can’t get any worse.” But the at the Freiburg University these questions, and the well-connected virolo- researcher wants to learn more: Why hasn’t it Medical Center in 2000. He gist also believed he knew an indirect means of returned to the Institute of obtaining a functional virus. Virology of the same institution in 2003, where he has Artiﬁ cial Virus Lights Up Green since studied Borna disease virus, flu viruses, and zoonoses with a team of ten Schwemmle had the virus genome sent to him researchers. Schwemmle sits and contacted Dr. Gert Zimmer from the University on the editorial board of of Bern. The Swiss virologist had developed a several journals and on the system in which viruses light up green when they Human cells infected with influenza viruses (green). board of directors of the infect cells. However, the system was designed The blue patches are the nuclei of the infected cells. Spemann Graduate School to work with another virus, vesicular stomatitis Image: Martin Schwemmle of Biology and Medicine virus (VSV). Schwemmle and Zimmer adapted (SGBM). Photo: private the system and fit the anchoring protein H18 from the bat virus into VSV. Then they tested Further Reading Getting to the source of the disease: their artificial virus VSV-H18 with many cells of Moreira, É. A. / Locher, S. / Kolesnikova, L. , et al. Scientists are studying infectious bat influenza different origins. Most of the time it remained (2016): Synthetically derived bat infl uenza viruses in the lab. Photo: Martin Schwemmle dark, but several of the bat cells made it light up A-like viruses reveal a cell type – but not a delicate pale green. The cultures with particular species-specifi c tropism. In: Proceedings of cells from dogs shined brightest, but several the National Academy of Sciences 113/45, cultures with human cells also began to glow. pp. 12797–12802. doi: 10.1073/pnas.1608821113 This was proof that it is fundamentally possible for humans to be infected. Moreira, É. A. / Weber, A. / Bolte, H., et al. (2016): A conserved infl uenza A virus nucleoprotein includes genes for H and N, namely the variants But can the virus make the jump to humans in code controls specifi c viral genome packaging. H18 and N11. “The virus is clearly similar to nature as well? How great is the danger of this In: Nature Communications 7. doi: 10.1038/ influenza A viruses but is different,” says happening? “Only a functioning virus could pro- ncomms12861 Schwemmle. One significant difference is that vide the answer,” says Schwemmle, and so the the bat virus does not bind to sialic acid. This Freiburg researchers also went about attempting Ma, W. / García-Sastre, A. / Schwemmle, M. molecule is present on the surface of human to reconstruct the bat flu virus H18N11 from the (2015): Expected and unexpected features of cells. It is the docking site for the H protein of available genetic material. They enjoyed a crucial the newly discovered bat infl uenza A-like influenza A viruses. The pathogens latch onto advantage over their American colleagues: H18N11 viruses. In: PLoS Pathogens 11/6. doi: 10.1371/ the cells they infect via sialic acids. reproduced rapidly in the dog cells that had been journal.ppat.1004819

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All at the Same Time he’s already on her second cup of coffee and University of Freiburg psychologists Sstill hasn’t written a single line. Lea’s research are searching for strategies to facilitate paper waits patiently to be written, buried under a slew of other windows on her virtual desktop, multitasking but first she has to check her email and print out a text for this afternoon’s seminar. While the by Mathilde Bessert-Nettelbeck printer is working, she does the paperwork for the Erasmus exchange she’s applying for and tries at the same time to arrange the next meeting for her study group – her smartphone vibrates constantly, because Fred and Nina can’t agree on a time for the meeting. Lea sends a text mes- sage: “Should we put it off until tomorrow?” The phone keeps vibrating as she calls up the window with her research paper and begins to type.

“Multitasking is ubiquitous.”

It’s diffi cult to avoid doing a lot of things at once in our day and age, whether in our private lives, for our studies, or at work. “Multitasking is ubiquitous,” explains the psychologist Prof. Dr. Andrea Kiesel, who is conducting research on the phenomenon at the University of Freiburg. In the worst case this behavior gives rise to a considerable amount of stress – and in the best case it leads to effective work in an environment in which assembly line–style work is a thing of the past.

“Up to now, psychological research on this issue has focused on the costs people bear in multitasking and how it can be avoided,” explains Kiesel, who works at the Department of General Psychology. What psychologists mean by multitasking is not just divided attention – such as when someone talks on the telephone while driving a car – but also situations in which we are Emails, telephone calls, jobs: Multitasking has become interrupted from tasks and continue them later – virtually unavoidable in our daily lives and can lead to stress. as in the case of Lea’s research paper. Researchers Illustration: Svenja Kirsch assume that we possess limited cognitive resources that need to be reallocated when we get ready to tackle a new task. This “reconfiguring”

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“Multitasking is ubiquitous.”

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Telephone, camera, calendar, and much more: Smartphones unite all kinds of tools, but they make it more difﬁ cult to complete several tasks at the same time. Photo: Sandra Meyndt

Prof. Dr. Andrea Kiesel becomes more difficult classifying vowels and consonants. The experi- need to use different keys for the tasks,” explains now than we were 15 years ago,” says Kiesel. studied psychology at the the more tasks we are ment begins following a brief practice phase. Kiesel. This contradicts current technological “We need to learn how to deal with this.” Multi- University of Würzburg, confronted with at once. The test subjects have to complete more than trends: Developers of smartphones try to unite tasking is often associated with burnout or emo- earning her PhD in 2003. 100 of these tasks. After each task, the ones who all kinds of tools in a single device. “Such multi- tional exhaustion. However, the psychologist In 2006 she did postdoc- Kiesel is now taking a different are allowed to multitask have four options to purpose devices make it more diffi cult to complete warns against making generalizations based on toral work at the University approach. She regards multi- choose from. Among other things, they can choose several tasks at the same time – particularly for observations of everyday life and being taken in of Otago, New Zealand. tasking as unavoidable and wants to continue with the task they have begun or older people who find multitasking more challeng- by prejudices. “We want to test observations Back in Würzburg, she to study how people deal with the switch to another task. Data from 20 to 40 test ing.” Hence, the research can also help to design in reduced experiments and avoid jumping to completed a habilitation cognitive challenge it involves: “Do subjects allow the researchers to identify trends: technical devices like computers and smart- conclusions.” thesis on the topic of un- we fi nd circumstances in which multi- Multitasking does not really make the test sub- phones that are optimized for the way people conscious cognition. In tasking is easier? Can we train these abilities? jects faster, and most of them opt to continue work. “Due to advancements in communication www.spp1772.uni-freiburg.de 2015 she accepted a post These questions have been neglected until now.” working on a single task. Responses to a ques- technology, we are exposed to more multitasking as professor of general This has changed since the establishment of a tionnaire completed afterwards indicate that psychology at the Univer- German Research Foundation (DFG) Priority study participants find multitasking stressful. sity of Freiburg and has Program on the topic in 2015. Coordinated by since also served as coor- Kiesel, the program encompasses 22 research Stress Reduction Training dinator of the German projects at 19 German universities and focuses Research Foundation (DFG) primarily on integrating aspects from kinesiology In another test, Kiesel also found out that peo- Priority Program “Human and cognitive psychology. “My research group is ple can estimate when switching to another Performance under Multi- studying how effective people are when they can task will save them time. When a task had to be ple Cognitive Task determine the sequence of tasks themselves,” repeated, the researchers made the wait between Requirements: From Basic she explains. the repetitions longer each time. Hence, it was Mechanisms to Optimized best to switch to another task as soon as the wait Tick, tock, tick, tock – get done as much as Task Scheduling.” She became longer than the time it took to get start- you can as quickly as possible: Scientific findings also conducts research ed on a new task. The test subjects needed indicate that controlled forms of multitasking on time perception and “We reduce the phenomena approximately 200 milliseconds for this. “We can allow for more effective work. Photo: booka/Fotolia traffic psychology issues. to simple tasks.” demonstrate that the test subjects are relatively Photo: Jürgen Gocke good at estimating this trade-off,” explains Kiesel. “Controlled forms of multitasking can therefore enable us to work more effectively.” Although Kiesel and her research group didn’t Among other things, Kiesel would like to study come to Freiburg until 2015, they have already whether people could profit from determining the produced concrete results. The psychologists sequence of tasks themselves and then always Further Reading recruited test subjects – mostly students – to test completing them in this sequence. Training could when people complete simple cognitive tasks on also help reduce the stress caused by multitask- Kiesel, A. / Dignath, D. (2017): Effort in multitasking: local and global assessment of effort. the computer faster: when the sequence of tasks ing: “When the test subjects practice switching In: Frontiers in Psychology 8/111. www.psychologie.uni-freiburg.de/Members/kiesel/Publications/ is predetermined or when they can determine between the tasks ten times for an hour, the Kiesel%2CDignath%2C2017.pdf the sequence themselves. “We reduce the phe- potential for saving time is huge.” nomena to simple tasks in order to draw infer- Kiesel, A. / Steinhauser, M. / Wendt, M. et al. (2010): Control and interference in task switching. ences about complex abilities from everyday life,” However, a better understanding of multitask- A review. In: Psychological Bulletin 136/5, pp. 849–874. www.psychologie.uni-freiburg.de/ explains Kiesel. ing is not just useful for optimizing work routines. Members/kiesel/Publications/Kiesel_etal_2010_Psychological_Bulletin.pdf The researchers also receive indications on how A small room with a computer is all the research- to improve the operation of technical instruments: The psychology researchers rely on the help of paid test subjects for their experiments. ers need to conduct the experiment. The tasks “What we see in our experiments is that it is easier If you are interested in volunteering, please add yourself to the list on the following website: are easy: identifying even and odd numbers, for people to switch between tasks when they https://psychologie-freiburg.sona-systems.com

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Telephone, camera, calendar, and much more: Smartphones unite all kinds of tools, but they make it more difﬁ cult to complete several tasks at the same time. Photo: Sandra Meyndt

16 uni wissen 01 2017 17 An Interdisciplinary Thread The University of Freiburg has teamed up with regional partner institutions to establish a research focus on sustainability

by Nicolas Scherger

overty, education, climate change, energy diversity in ecosystems and how it can be main- Psupply, security, infrastructure, gender equality, tained in the long term; resilience research economic growth, conservation of ecosystems – improves the robustness, adaptability, and learn- these are just a few of the topics treated in the ability of infrastructures and technical systems to sustainability strategy passed by the German keep the damage caused by extreme weather federal government in early 2017. Sustainability events, industrial accidents, terrorist attacks, seems to have become an all-encompassing and other sources of danger as low as possible; buzzword. So what can we expect when the Uni- finally, humanities, law, and social science versity of Freiburg establishes a research focus research contributes aspects like governance, on sustainability research? “We can’t cover every- acceptance, legal feasibility, ethics, and techno- Special Topic: Sustainability Topic: Special thing,” says Prof. Dr. Gunther Neuhaus, deputy logical impact assessment. In this issue of rector and vice president of research at the Uni- uni’wissen we present several research projects versity of Freiburg, “but we are very well placed that address sustainability issues from various to make significant and groundbreaking contribu- perspectives. tions in several fields.” In addition, the University of Freiburg has What puts the university in a unique position committed itself to following a model of sustain- for this task is its broad spectrum of fields and able development. Among other things, we are the way they are linked by an interdisciplinary generating certified green energy from water thread. “Freiburg offers a full range of disciplines: power and operating photovoltaic systems, we from humanities, social sciences, law, and eco- are using environmentally friendly recycled nomics to environmental and natural sciences, paper in almost all departments, we are Baden- engineering, and materials science. This enables Württemberg’s leading university in the area of us to take a systematic approach,” Neuhaus waste management according to a study by the emphasizes. Institutions have been established State Court of Auditors, and we have received in which researchers from a variety of fields are the City of Freiburg’s ecological traffic award conducting joint projects on sustainability issues, several times – in recognition of the incentives both within the university and together with region- we offer to our students and employees for com- al partners that contribute additional expertise. muting to the university by public transportation (See the profiles on pages 18–19 for examples.) or bicycle. The goal is to be as economical and efficient as possible with all resources and to The research focus is divided into four fields: continue to reduce our ecological footprint.

Photos: dr322, Gina Sanders, piyaset, Technical sustainability research develops new firstflight, WavebreakmediaMicro, zapp2photo, materials and energy systems; biodiversity www.nachhaltige.uni-freiburg.de htpix, Richtsteiger/Fotolia research studies the significance of biological

16 uni wissen 01 2017 17 An Interdisciplinary Thread The University of Freiburg has teamed up with regional partner institutions to establish a research focus on sustainability

by Nicolas Scherger

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Faculty of Environment and Natural Resources Sustainability Center Freiburg | Department of “Sustainability Sustainable Systems Engineering The University of Freiburg’s Faculty of Forest and Environ- mental Sciences and Institute of Earth Sciences merged in The University of Freiburg and the city’s five Fraunhofer 2013 to form the Faculty of Environment and Natural Means Conﬂ ict” institutes opened the Sustainability Center Freiburg in 2015. Resources. The researchers study natural processes and Scientists at the center cooperate with industry partners and the resulting interplay between the environment and society. other external institutions to develop solutions to great chal- The main areas of joint research include the sustainable The German federal government appointed Prof. Dr. lenges like climate change and resource scarcity. The key use of natural resources, the conservation of water, soil, Ulrich Schraml from the University of Freiburg’s Fac- topics are sustainable materials, energy systems, resilience air, and biodiversity, means of adapting to global change, ulty of Environment and Natural Resources and research and resilient engineering systems, and ecological and natural dangers and risks. Baden-Württemburg’s State Forest Testing and Re- and social transformation. The engineering core of the center search Institute to the German Council on Sustainable is the Department of Sustainable Systems Engineering www.unr.uni-freiburg.de Development in late 2016. Nicolas Scherger spoke to There are many sustainability issues in which the problem is (INATECH), also founded in 2015 at the University of him about his experiences as a policy advisor. known but the solution is yet to be found, says Ulrich Schraml. Freiburg’s Faculty of Engineering.. Photo: Klaus Polkowski uni’wissen: Prof. Schraml, why did you decide to par- www.leistungszentrum-nachhaltigkeit.de ticipate in the Council on Sustainable Development? www.inatech.uni-freiburg.de

Center for Renewable Energy Ulrich Schraml: I’ve always enjoyed advising politicians, in Stuttgart just as at the national level. A major source of But sustainability is something everyone can agree Founded in 2008, the Center for Renewable Energy (ZEE) my motivation for conducting scientific research is the upon, right? unites all University of Freiburg departments that engage prospect of receiving feedback – not just from an expert Upper Rhine Cluster for Sustainability Research in research, instruction, and continuing education on who reviews a journal article but also from political actors As long as the concept remains abstract, everybody nods renewable energy – including photovoltaics, biomass, wind who are then, at best, very enthusiastic about letting you his or her head in approval. However, things get interest- Founded in 2016, the Upper Rhine Cluster for Sustainability power, and geothermal power, as well as questions involv- know whether they find something good or bad. ing as soon as it becomes concrete, because sustainabil- Research includes the member universities of “Eucor – The ing energy efficiency. The center also collaborates with ity means conflict. Environmental, economic, agricultural, European Campus” in Basel, Freiburg, Karlsruhe, Mulhouse, external partners, particularly on activities involving Do scientists have a special responsibility to make and social policymakers need to debate with one another and Strasbourg, the University of Koblenz and Landau, and research and development. a contribution in matters concerning the long-term to determine which programs are feasible from the stand- other associated partners. The cluster concentrates on the conservation of nature? point of sustainability. general theme of how to govern sustainable growth, encom- www.zee.uni-freiburg.de passing ecological, social, and economic sustainability. The Special Topic: Sustainability Topic: Special That is certainly the case. We hear the term “sustainability” What aspects are you most interested in bringing to main focus areas are “Governance,” “Energy, Infrastructure, a lot, but it often remains vague and inaccessible. Scientists the table? and Social Change,” “Transformation Processes and Tech- can be a big help in communicating and interpreting what nologies,” “Resource Management,” and “Multiculturalism it means. They can translate the term to make it politically The fields I’m most familiar with are environmental policy and Multilingualism.” accessible in the first place and pinpoint areas where and land use, with an emphasis on forests. In the past Freiburg Center for Interactive Materials and there is a particular need for action. years my team and I have also focused increasingly on www.nachhaltigkeit-oberrhein.info Bioinspired Technologies | Freiburg Materials social topics, such as health and recreation. These are Research Center How does the council aim to do this? important and interesting aspects, both for forests and for urban green spaces. The University of Freiburg opened the Freiburg Center for Our great chance is that we receive regular institutional Interactive Materials and Bioinspired Technologies (FIT) in access to policymakers, such as members of Bundestag, Generally speaking, are the social sciences gaining in Upper Rhine Research Alliance 2016. The scientists at the center take nature as a model the German Chancellery, or the federal government. significance here? for developing intelligent materials and systems that are To use the words of our prime minister here in Baden- The Upper Rhine Research Alliance, founded in 2017 by the capable of things like identifying, reacting to, and learning Württemberg, we are heard as a matter of course – and if That is the impression I get, because there are a lot of University of Freiburg, the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, from changes in the environment, healing themselves, and our argumentation is sound, our recommendations have a issues where we know the problem but do not yet have the and the Universities of Applied Sciences in Furtwangen, supplying themselves with energy autonomously. The fun- chance of being acted upon. solution. Take purchasing, for example: A lot of organiza- Karlsruhe, and Offenburg, focuses on the technical founda- damental research conducted at FIT forms the basis for tions want to follow sustainability goals when purchasing tions of sustainability under the theme “long-term stable the work done at the Freiburg Materials Research Center What do you see as being the most difficult task? goods like paper, furniture, or automobiles, but the results and resilient technologies – from the component to the sys- (FMF). The FMF has been engaged in applied research on often fall short of expectations – for instance due to legal tem.” The goal is to develop energy-efficient, intelligent, the electric, magnetic, thermal, chemical, and optical qual- The greatest challenge is to better integrate and coordi- barriers, a lack of knowledge, or high costs. Social science and resilient technical systems for countering global warm- ities of organic and inorganic materials since 1990. nate the sometimes very good policies of the individual research can improve our understanding of where these ing and resource scarcity and dealing with their ecological ministries, like agriculture, labor, education, or environ- problems of implementation lie and how we can address and social consequences. www.fit.uni-freiburg.de www.fmf.uni-freiburg.de ment. When the people at the ministries speak more with them. one another before pressing ahead with their sectoral www.pr.uni-freiburg.de/go/forschungsallianz policies, we’ve taken one big step forward. www.ifp.uni-freiburg.de/team/ma-fopof/ulrich-schraml

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What could Freiburg look like in the year 2030? The city and the university are participating in a competition organized by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research. Photos: Thomas Kunz here questions of the future are concerned, Wthe boundaries between science and society become more permeable. This is evident in the project “Freiburg: City of the Future.” Organized by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research, the “City of the Future” competition invites municipalities to discuss their ideas of sustainable urban life along with citizens and scientists, and in later phases of the competition also to put them into practice in pilot projects. Freiburg is participating in this competition, which began in 2015. The scientific side is repre- sented by the Sustainability Center Freiburg and the city’s five Fraunhofer institutes. The project “Freiburg: City of the Future” is being organized and coordinated by Michael Pregernig, professor of sustainability governance at the university’s Institute of Environmental Social Sciences and Geography. His contribution consists primarily in treating methodological issues, because the goal of the competition is not just to develop a sustainability concept but also to design new methodologies and put them to the test.

An Urban Vision for 2030 Special Topic: Sustainability Topic: Special The city and university are already well into their work on the project. The first phase, which involved developing an urban vision for Freiburg in the year 2030, lasted nine months and is already completed. Citizens were invited to submit their ideas and projects for a sustainable city on an online tool. Then Pregernig’s team arranged the ideas into the five subject areas integration, energy, mobility, trade and industry, and new communication forms. At the heart of this phase Shopping at the farmer’s market: One of the topics of the competition was the “Dialogue on the Future” of the project is how to better promote regional food in February 2016, a half-day event at which 30 production in the future. Freiburg: citizens and scientists got together at the university to incorporate the citizens’ ideas for projects into a common vision. “Our task at the institute tainability research. With an eye to the further is to develop methods that enable scientists course of the competition, the citizens and scien- City of the Future and citizens to tackle sustainability challenges tists decided together at the dialogue event together. The dialogue event format is one of which issues to prioritize in their concept. The A project is bringing citizens and researchers together these methods,” explains Pregernig. issues they selected were sustainable energy to discuss how to make urban life sustainable supply, alternative forms of economy, and regional The idea behind it is to give social actors, food production. “It became clear at the event that instead of just scientists, an opportunity to set food production is a matter of particular concern,” by Petra Völzing priorities for research and formulate specific says Pregernig, “so we decided to treat it as a questions. Known as “co-design,” this new prin- discreet topic for the further development of our ciple is becoming increasingly important in sus- concept.”

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The second phase of the competition is now regard to its food supply. “The goal is unrealistic,” Freiburg to produce 100 percent of its energy By the end of the second phase of the compe- underway, and Freiburg was one of 20 out of an says Pregernig, and this has also been confi rmed supply from renewable sources. This issue illus- tition, the researchers hope to have developed original 52 cities to make the cut. The goal of this by the results of a study recently commissioned trates how difficult it is to develop robust sustain- a sound concept. The goal in the third phase – 18-month phase, which began in January 2017, by the city. However, he does see the sense in able concepts: If you take away the corn for presumably starting in mid 2018 – will then be to is to develop a strategy for planning and imple- investigating the systemic connections. If areas biogas, you make it that much more difficult to put the various elements to the test in the form of menting the “vision for 2030” outlined in the first on the Upper Rhine Plain currently dedicated to solve the energy problem. To assess this situation so-called living labs in the pilot neighborhoods. phase. The starting point for this task is to elabo- growing corn for biogas were instead used to in more detail, Uli Siebold’s team at the Fraun- For Pregernig, the innovative thing about the rate on the three topics suggested in the dialogue produce food, the city could indeed make itself on the future. This involves a lot of steps. “What more self-sufficient. Prof. Dr. Michael Pregernig we are doing now is studying the individual pro- “Food production is a matter of particular concern.” studied commercial science ject ideas from a scientific perspective to deter- In a project led by Gerhard Stryi-Hipp, the with an emphasis on envi- mine how realistic they are,” for instance the goal Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy Systems ronmental economics and of making Freiburg completely self-sufficient with (ISE) is testing whether and how it is possible for forestry with an emphasis on hofer Ernst Mach Institute (EMI) is working on a “city of the future” format is not just the content environmental and resource web-based tool for comparing the sustainability of the projects themselves but also the new policy in Vienna, Austria. effects of various measures. The tool reveals methodological approaches – like the dialogue He completed his PhD in how various sustainability goals are dependent on the future or the role of the knowledge broker, 1999 and his habilitation on each other and allows them to be considered both of which will be continued in the third phase. qualification in environmen- in the development of implementation concepts. tal and resource policy in At the moment, Pregernig is looking for suitable www.zukunftsstadt.freiburg.de 2006, both at the University neighborhoods for pilot projects. “We need places of Natural Resources and where scientists and citizens can exchange ideas Life Sciences, Vienna. In on concrete project ideas and ideally implement 2009 he came to the Univer- them together.” He is also still looking for scien- sity of Freiburg to serve as tists interested in participating in the project. interim head of the master’s “However, we already have several researchers program Environmental on board, for instance environmental scientists, Governance (MEG). In March economists, and engineers.” 2016 he was appointed as professor of sustainability Special Topic: Sustainability Topic: Special Research in Pilot Neighborhoods governance at the Institute of Social Environmental A second dialogue event that will bring together Sciences and Geography. citizens and scientists is planned for July 2017. His research interests in- The goal is to formulate concrete research pro- clude the governance of jects. “The fi rst dialogue was devoted to collecting sustainability processes ideas for topics; in July we will be putting these in politics and society.

ideas in concrete terms and working out the Photo: Jürgen Gocke details,” Pregernig explains. After the event, the researchers will defi ne and implement small-scale specialized research projects and then invite the citizens to participate in the research work according to the principle of citizen science. “A Further Reading project like this might, for example, consist in testing out alternative forms of sustainable food Rhodius, R. / Pregernig, M. / Koch, B. (2016): Herausforderungen trans- supply in a neighborhood.” Citizens could partici- disziplinären Arbeitens im Reallabor „Wissensdialog Nordschwarzwald“. pate in the data collection by conducting surveys In: Technikfolgenabschätzung – Theorie und Praxis 25/3, pp. 19–25. on eating habits or “(self-)experiments on consumption.” Dörte Peters from the Institute of Schneidewind, U. / Singer-Brodowski, M. (2013): Transformative Wissen- Environmental Social Sciences and Geography schaft: Klimawandel im deutschen Wissenschafts- und Hochschulsystem. will help with the implementation of these Marburg. projects – as a so-called knowledge broker, whose job will be to coordinate the work between Lang, D. J. / Wiek, A. / Bergmann, M. et al. (2012): Transdisciplinary Corn for biogas can help to provide a city more renewable energy, but it takes away space for growing food – making it more difficult to the citizens and scientists and provide organiza- research in sustainability science: practice, principles, and challenges. achieve self-sufficiency with regard to food supply. Photo: AVTG/Fotolia tional support. In: Sustainability Science 7/1, pp. 25–43.

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View of a forested area from an unmanned airborne platform: Freiburg researchers are developing a system that collects data on features like tree structure and photosynthetic activity. Photos: Andreas Fritz

Airborne Data Collectors Remote sensing enables scientists to collect information on the environment and make more accurate assessments of geo-risks

by Katrin Albaum

The unmanned flight platform covers a large area in a short time and is equipped with a sensor orrents of water surge through the streets and development of the flood and its magnitude in thing without coming into physical contact with

Special Topic: Sustainability Topic: Special that either uses available sunlight or generates Tspill into buildings. The townspeople hadn’t this fictitious scenario. the object of investigation.” electromagnetic energy itself. expected such severe flooding. They had been warned that the river that flows through the town The forest scientist Barbara Koch, professor Great Danger from Small Insects would rise after a heavy rainfall, but no one of remote sensing and landscape information could have foreseen the precise extent of the systems at the University of Freiburg, and the Besides geo-risks, Koch and her assistants catastrophe. The fi refi ghters just barely managed members of her research group aim to prevent are also measuring and analyzing bio-risks, to reach the buildings with their emergency vehicles such events from happening or reduce the dangers which can appear, for example, when trees to evacuate everyone, but now they’re stuck, be- they pose. In their project at the Sustainability become infested with pests. The team is studying cause the street they used to reach the buildings Center Freiburg and the city’s five Fraunhofer ways to identify such biotic damage caused by institutes, MulDiScan, they are developing tech- living organisms early on. The goal is to prevent nical tools for collecting environmental data that pests and diseases from spreading further in the “The photosynthetic activity tells will make it possible to more accurately assess forest, thus limiting their negative effects on the us whether a plant is under stress.” geo-risks like floods and to take suitable meas- environment. “Wood is a renewable resource, so ures to combat them. “The term ‘geo-risks’ in- the management of our forests is also important cludes all dangers that are neither caused by for sustainability. As a part of the nutrient cycle has suddenly flooded as well. The people are humans nor set off by biological processes,” in ecosystems, wood decomposes and forms the stranded. A helicopter is called in, but it takes a explains Koch. Landslides, avalanches, and basis for the growth of new plants.” long time for it to show up, and it has to make volcanic eruptions also fall in this category. several trips to evacuate everyone. If the rescue “Among other things, we are working with the Certain insects present a great danger to many workers had known how quickly the flood would Fraunhofer Institute for Physical Measurement trees. One example is the bark beetle, which Researchers at the Department of Remote Sensing spread, they would have used a helicopter right Techniques on sensor systems on unmanned breeds in the spring and summer. Several gen- and Landscape Information Systems are teaming up away instead of ground vehicles. Precise infor- airborne platforms that can collect environmental erations can develop when the weather is warm with the Fraunhofer Institute for Physical Measure- mation on flow rate, an elevation profile of the information.” What this involves in particular is and dry and spread to further nearby trees. In ment Techniques to develop sensor systems that can surroundings, and other environmental data remote sensing: “Remote sensing is a method this way, the bark beetle can quickly infest a be attached to unmanned airborne platforms. would have enabled the town to predict the we can use to obtain information about some- large area under the right conditions. “Commer- Photo: Markus Quinten

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Airborne Data Collectors Remote sensing enables scientists to collect information on the environment and make more accurate assessments of geo-risks

by Katrin Albaum

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to be chopped down, reducing the economic Encouraging Biodiversity Once these structures have been identified, it is damage. possible to take action to conserve or even en- The researchers at the Department of Remote courage them. In addition, the technology can Identifying Plant Stress Sensing and Landscape Information Systems also be transferred to numerous other areas of are also working on methods for collecting data application, emphasizes Koch. For example, they The unmanned airborne platforms with sensor on a forest’s structural diversity with unmanned could be used in the future to inspect crevices systems developed in the project cover a large airborne platforms. Structural diversity is closely and analyze the risk of rock falls or to check area in a short period of time. If a plant is under connected to biodiversity. For example, large, man-made structures like bridges for cracks. stress, it causes a change in the chlorophyll old trees often have a pronounced crown with Prof. Dr. Barbara Koch absorption of their leaves, and they reflect more many branches and small structures that provide www.leistungszentrum-nachhaltigkeit.de/ has served as professor of remote sensing and land- radiation in certain wavelength ranges, indicating niches for insects and birds. “Such features pilotprojekte/muldiscan scape information systems a reduced photosynthetic activity. This is the first therefore also have a positive effect on biodiversity.” at the University of Freiburg’s source of information on the state of a plant’s Faculty of Environment health, says Koch. “We use sensors to measure and Natural Resources since the emitted light energy, which is directly con- 1994. She studied forest nected with the photosynthetic activity and thus science at the Ludwig Maxi- with the vitality of the plant.” However, it is not milian University of Munich possible to see everything from above. “The from 1977 to 1982. She photosynthetic activity tells us whether a plant is worked as a research assis- Bark beetles pose a cial forests bordering on a national park are at under stress, one possible cause of which is a tant at the same institution from 1982 to 1994, earning major threat to trees. a particular risk,” explains Koch. In protected bark beetle infestation.” Determining whether the her PhD in 1988. Koch also The traces of the beetle forests the bark beetle can breed and spread stress is being caused by beetles or some other spent a time conducting re- are visible after the unchecked because these areas are designated factor involves sending a person to examine the search at the Jet Propulsion tree has been infested as free from human intervention. “There is thus a tree on location. In the case of certain tree Laboratory in California, for a certain time. buffer zone around the parks in which the bark species, however, it is highly likely that the bark USA. In 2005 she founded Photo: Friedberg/Fotolia beetles are observed especially closely.” The beetle is indeed responsible – two of the most the Steinbeis research center goal is to prevent the beetles from making the common bark beetle species in Germany are “FeLis,” which makes scien- jump to the commercial forests. “Here remote partial to spruce. “Our sensors are designed to tific findings from her field sensing methods serve to support monitoring on identify critical areas that can then be checked available to industry re- Special Topic: Sustainability Topic: Special the ground.” individually. In this way, forest owners do not search and development have to monitor their entire plot and can take the departments. Her research interests are remote sens- The traces of a bark beetle infestation be- necessary measures to prevent the infestation ing, geomatics, and spatial come visible in the crowns of affected trees after from spreading to other trees more quickly. modeling. Photo: Thomas Kunz a certain time. The needles change, turning a pale yellow. At this point the pests have already There are passive and active sensor systems: used the tree as a breeding ground for a long Passive systems use the available sunlight, time. If a tree is infested by bark beetles, the while active systems generate electromagnetic Spotting damage from the sky: The sensor system identifies the trees that are infested with beetles. Forest owner of the forest is required to chop it and all energy themselves, send it toward the ground, owners can chop down these trees quickly to protect other nearby trees. Photo: Teja Kattenborn other surrounding trees down. Only in this way and measure the reflected radiation. “One diffi- culty is designing the sensors to be small and light enough to be fixed on unmanned airborne “We use sensors to measure platforms.” This is where the scientists at the Fraunhofer Institute for Physical Measurement Further Reading the emitted light energy.” Techniques come in: They are responsible for developing and improving the sensor systems. Maack, J. / Lingenfelder, M. / Weinacker, H. et al. (2016): Modelling the standing timber volume Koch and her team, for instance, provide infor- of Baden-Württemberg – a large-scale approach using a fusion of Landsat, airborne LiDAR can the pests be prevented from spreading mation on the relevant wavelengths, test the and National Forest Inventory data. In: International Journal of Applied Earth Observation and unchecked. “It would be more advantageous if sensor systems, and process the data from the Geoinformation 49, pp. 107–116. we had a means of identifying which trees are studies. Airborne systems are already good at infested before external changes are visible and identifying severely damaged trees whose leaves Fassnacht, F. / Latifi, H. / Ghosh, A. et al. (2014): Assessing the potential of hyperspectral imagery the beetles have multiplied and spread to other exhibit distinct changes and moderately damaged to map bark beetle induced tree mortality. In: Remote Sensing of Environment 140, pp. 533–548. trees,” says Koch. “We are therefore working on trees that also show visible changes. “Our goal methods for identifying an infestation at a very is to identify the reduced photosynthetic activity Dees, M. / Straub, C. / Koch, B. (2012): Can biodiversity study benefi t from information on the vertical early stage.” In this case less trees would need before the changes are visible.” structure of forests? Utility of LiDAR remote sensing. In: CURRENT Science 102/8, pp. 1181–1187. Special Topic: Sustainability 28 of the logging industry on biodiversity Examples from Germany and Brazil demonstrate the impact Diversity Structural Maintaining by Sarah Schwarzkopf by Sarah with these structures are rare rare are structures these with forest types. However, trees However, trees types. forest in intensively used forests. used intensively in important habitat for many important Hollow tree trunks are an an are trunks tree Hollow Special living space: space: living Special Photos: Jürgen Bauhus Photos: Jürgen leisten dem Menschen wichtige Dienste. wichtige Menschen dem leisten im Buchen-Tannen-Mischwald Schwarzwald und strukturreiche naturnahe dieser wie Bestände Artenreiche Ökosystem: Wertvolles G Freiburg’s Faculty of Environment and Natural Natural and Environment of Freiburg’s Faculty can use forests without causing a substantial re- asubstantial causing without forests use can Resources. climate change, for instance. Ecosystemsclimate for instance. change, with cludes data on features like the species and di- and species like the features on data cludes in- It Germany. in years ten every conducted Bauhus, Jürgen scientist forest the says cesses,” for services important forests perform cies-rich ences in crown height also increase structural structural increase also height crown in ences features. in The structural rich are particularly thus carbon, more fix diversity high with ests for- and pests, more off kill can species animal duction in their biological diversity. Since it is dif- is it Since diversity. biological their in duction determines whether the forest is capable of ful- of capable is forest the whether determines Bundeswaldinventur, a national forest inventory inventory forest a national Bundeswaldinventur, disturbances – they at are better withstandingdisturbances diversity. Bauhus thus takes the structure of a of structure the takes thus Bauhus diversity. out endangering their biological diversity isdiversity out the their endangering biological study how intensively forests can be used with- used be can forests intensively how study trees there are not all the same but vary in size in vary but same the all not are there trees humans intensively how in interested is He ture. what and functions forest of maintenance the to eco- terrestrial natural last the are “Forests tion. resources fossil some to alternative an as term Index Diversity for Structural tle species in a particular patch of forest –, Bau- –, forest of patch a particular in species tle species. Mixed forests with trees of various ages pro- and species their conserve to sponsibility systems.than agricultural We have a great re- biodiversity more much provide They systems. in the economic cycle. However, an increased However, cycle. increased an economic the in ing a habitat for a variety of animal and plant and animal of avariety for ahabitat ing bee- and fungus of hundreds identify to instance struc- forest havethe on can forestry influence provide a home for many species, and the differ- haus focuses on structural diversity. It diversity. structural on focuses haus of University the at silviculture of professor of amount alarger Forexample, effectively. more functions their also fulfill diversity high biological external to resistant more often are and humans renewable resource, wood can serve in the long long the in serve can wood resource, renewable making a major contribution to climate protec- climate to contribution a major making use of forests endangers their biodiversity. Spe- biodiversity. their endangers forests of use from very large to very small. Fallen dead trees trees dead Fallen small. very to large very from forest as an indicator for its biodiversity. its for indicator an as forest provid- functions: important most its of one filling –for directly biodiversity measure to ficult One of the tools his research group uses to uses group research his tools the of One Bauhus studies how mixed forests contribute contribute forests mixed how studies Bauhus rowing interest in the bioeconomy has also has bioeconomy the in interest rowing led to an increased demand for wood. As a As wood. for demand increased an to led perform important services for humans. for services important perform beech-ﬁ Forest rich Black the in r forest structurally and near-natural this like stands Species-rich Felix Storch therefore used the individual meas- individual the used therefore Storch Felix changes in the course of time. of course the in changes ed areas in Germany. However, Germany. in was it now areas to up ed ture. Now, with each new edition of the inventory, the of edition new each Now, with ture. a forest’s higher The provide. they habitat the sity of the forests. Bauhus’s doctoral candidate candidate Bauhus’s doctoral forests. the of sity score on the index, the more diverse is its struc- its is diverse more the index, the on score also thus –and forests the of diversity structural wood are harvested and is only reduced in the in reduced only is and harvested are wood woody debris from approximately 60,000 forest- 60,000 approximately from debris woody itially increases when only small when amountsof increases itially diversity this how track to possible be will it in biodiver- the changes concerning inferences had on the structural diversity of the forest. His forest. the of diversity structural the on had of amount the and trees individual of mensions basis for calculating the impact intensity of intensity use impact the basis for calculating not possible to use this inventory to make direct makedirect to inventory this use to possible not results demonstrate that the available habitat in- habitat available the that demonstrate results a as index structural the in change the and ry urements to compile an index that reveals the reveals that index an compile to urements from trees chopped down since the last invento- last the since down chopped trees from uni Storch took the volume of the harvested wood wood harvested the of volume the took Storch

wissen

“Forests thelast natural are 01 terrestrial ecosystems.”terrestrial

2017 29 Special Topic: Sustainability 28 Structural Diversity Structural Maintaining of the logging industry on biodiversity Examples from Germany and Brazil demonstrate the impact by Sarah Schwarzkopf by Sarah with these structures are rare rare are structures these with forest types. However, trees However, trees types. forest in intensively used forests. used intensively in important habitat for many important Hollow tree trunks are an an are trunks tree Hollow Special living space: space: living Special Photos: Jürgen Bauhus Photos: Jürgen leisten dem Menschen wichtige Dienste. wichtige Menschen dem leisten im Buchen-Tannen-Mischwald Schwarzwald und strukturreiche naturnahe dieser wie Bestände Artenreiche Ökosystem: Wertvolles G Freiburg’s Faculty of Environment and Natural Natural and Environment of Freiburg’s Faculty can use forests without causing a substantial re- asubstantial causing without forests use can Resources. climate change, for instance. Ecosystemsclimate for instance. change, with cludes data on features like the species and di- and species like the features on data cludes in- It Germany. in years ten every conducted Bauhus, Jürgen scientist forest the says cesses,” for services important forests perform cies-rich ences in crown height also increase structural structural increase also height crown in ences features. in The structural rich are particularly thus carbon, more fix diversity high with ests for- and pests, more off kill can species animal duction in their biological diversity. Since it is dif- is it Since diversity. biological their in duction determines whether the forest is capable of ful- of capable is forest the whether determines Bundeswaldinventur, a national forest inventory inventory forest a national Bundeswaldinventur, disturbances – they at are better withstandingdisturbances diversity. Bauhus thus takes the structure of a of structure the takes thus Bauhus diversity. out endangering their biological diversity isdiversity out the their endangering biological study how intensively forests can be used with- used be can forests intensively how study trees there are not all the same but vary in size in vary but same the all not are there trees humans intensively how in interested is He ture. what and functions forest of maintenance the to eco- terrestrial natural last the are “Forests tion. resources fossil some to alternative an as term Index Diversity for Structural tle species in a particular patch of forest –, Bau- –, forest of patch a particular in species tle species. Mixed forests with trees of various ages pro- and species their conserve to sponsibility systems.than agricultural We have a great re- biodiversity more much provide They systems. in the economic cycle. However, an increased However, cycle. increased an economic the in ing a habitat for a variety of animal and plant and animal of avariety for ahabitat ing bee- and fungus of hundreds identify to instance struc- forest havethe on can forestry influence provide a home for many species, and the differ- haus focuses on structural diversity. It diversity. structural on focuses haus of University the at silviculture of professor of amount alarger Forexample, effectively. more functions their also fulfill diversity high biological external to resistant more often are and humans renewable resource, wood can serve in the long long the in serve can wood resource, renewable making a major contribution to climate protec- climate to contribution a major making use of forests endangers their biodiversity. Spe- biodiversity. their endangers forests of use forest as an indicator for its biodiversity. its for indicator an as forest trees dead Fallen small. very to large very from provid- functions: important most its of one filling –for directly biodiversity measure to ficult One of the tools his research group uses to uses group research his tools the of One Bauhus studies how mixed forests contribute contribute forests mixed how studies Bauhus rowing interest in the bioeconomy has also has bioeconomy the in interest rowing led to an increased demand for wood. As a As wood. for demand increased an to led perform important services for humans. for services important perform beech-ﬁ Forest rich Black the in r forest structurally and near-natural this like stands Species-rich Felix Storch therefore used the individual meas- individual the used therefore Storch Felix changes in the course of time. of course the in changes ed areas in Germany. However, Germany. in was it now areas to up ed ture. Now, with each new edition of the inventory, the of edition new each Now, with ture. a forest’s higher The provide. they habitat the sity of the forests. Bauhus’s doctoral candidate candidate Bauhus’s doctoral forests. the of sity score on the index, the more diverse is its struc- its is diverse more the index, the on score also thus –and forests the of diversity structural wood are harvested and is only reduced in the in reduced only is and harvested are wood woody debris from approximately 60,000 forest- 60,000 approximately from debris woody itially increases when only small when amountsof increases itially diversity this how track to possible be will it in biodiver- the changes concerning inferences had on the structural diversity of the forest. His forest. the of diversity structural the on had of amount the and trees individual of mensions basis for calculating the impact intensity of intensity use impact the basis for calculating not possible to use this inventory to make direct makedirect to inventory this use to possible not results demonstrate that the available habitat in- habitat available the that demonstrate results a as index structural the in change the and ry urements to compile an index that reveals the reveals that index an compile to urements from trees chopped down since the last invento- last the since down chopped trees from uni Storch took the volume of the harvested wood wood harvested the of volume the took Storch

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Prof. Dr. Jürgen Bauhus Dr. Angela de Avila Felix Storch studied forest science completed a diplom degree earned his diplom degree at the Universities of in forest engineering at in forest science at the The natural regeneration of beech forests involves an Shelterwood cutting is a traditional form of forest A tree of the species Manilkara huberi in the Freiburg; Vienna, Austria; the Federal University of University of Freiburg in extensive use of individual old-growth trees. The conservation management. Individual trees are chopped down, Amazon rainforest in Brazil – it is one of the and Göttingen. He earned Santa Maria, Brazil. She 2009. He then worked for of habitat trees, i.e., trees that provide a habitat for other leading to a permanent high forest that can be used economically useful species in the rainforest and his PhD in Göttingen in then went on to specialize three years at the Baden- organisms, and woody debris leads to an increase in structural intensively while at the same providing space for is valued for the hardness of its wood and its 1994 with a dissertation in environmental education Württemberg Forest Testing diversity. Photos: Jürgen Bauhus many different tree species. resistance to decay. on the nutrient cycle in at the same institution, and Research Institute, beech forests. He then earning her master’s in for- where he collected and researched and taught in est science in 2010. After analyzed data for the Montreal, Canada, and teaching for two years at German forest inventory. case of more intensive use. There is thus a While deciduous forests tend to be less tolerant within the next 30 years. This is also true of the Canberra, Australia. In 2003 the University of West Santa Since 2014 he has been threshold value, above which the wood harvest of intensive use, it is possible to harvest large economically interesting trees: They only grow Bauhus was appointed Catarina in Xanxerê, Brazil, working on his doctorate at as professor of silviculture she came to the University the University of Freiburg has a negative influence on structural diversity. amounts of wood from coniferous forests and again if one limits the intensity of use – other- at the University of of Freiburg as a research under Prof. Bauhus. His Limiting forest use to this level enables a sus- then convert them into mixed forests. wise it is mainly the non-usable trees that multi- Freiburg’s Faculty of assistant under Prof. dissertation investigates tainable cultivation of the forest with regard to ply. The legally permitted use intensity in Brazil Environment and Natural Bauhus. She earned her the impact of use intensity biodiversity. “This allows us to determine for the Sustainable Rainforests now lies below the threshold calculated in the Resources. His research PhD in January 2017. Her on biodiversity in the forests fi rst time ever what level of use intensity will likely study. “According to our analyses, a sustainable focuses on the interplay dissertation explores of Baden-Württemberg. have a positive effect on biodiversity, or at least As an example of how widely threshold values use of these forests is possible if one obeys the between the structure and how the tropical rainforest not a negative effect,” reports Storch. Bauhus can differ from region to region, Bauhus and his law there,” concludes Bauhus. function of forest ecosys- regenerates within 30 and his research group are conducting two studies assistant Dr. Angela de Avila are conducting tems as well as their silvi- years after a wood harvest. to demonstrate the relevance of this threshold studies in Brazilian rainforests. They contain 200 Debate on the Bioeconomy cultural control. Special Topic: Sustainability Topic: Special value – one in the forests of Baden-Württemberg, to 300 tree species – compared to only half a Photos: Jürgen Gocke and the other in the Brazilian rainforest. dozen or less in German forests. Since many of The guidelines for forest use in Germany are the tree species in rainforests are not usable, set in accordance with the condition, wood foresters chop down just five to ten selected growth, and desired functions of the forest. “The “This long-term study in the trees per hectare and leave the rest standing. It principle is to not take away more you than can tropical rainforest is practically is only since the second half of the 20th century grow back in the long term,” explains Bauhus. that attempts are being made to make sustaina- The amount taken away has even been much one of a kind.” ble use of the rainforests. However, there is a less in the past decades. Whether this should re- lack of experience with regard to the issue of main so is a contentious issue, because bioec- Germany is one of the European Union’s most how much time rainforests need to recover from onomy initiatives want to use the forests more densely forested countries. The average forest the interventions and whether this depends on intensively in the future. The research conducted Further Reading in Baden-Württemberg yields a volume of almost the intensity of use. by Bauhus and his group is making an important 380 cubic meters of wood per hectare – a record contribution to this debate. “We can show on the De Avila, A. L. / Schwartz, G. / Ruschel, A. R. et al. (2017): Recruitment, amount. With the help of the inventory data from De Avila and Bauhus analyzed an experiment basis of the structural index what levels of use growth and recovery of merchantable growing stock over 30 years this state, Bauhus and Storch have demonstrat- that has been running for over 30 years – includ- intensity are possible in particular forests with- following logging and thinning in a tropical rainforest. In: Forest Ecology ed that the threshold values for a reduction in ing eight inventories to date. “This long-term out causing a large-scale reduction in biodiver- and Management 385, pp. 225–234. structural diversity differ depending on the type study in the tropical rainforest is practically one sity,” he summarizes. If it is not possible to of forest. In a beech forest, for example, it is ad- of a kind. They greatly increased the level of use remain under the threshold value, it is necessary Kahl, T. / Bauhus, J. (2014): An index of forest management intensity visable to harvest somewhat less wood than can intensity to test out how the forest would recover to compensate for the higher level of use: Con- based on assessment of harvested tree volume, tree species composition grow back in the same period of time, while in a over time,” explains de Avila. She calculated a serving habitat trees and adding woody debris and dead wood origin. In: Nature Conservation 7, pp. 15–27. doi: spruce forest one can harvest nearly twice as threshold value for the Brazilian forests: In a se- present alternative means of creating a diverse 10.3897/natureconservation.7.7281 much as what grows back. Bauhus stresses that lective wood harvest, one can use approximately habitat and therefore maintaining biodiversity. the threshold values are not fixed limits but 20 percent of the wood supply. If one takes away McElhinny, C. / Gibbons, P. / Brack, C. et al. (2005): Forest and woodland merely an indication of where one should reduce more, the composition of tree species and the www.waldbau.uni-freiburg.de stand structural complexity: its definition and measurement. In: Forest use intensity or could potentially increase it: carbon stock of the forests does not recover Ecology and Management 218, pp. 1–24.

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he light emitted by large cities like New York, TMoscow, and Tokyo at night rivals that of the moon, as satellite images from the US space Switched On agency NASA reveal. While some parts of the earth are shrouded almost entirely in darkness, The project SusLight is developing the densely populated regions appear bathed in a bright light. Around one-fifth of the electricity better LEDs and therefore addressing generated worldwide is used for lighting today, and the issue of sustainable lighting the amount continues to increase. The demand for sustainable lighting is correspondingly great. by Alexander Ochs One of the most important technologies in this context is the light-emitting diode, LED for short. A pilot project at the Sustainability Center Freiburg has set itself the task of improving LEDs and making them more efficient. The university’s side of the project involving technical aspects, which goes by the title “SusLight – Sustainable LED Lighting” and is part of the “Energy Systems” research focus at the center, is headed by Prof. Dr. Yiannos Manoli, holder of the Fritz Hüttinger Chair of Microelectronics at the University of Freiburg’s Department of Microsystems Engineer- ing (IMTEK).

“We want to integrate microelectronic circuits into the lamps to im- Special Topic: Sustainability Topic: Special prove their efficiency even more.”

The European Commission implemented a ban on incandescent light bulbs in 2009, paving the way for more modern lighting technologies. One of the most well known of these, the compact fluorescent lamp, is not regarded as a satisfactory replacement. Its many limitations include a relatively short lifespan, an unnatural rendering of colors, and a delay before reaching full brightness – plus it is poisonous because it contains mercury. As a result, researchers are now focusing on the white LED, invented in 1995 with support from Fraunhofer Institute for Applied Solid State Physics (IAF) in Freiburg.

White LEDs are optoelectronic semiconductor components capable of converting electrical ener- The metropolitan area of Atlanta, USA, seen from space: gy directly into light. To be used in conventional Around one-fifth of the electricity generated worldwide is lamp sockets, however, they need to be retrofitted used for lighting, and the amount continues to increase. with a driver circuit that converts the alternating The demand for sustainable lighting is correspondingly great. current from the 230 volt wall socket to direct Source: NASA Image and Video Library current. The method currently in favor is silicon MOSFET technology; MOSFET stands for metal–

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“We want to integrate microelectronic circuits into the lamps to im- Special Topic: Sustainability Topic: Special prove their efficiency even more.”

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oxide–semiconductor field-effect transistor. For involves running computer simulations of circuit what to do. For example, a team of economists the SusLight project, Prof. Dr. Joachim Wagner, configurations that consume less electricity but from the University of Freiburg is studying the Dr. Michael Kunzer, and the latter’s team at the also require less components. The most promising barriers to market entry faced by manufacturers Fraunhofer IAF are conducting research on gallium models are then constructed, measured, and of LED lamps. They are taking a look at the public nitride components for the driver electronics as evaluated in the lab. perception and acceptance of LED lighting and well as on the assembly and circuitry of the investigating the support for sustainable con- entire LED lamp. Manoli says of their work so Another means of optimizing LED lamps is to sumption among consumers as well as the issue far: “In comparison to the commercial models of replace components with others made of different of how the government can encourage sustainable the same size, our LED lamp yields twice as materials. One of the weak points in current LED consumption and production. Prof. Dr. Yiannos Manoli much light output.” lamps or retrofi ts is the electrolytic capacitors built studied in the USA on a Fulbright scholarship, into them, which are used for temporary energy At the end of the day, even the best high-tech completing a bachelor’s in storage. They are more affordable and can store lighting will have little impact if the consumer physics and mathematics “Cold white light keeps us awake more energy per volume than other types of ca- does not buy it – preferring instead to hoard old- and a master’s in electrical during the day; warm white light helps pacitors, but they are much less durable than the style light bulbs in the basement. Even though engineering and computer LEDs and therefore shorten the lifespan of the the price of LEDs is falling very rapidly, they are science. In 1987 he earned us fall asleep better in the evening.” lamp as a whole. “We have developed a concept still relatively expensive to make. And yet the ef- his PhD at the University that does without electrolytic capacitors and have ficiency of LEDs is sensational compared to that of Duisburg. His research applied for a patent, and we believe that it could of traditional incandescent light bulbs: While the in the 1980s and 1990s Another objective is to improve the function- drastically increase the lifespan of LEDs.” And The project team at SusLight is working on further latter manage a meager efficiency level of just focused on the development ing of the LEDs. The scientists want to equip the that’s not all: “We want to integrate microelectronic reducing performance losses in the driver five percent, white LEDs can now achieve up to of analog/digital MOS and CMOS circuits. This work lamps with sensors to make them controllable. circuits into the lamps to improve their effi ciency electronics and in the LEDs. The goal is to allow 65 percent, depending on the quality of color led to numerous patents, For example, the color temperature of the white even more, and above all to make them smaller.” as little heat energy as possible to escape and rendering and temperature. The project partners scientific publications, and to reduce the lamp’s operating temperature – light could be adjusted so that it appears warm therefore still see great potential in the further awards for his research and white like the light from a conventional Even though LEDs are already far more currently around 80 degrees Celsius – to increase spread of LEDs – especially when one considers teaching. Since 2001 Manoli light bulb or cold white like daylight. effi cient than incandescent light the lifespan of the components. Photo: 3dmavr/Fotolia that around one-fifth of the electrical energy has held the Fritz Hüttinger That is important, because our bulbs, the scientists participat- generated worldwide today is used for lighting. Chair of Microelectronics at innate sense of time, our “in- ing in the SusLight project This figure could rise in the future, for obvious the University of Freiburg’s ternal clock,” is influenced are conducting research reasons, says Manoli: “The population is grow- Department of Microsystems by the color temperature on ways to reduce per- If everything goes off according to plan, a proto- ing, there are more single-person households, Engineering (IMTEK). His Special Topic: Sustainability Topic: Special of the light in our envi- formance losses in the type will be completed by 2018. The overarching the living space per person is increasing, and current research interests ronment: “Cold white driver electronics and goal of the SusLight project is to encourage the the issue of security in public spaces also calls include mixed analog/digital integrated circuits and the light keeps us awake in the LEDs even fur- more widespread adoption of LED lighting and to for more lighting.” design of circuit concepts and during the day; warm ther. The goal is to more fully exploit the energy-saving potential of system solutions with espe- white light helps us allow as little heat the technology. The longer the new lamps can www.leistungszentrum-nachhaltigkeit.de/ cially low power consumption. fall asleep better in energy as possible to be made to last, the less of them will have to be pilotprojekte/suslight Photo: Klaus Polkowski the evening,” says escape and to reduce disposed of in the future – and when they do Manoli. The scien- the lamp’s operating need to be thrown away, they will contain less tists want to con- temperature – cur- pollutants. This is another of the many sustaina- trol the intensity rently around 80 bility issues addressed in the project. and thus also the degrees Celsius – brightness of the to increase the Another feature of the project, which is receiving light by dimming. lifespan of the funding from the State of Baden-Württemberg, is Moreover, they are components. That’s that the researchers have managed to bring on developing an inte- reason enough to board a host of partners from various institutions Further Reading grated motion sen- search for ways and a wide range of disciplines, including Hahn- sor, for instance so and means to carry Schickard, an institute for applied research with Reiner, R. / Weiß, B. / Zibold, A. et al. (2016): High voltage GaN-based that the lamp only off the heat, to facilities in Villingen-Schwenningen and other Schottky diodes in non-isolated LED buck converters. switches on when a “reduce the heat dissi- locations. Besides tackling the technological In: Power Electronics and Applications (EPE’16 ECCE Europe). person is actually nearby. pation in the lamp,” as challenges of LEDs, the project partners are also https://doi.org/10.1109/EPE.2016.7695316 “Effi cient architectures” is This light bulb is based on a Manoli terms it: “We’ve investigating economic and behavioral aspects the term Manoli uses to highly-efﬁ cient LED module developed by already managed to get of the technology. The idea is to motivate consum- Manoli, Y. / Schilliner, D. / Hu,Y. et al. (2016): A 96.7% effi cient boost refer to what he and his researchers in the SusLight project. It has the losses in the driver ers to use energy-efficient and long-lasting converter with a stand-by current of 420 nA for energy harvesting team are working on a color temperature in the cold white region. electronics down to under lamps and thus adopt sustainable practices – applications. In: Circuits and Systems (ISCAS), 2016 IEEE, pp. 654–657. developing. The process Photo: Jürgen Gocke 10 percent.” without making them feel like they are being told http://dx.doi.org/10.1109/ISCAS.2016.7527325

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Authority and

Democratic n 1967, the Frankfurt school student Karin Storch growing criticism of authoritarianism. The histori- Iheld a graduation speech that attracted nation- an speaks of an “unusually pronounced feeling of wide attention. Its title was “Teaching Disobedience discontent with forms of authority aimed at obedi- as a Responsibility of a Democratic School.” The ence and subordination.” Hardly anyone spoke of Education young woman criticized the fact that German a contrast between authority and democracy in schools too often taught authoritarian behavior 1950s and 1960s France, says Levsen. In Germany, and educated the students to be loyal and sub- on the other hand, this view had a very strong impact West Germany experienced dynamic servient, even though autonomy, critical thinking, as an explanation for National Socialism, especially and disobedience are necessary virtues for the in the education sector. educational change in the 1950s life and health of a democratic society. and 1960s – in contrast to France Some people saw the speech as a provocation, but the reactions from the public and from state by Thomas Goebel “The Americans as well institutions were not all negative. On the contrary, organs like the conservative Protestant weekly as the British asked themselves Christ und Welt published the text, and the political at the end of the war what education department of the City of Cologne school board reprinted the speech to make it available was wrong with the Germans.” to students and teachers. In 1968 Karin Storch received the Theodor Heuss Medal. “The speech sounds like a rebellion against the authorities,” says University of Freiburg historian Dr. Sonja And yet this interpretation was fi rst put forward Levsen, “but in 1967 the authorities already sup- by the allied occupying powers: “The Americans ported most of what this speech calls for.” as well as the British asked themselves at the end of the war what was wrong with the Germans,” Rapidly Growing Criticism says Levsen. In an attempt to fi nd an answer, they fell back on the old image of the Germans as obe- Sonja Levsen studied the relationship between dient subjects. In the course of the so-called authority and democracy in the post war era in re-education of the Germans as democrats, the her habilitation thesis, which she completed in Americans placed great emphasis on the school September 2016. According to its subtitle, the culture: They encouraged discussions in class, thesis is a cultural history of educational change saw to it that student councils were introduced, in West Germany and France. “It is striking that and supported the establishment of critical student the term ‘authoritarian’ often appears in historical newspapers. accounts of the 1950s and 1960s,” says Levsen. According to this widely-held view, the young “The Germans gradually began to adopt this Federal Republic of Germany was – in contrast image themselves,” says Levsen. In the immediate to countries like France or Great Britain – marked aftermath of the war it had still been common to a large extent by “authoritarian traditions,” by to interpret National Socialism as a break with hierarchical thinking and Prussian subservience, traditional forms of authority, but gradually the School was supposed to educate the Germans attributes that had ultimately also paved the way belief became accepted that the Germans needed to become democrats after the Second World War for National Socialism. to break away from their authoritarian traditions and thus help them to overcome “authoritarian to become real democrats, particularly in educa- traditions” that had ultimately also paved the way In her study, Levsen comes to the contrasting tion. This interpretation became “a driving force for National Socialism. Photo: ADDICTIVE STOCK/Fotolia conclusion that it was not a particularly marked in the educational change” – because it appeared authoritarianism that made the young Federal especially compelling against the backdrop of Republic different from France – but rapidly National Socialism.

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Authority and

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“For example, many ministries of education – there were immediately calls for more political As a result of these differences in dealing with even some in states governed by the conservative information at schools. When copycats committed authoritarian structures, the protests of 1968 had Christian Democratic Union – began in the second a similar offence shortly afterwards in Paris, the a different meaning in Germany than in France: half of the 1950s to support critical student reaction was completely different. Levsen tells of “The schools in Germany were already far more newspapers,” says Levsen. Active students were a school principal’s letter prohibiting all political open at the time.” The revolt in France thus con- invited to participate, and there were government discussion in class, because if the topic were to stituted an actual break, whereas the movement grants. From the 1960s on, more and more minis- become a part of school life it could lead to unrest of 1968 in Germany served more to intensify tries began forbidding school principals from and dissent among the student body. developments that had already been in evidence Dr. Sonja Levsen censoring the newspapers, “with the argument: since the mid 1950s. is deputy holder of the Chair in Modern and Contemporary ‘We’ve had that already.’” Levsen estimates that Levsen stresses that her intention was not to Western European History almost 1000 student newspapers existed in mid “paint a rosy picture and sum things up in black “I naturally also asked myself why the discus- at the University of Freiburg. 1960s Germany, compared to perhaps 20 or 30 and white terms” in her book. There were of sion on authority in Germany was so effective in She studied history, political in France – and even these were “underground” course many teachers in the early years of the bringing on educational change,” says Levsen. science, and German studies newspapers, established without official recogni- Federal Republic who refused to speak about The point of reference was more the collective, in Tübingen; Cambridge, tion and support. National Socialism, or principals who banned society in general, than the individual: “Schools England; and Munich and student newspapers on account of harmless arti- did not fund student newspapers to help the earned her PhD with a cles. The historian’s intention was rather to iden- students develop their personalities or express comparative study of the tify general patterns of interpretation in the their interests – but to make them into good consequences of World War debates and point out their concrete potency. democrats.” Consequently, the debate should be I on the mentalities and political attitudes of German She did her research in the archives of German understood primarily as a means by which society and English students, for and French school administrations, as well as in attempted to dissociate itself from its National which she received the Dr. magazines for parents, publications of teachers’ Socialist past. It was a rather lazy way of doing Leopold Lucas Prize for associations, educational treatises, informational so, however, “because it evoked the old image of Junior Researchers. Levsen material for youth leaders from youth organiza- Germans who couldn’t help but obey on account then worked as a research tions, and student newspapers. of their education as obedient subjects.” assistant at the University of Freiburg and a junior fellow Radicalized Debates www.pr.uni-freiburg.de/go/levsen at the Freiburg Institute for Advanced Studies (FRIAS). Levsen examined the treatment of authority She completed her habilita- relations in four selected fields: school culture, tion thesis in 2016 with the help of a Dilthey Fellowship political education, stance on corporal punish- from the Volkswagen Founda- ment, and sex education. Her findings bring to tion. Her research interests light subtle differences: “Beatings were indeed include the history of Western much more prevalent in German elementary Europe in the 19th and schools than in French schools,” she says. There 20th centuries and cultural had already been criticism of this in the early historical approaches. 1950s, “but the change didn’t really gain momen- Photo: private tum until the argument of the past came into play and until psychologists began arguing in the 1960s that if we beat the children they would become Student protests in Freiburg: In Germany the movement of 1968 served new Eichmanns, Nazis ready to obey orders.” more to intensify developments that had already been in evidence since the mid 1950s, whereas in France the revolt constituted an actual break. Debates on sex education followed a similar Source: Freiburg University Archive trend, with some aspects becoming even more Further Reading radicalized in the 1970s: “There was a theory that it was not enough to merely provide children Levsen, S. / Torp, C. (Eds.) (2016): Wo liegt die The historian paints a similar picture of the way information but that one also needed to awaken Bundesrepublik? Vergleichende Perspektiven political education was treated in the two coun- their desire, because only so would they develop auf die westdeutsche Geschichte. Göttingen. tries: Experts funded by the German government into truly liberated adults who would not become Almost 1000 student newspapers existed in mid 1960s came to evening lectures and discussions with fascists.” In a follow-up project, Levsen wants to Germany, like the Schüler Digest in Lahr (above) or Levsen, S. (2010): Jugend in der europäischen the leaders – still known at the time as “Führer” – study how this very German argumentation influ- Der Spikker in Marburg – by contrast, there were only Zeitgeschichte. Nationale Historiographien of youth organizations, and when swastikas were enced the philosophical debates of the time, also few such publications in France at this time. und transnationale Perspektiven. In: Neue painted on a synagogue in Cologne in 1959, at the international level. Sources: Stadtarchiv Lahr, https://www.mls-ehemalige.de/der-spikker Politische Literatur 55/3, pp. 421–446.

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Starting gun: The brain gives the command, and the muscles execute it – but it is not yet known how this process works in detail. Photo: Valeriy Velikov/Fotolia

eady, set, go! Many precious milliseconds neurons – nerve cells that then use their own Rpass by in the interval between the starting axons to activate the skeletal muscles. shot and the point at which a 100-meter sprinter starts running – time in which a whole lot hap- Leukel has devised a special blend of methods pens in the sprinter’s brain. Innumerable nerve to obtain detailed information on the activity of cells need to communicate successfully with one the pyramidal cells and investigate previously another to get the right muscles to flex at just the unknown neural mechanisms of motor control. right time. He and his team are employing a combination of electrophysiological stimulation and detection The human brain is plastic and therefore techniques. By stimulating the cells, the scientists changeable. We are thus capable of learning can determine how nerve cells react to stimuli motor skills throughout our lives. Hurdlers and and thus control their activity. dancers, for example, learn to seemingly effort- lessly control and coordinate all the muscles of the central nervous system, consisting of the brain and the spinal cord. Evolution has driven “It’s all about timing.” the formation of increasingly complex structures in our brains, and the control processes have shifted more and more to an area of the cerebral In one experiment, healthy young volunteers cortex known as the neocortex. Our control over sit on a measurement chair and are asked to flex our fingers and hands as well as our speech or- their leg muscles when they hear a signal. The gan in particular has become much more refined. scientists can measure the cell activity in the Scientists refer to this as cortical takeover: Much brain and muscles simultaneously via electro- of what was once executed autonomously in the encephalography (EEG) and electromyography spinal cord independent of willpower is now con- (EMG). To stimulate the nerve cells in the brain, trolled consciously in the cerebral cortex. Primates they use a method known as transcranial and humans can exert influence on their environ- magnetic stimulation (TMS), in which a coil of ment deliberately and purposefully thanks to this copper wires is placed on the test subject’s head highly developed structure with direct connections precisely above the primary motor cortex. The to the spinal cord. coil generates an electromagnetic field below the skull cap that stimulates cells in the primary Passing on Orders motor cortex. “When we stimulate the right parts of the brain, we hit all possible cells at once, It is not yet known exactly how an action including the pyramidal cells, whose activity we From Idea to Movement is controlled in the brain. Junior professor Dr. want to measure,” says the scientist. Christian Leukel, sports scientist and neurophys- iologist at the University of Freiburg’s Institute of Direct Connection to the Spinal Cord Scientists are using a special blend of Sports Science and Physical Education, would methods to investigate previously unknown like to find out. “We do not yet have a precise The primary motor cortex has more pyramidal conception of where and how the initial plan to cells that reach down into the spinal cord than neural mechanisms of motor control execute a movement in the brain begins,” he any other connection between the neocortex and says. Various brain areas are responsible for the skeletal muscles. “The information there by Stephanie Heyl motor actions. The deep layers of the primary can be transported very quickly to the spinal motor cortex, a part of the cerebral cortex, harbor cord and to the muscles,” explains Leukel. These the pyramidal cells. Some of these cells reach all connections are especially well developed in the way into the spinal cord with long threadlike humans, and some of them run directly to the projections called axons, where they pass on the spinal cord without being influenced by other orders for each movement to the spinal motor nerve branches. “The information that the brain

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Starting gun: The brain gives the command, and the muscles execute it – but it is not yet known how this process works in detail. Photo: Valeriy Velikov/Fotolia

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parallel to one another shortly before a move- at the beginning of a movement is not always the ment is executed. Then, according to Leukel’s same but that the nervous system always produces model, the forces cancel each other out, and a range of variation. “At the moment when we nothing happens in the cell. If the inhibitory wish to precisely time a movement, however, this forces suddenly cease and only the excitatory variation is poor,” says Leukel. If the variation forces remain, movement occurs. The cell in the can be reduced, the timing becomes better. That primary motor cortex then passes on information. is learning. “Training of particular motions is a The sports scientists have already detected this reduction of variability,” says the sports scientist. Juniorprofessor inhibition. Now Leukel wants to know how the “A more detailed knowledge of neural mecha- Dr. Christian Leukel studied sports science in Executing a simple movement involves complex struc- inhibition that influences the pyramidal cells is nisms would allow us to better assess neural Freiburg and earned his tures: A part of the cerebral cortex (marked yellow) controlled. He suspects that this excitation is variability under pathological conditions and PhD in 2010. During stays contains the so-called pyramidal cells. Some of these determined not just by the primary motor cortex even to foster plasticity. If there is a change in in Copenhagen, Denmark, cells have long projections called axons that reach into but also by other structures of the cerebrum. the balance between excitation and inhibition, for and in Zurich and Fribourg, the spinal cord, where they pass on the commands to example in patients with stroke or Parkinson’s Switzerland, he gained nerve cells that then use their own axons to activate To what extent are humans capable of learning disease, we could possibly adjust the control additional qualiﬁ cations in the skeletal muscles. Illustration: Oliver Wrobel motor abilities, and how can the process be system with our stimulation methods to enable clinical neurophysiology, infl uenced? Leukel has tools for obtaining precise an improved movement.” focusing particularly on details on neural mechanisms and exerting influ- the application of neuro- ence on the activity of nerve cells. Scientists www.sport.uni-freiburg.de/institut/Arbeitsbereiche/ physiological methods in fundamental research on assume that the increase in cell activity in a person Neurowissenschaft movement and sports. Since 2014 he has served as a junior professor in neuroscience and sports at the University of Frei- burg’s Institute of Sports Science and Physical Education and as an associ- ate member of the Bern- stein Center Freiburg sends via these connections can not be changed can again be measured. This is only possible (BCF) and the Freiburg Institute for Advanced until it reaches the spinal motor neurons, and it because the scientists know precisely how much Freiburg sports scientists stimulate nerve cells Studies (FRIAS). is therefore also what activates the muscles.” time the information coming from the primary in the brain of a test subject and follow the activity Leukel’s team wants to stimulate precisely those motor cortex needs on the fastest pyramidal on a computer screen. cells that reach the motor neurons without any pathway. “We wait for the point at which the two Photos: Michael Veit further influences. To do so, the researchers use stimuli collide at the spinal cord. The collision an ingenious trick: “It’s all about timing – that’s leads to a change in our measurement signal, the secret ingredient that gives us a unique allowing us to determine the activity of our possibility to apply our methods to observe a pyramidal cell population. This is a rather com- Further Reading subpopulation of cells in the primary motor plex undertaking, but it is the only way to enable cortex with great precision.” isolated and detailed observation of nerve cell Leukel, C. / Gollhofer, A. / Taube, W. (2015): In experts, underlying activity in the human brain,” Leukel concludes. processes that drive visuomotor adaptation are different than in novices. The key lies in precisely coordinating the stimuli. In: Frontiers in Human Neuroscience. doi: 10.3389/fnhum.2015.00050 “Training of particular motions “Since our stimulation methods and recording devices are much faster than what the nervous Leukel, C. / Taube, W. / Rittweger, J. et al. (2015): Changes in corticospinal is a reduction of variability.” system itself is capable of, we are able to image transmission following 8 weeks of ankle joint immobilization. In: Clinical the activity at a high temporal resolution.” Neurophysiology 126/1, pp. 131–140.

To this end, the researchers apply electric Excitatory and Inhibitory Forces Taube, W. / Leukel, C. / Nielsen, J. B. et al. (2015): Repetitive activation of stimulation along the leg parallel to the transcra- the corticospinal pathway by means of rTMS may reduce the effi ciency nial magnetic stimulation of the brain. These But how is the interaction that produces the of corticomotoneuronal synapses. In: Cerebral Cortex 25/6, pp. 1629–1637. nerves also reach into the spinal cord and activate actual movement organized? When the pyramid the motor neurons via a reflex. The two stimuli cells are stimulated in the primary motor cortex, Video about Christian Leuke’s research: arrive at the spinal cord simultaneously, and this excitatory and inhibitory forces are always active www.pr.uni-freiburg.de/go/neuroscience-in-sports

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The linguistic database FREDDIE includes examples of dialect from the British counties of Yorkshire, Lancashire, Kent, and Cornwall, among others. Digitalized Photos: Davorana/Fotolia; Collage: Kathrin Jachmann Dialects

A team at the Department of English is pioneering research-based learning approaches with the linguistic database FREDDIE

by Anita Rüffer

hen many Germans hear the name Freddy, lish decided in the late 1990s to examine these Researchers addressing differences in pronun- copyright to all text and audio fi les needs to be Wthey think of a television detective from differences in detail and began systematically ciation can make use of the audio files, and settled and the data have to be anonymized. Cologne on the popular crime series Tatort. How- collecting data on English dialects. In the course those interested in grammatical features can ever, FREDDIE is also the name of a linguistic of countless trips, the team collected data in the draw upon the transcriptions. FRED was created How did FRED become FREDDIE? The col- database developed at the University of form of transcripts and original interviews: Men between 2000 and 2005 in two projects funded lection of interviews alone might be referred to Freiburg’s Department of English that is currently and women, most of them over 60, shared stories by the German Research Foundation (DFG), as the raw material – the important thing here poised to expand into the great wide world of the from their lives with the researchers. The material both of them headed by Kortmann. too is what one does with it. Bernd Kortmann internet and open up entirely new avenues for could therefore also be of interest to historians. and his research assistants Dr. Katja Roller and research-based learning – and not just for The remarkable thing about the database is not Marten Juskan came up with a whole host of ideas students of English linguistics. From FRED to FREDDIE just the educational and scientifi c potential. After on how FRED could be developed further into all, Kortmann and his team would never have the multimedia teaching and learning platform FREDDIE (Freiburg English Dialect Database What Bernd Kortmann and his data collectors been able to unleash this potential if it hadn’t FREDDIE. In 2016 they received an Instructional for Instruction and E-Learning) is based on an were interested in, however, was not primarily been for the rapid technological developments of Development Award (IDA) worth 70,000 euros earlier database called the Freiburg Corpus of the content of the stories but “how the people the past decades. The interviews were originally for their concept from the University of Freiburg. English Dialects (FRED). Just as not everybody said things.” The FRED corpus consists of 300 transported back to Freiburg on audio cassettes “We are going to edit the data for use by people in Germany speaks such a clean standard hours of audio recordings encompassing a total and minidiscs. They were later all digitalized, and at different competency levels,” explains Kort- German as people in Hanover do, not everybody of 2.5 million words from 372 interviews conducted the data edited on the computer. Around three mann, possibly even secondary school students. in Great Britain speaks a pure Oxford English in 163 towns in England, Scotland, and Wales. years ago, the team began making them available like the Queen does, the variety of English The collection is the largest of its kind and is a online for researchers around the world. This in- Katja Roller has already tested out the possi- generally taught in Germans schools. Just like in veritable treasure trove for corpus linguistics: volves a lot of hard work: The issue of who owns bilities of FREDDIE with her students in an Germany, the dialects in Great Britain can differ in grammar or pronunciation from county to county and from town to town. A team of researchers led by Prof. Dr. Bernd Kortmann at the University of Freiburg’s Department of Eng-

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A team at the Department of English is pioneering research-based learning approaches with the linguistic database FREDDIE

by Anita Rüffer

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or wikis for particular courses. A simple home- page will include general instructions on using the platform as well as links to the individual elements.

Hence, the platform under development at the Department of English is quite a marvel – and it is not just dialectologists who stand to benefit: It can be used by everyone who works with it to Prof. Dr. Bernd Kortmann Dr. Katja Roller Marten Juskan learn basic scientific methods that “can be trans- has served as professor of completed an elementary studied English and Romance This online interface shows what data are available for ferred to other areas of linguistics,” as Kortmann English language and school teaching program studies at the Universities listening and download. assures. Perhaps the platform will even end up linguistics at the University with a major in English at the of Freiburg; Grenoble, France; of Freiburg since 1995. University of Bamberg and and Surrey, England. He Photo: Marten Juskan, Katja Roller/Department of English providing practical applications in forensic lin- After studying English and the Swansea University in was an adjunct lecturer at guistics: If a perpetrator leaves characteristic history at the University Wales. From 2012 to 2014 Freiburg’s Department of “sound prints” instead of footprints, for example, of Trier and the British Uni- she received a doctoral English from 2014 to 2015 FREDDIE might even turn out to be a useful versities of Lancaster and scholarship at the University and has since served as a With the help of a professional program for linguistic text analysis, students found out that the negation crime-fighting tool for the other Freddy, the tele- Oxford, he completed his of Freiburg as a member of research assistant. His primary “nae” – as in “He does nae like it”) is common in Scotland but is not used in the South of England. vision detective. PhD at the University of the research training group research interests are socio- Photo: Marten Juskan, Katja Roller/Department of English; Source: Laurence Anthony, www.laurenceanthony.net/software.html Hanover in 1989 and his (GRK) “Frequency Effects phonetics, language per- http://fred.ub.uni-freiburg.de habilitation qualiﬁ cation at in Language,” and in 2013 she ception, and the interplay www.freidok.uni-freiburg.de/proj/1 the Free University of Berlin also served as an adjunct between peculiar dialect in 1994. At the University lecturer in English linguistics features, identity issues, of Freiburg, he is the founder at the University of Bamberg. and language change. and chairman of the board From 2014 to 2017 she was of the Language Teaching a research assistant in the undergraduate seminar: The students learned to interviews conducted in various regions. The Centre (SLI) and has been aforementioned research conduct interviews and use a computer program subcorpus was recently made available on the executive director and training group and at the to transcribe them. They saw how a linguistic Freiburg University Library’s “Freidok” server. director of humanities at the Department of English of the corpus is set up. They analyzed which regions The library – as well as the university’s IT Services Freiburg Institute for University of Freiburg. She various words come from – finding out, for in- Department – has been very active in supporting Advanced Studies (FRIAS) ﬁ nished her PhD in English stance, that the negation “nae” (as in “He does the linguistic pioneers at the Department of Eng- since 2013. He main research linguistics in 2016. She nae like it”) is common in Scotland but is not lish. The library employees write programs, put interest is the grammar of is currently completing the used in the South of England. They carried out the data online, and make suggestions about non-standard English usage student teaching requirement statistical studies and learned a new program- how it can be used. “We spurred each other on,” SCOTLAND around the world. for elementary school teaching qualification in ming language for creating charts and diagrams. Kortmann raves of the collaboration. Photos: Jürgen Gocke Baden-Württemberg. “Like in a scientifi c process,” explains Katja Roller, “they selected data, edited and analyzed them, Freely Available Elements and visualized the results.” Marten Juskan, for example, is working on combining text and audio files. So far it is only “We are going to edit the data possible to make rough classifications, but for use by people at different “we’re going to refine things until it’s possible to look at each individual sound.” He hopes that ENGLAND Further Reading competency levels.” this monumental project will one day benefit WALES researchers around the world – and of course Anderwald, L. / Wagner, pp. (2006): The Freiburg English Dialect Corpus Damaris Stein, one of the participants in the teachers as well: The Instructional Development (FRED) – applying corpus-linguistic research tools to the analysis seminar, found it “pretty cool that you can access Award winners aim to develop general instruc- of dialect data. In: Beal, J. / Corrigan, K. / Moisl, H. (Eds.) (2006): Using so many audio files from so many different tional materials and concepts for the FREDDIE Unconventional Digital Language Corpora. Volume 1: Synchronic regions. It’s really funny to compare the various platform – like those Katja Roller has already Corpora. Basingstoke, pp. 35–53. UNITED KINGDOM accents.” Without FREDDIE, the 21-year-old tested out in her seminar – and also make them GREAT BRITAIN undergraduate might have had to conduct hun- suitable for independent study. Statistics and Kortmann, B. / Wagner, pp. (2005): The Freiburg English Dialect Project dreds of interviews herself to discover the differ- corpus analysis programs will be provided on the and Corpus. In: Kortmann, B. / Herrmann, T. / Pietsch. L. et al. (Eds.) ences between the dialects. For her term paper internet as tools. In addition to these freely avail- The researchers collected a total of 300 hours of audio (2005): A Comparative Grammar of British English Dialects: Agreement, she worked with FRED-S, a subcorpus containing able elements, the team is planning password- material in 163 towns in England, Scotland, and Wales. Gender, Relative Clauses. Berlin/New York, pp. 1–20 (= Topics in Eng- around a million words taken from transcribed protected areas in which teachers can post tests Illustration: olive1976/Fotolia, Kathrin Jachmann lish Linguistics 50/1).

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or wikis for particular courses. A simple home- page will include general instructions on using the platform as well as links to the individual elements.

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magine E.T.’s spaceship lands right next to the she experienced when Merriënboer suggested Good Teaching Iadministrative building of the University of not teaching E.T. the theoretical background nec- Freiburg. Smoke rises, lights flash. The door of essary for traveling but helping him to actually Educational scientists are using an educational the spaceship opens with a low hum. Out shuffl es travel himself. It would be enough for starters, the diminutive extraterrestrial. Once he has found Merriënboer, to simply accompany him on research model to improve teacher education reached the end of the long gangway, he stops his way to the train station and teach him the three and looks around – rolling his eyes, waiting cau- or four words necessary to ask someone the way. by Stephanie Streif tiously. But this time it’s not like it was in Steven Spielberg’s film: E.T. does not just want to return Klein is a project member of the Freiburg home. He wants to explore the world and be- Advanced Center for Education (FACE), a coopera- come a world traveler. This is not something he tion network organized jointly by the University of can do without external support. After all, E.T. Freiburg and the Freiburg University of Education. The extraterrestrial E.T. is not from this world. He doesn’t speak any lands in front of the German or English, and he has no idea how to administrative building of get around, because he isn’t familiar with cars or bicycles and doesn’t know how to read a map. “The model is perfect for the University of Freiburg. teacher education and How can he learn to find his How might one go about preparing E.T. for a way around on Earth? This is world tour? This is the tricky task ten University professional development.” of Freiburg teachers were confronted with at an introductory workshop on competency-based a problem participants of a instruction – taught by Prof. Dr. Jeroen van Its purpose is to improve teacher education in workshop on competency-based Merriënboer, a Dutch educational researcher Freiburg, in particular with regard to coherence instruction were confronted with. who developed the four-component instructional and professional orientation. Improving coherence design model, or 4C/ID for short. This model is means combining the academic, pedagogical, becoming increasingly important in the training theoretical, and practical components of teacher of future teachers at the University of Freiburg. education in a meaningful way and improving the Why? It offers teachers guidelines for planning coordination between the various training elements. and designing lessons that foster the acquisition Improving professional orientation, on the other and long-term retention of knowledge and abilities. hand, involves modeling these elements more Rather than flooding learners with theoretical closely after real situations from school life in an content, it encourages them to learn actively in a effort to align teacher education programs more learning environment that is tailored to their needs. closely with the teaching profession. Klein hopes 4C/ID can help to achieve both goals. “The model But let’s go back to E.T. for a moment: He’s is perfect for teacher education and professional still standing in front of the administrative build- development,” she explains. “It guides the learning and doesn’t know what to do next. The working process by providing concrete learning tasks shop participants recommended teaching him the teachers will later encounter again in the German as quickly as possible. In addition, he classroom.” Studies have long since provided needs to be explained how to read maps. Other- evidence for the effi ciency of 4C/ID-based courses. wise he won’t even be able to find his way from the administrative building to the train station. 4C/ID consists of four components: first, authentic and whole learning tasks; second, sup- Christiane Klein from the University of Freiburg’s portive information; third, procedural information; Center for Teaching and Learning was one of the and fourth, part-task practice. Hence, if E.T. participants in the workshop. The educational doesn’t want to get stuck in Freiburg forever he’ll scientist clearly remembers the sudden insight need a learning environment that supports him in

Illustration: Svenja Kirsch

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Illustration: Svenja Kirsch

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becoming a globetrotter. More specifically, what What does this involve? Field-specific knowl- he’ll need is, first, walks through town; second, a edge is only one side of the coin, says Kreutz. map; third, knowledge on how to navigate through “To become good teachers, students of history town by foot; and fourth, a whole lot of training in also need methodological, diagnostic, analytical, things like passing zebra crossings. Dr. Jessica conceptual, and self-reflective competencies to Kreutz from the Department of Political Science foster an awareness for history in their classes.” and History at the Freiburg University of Educa- As suggested by the 4C/ID model, Kreutz linked the learning content in her seminar “Competency Christiane Klein Dr. Jessica Kreutz Models and Competency Development in History began by studying pharmacy studied Latin, history, Instruction” to concrete exercises. This resulted at the University of Freiburg, educational science, and “The learning goals need to be in learning tasks composed of field-specific, switching to educational German as a foreign pedagogical, and theoretical parts, such as the science in 2009. In 2012 she language in Greifswald. earned her bachelor’s de- She earned her PhD in arranged in steps, broken up following: “Design a source-based instructional gree in education and in 2015 medieval and modern Latin sequence on a selected historical topic including into their individual elements, a master’s in educational philology in Göttingen. a complex task description and an explanation reviewed, and put together again.” science. Klein then served as She then worked as a student of the underlying theory.” This learning task was a research assistant at the teacher at the State already quite complex, says Kreutz. “At the be- Department of Educational Seminar for Teaching and ginning of the seminar, the tasks were much sim- In the future, training content in teacher education programs will be aligned Science. She is currently de- Teacher Education in tion knows from experience what it means to pler.” This is also a part of the model: To avoid even more closely with real classroom situations. veloping competency-based Freiburg. Since 2015 Kreutz design a history seminar in accordance with the making excessive demands on the students, the Photo: Oksana Kuzmina/Fotolia instructional models and has held the post of 4C/ID model. “Instruction in the field of history is teacher should begin by providing them more teaching teachers how to research assistant in the no longer just about presenting dates and facts support and less complex learning tasks. At use them at the Center for Department of History and Teaching and Learning. History Teaching at the but about teaching the students the necessary some point the progress becomes apparent, and Photos: Thomas Kunz Freiburg University of Edu- know-how,” she says. the students continue learning alone or in small cation, where she is en- groups. “The learning goals need to be arranged gaged among other things in steps, broken up into their individual elements, Christiane Klein and Jessica Kreutz believe with the “Quality Offensive reviewed, and put together again,” explains that the individual components of teacher educa- in Teacher Education,” a Kreutz. “In this way, you don’t lose sight of the tion should no longer be treated separately. Some joint project initiated by the big picture with 4C/ID.” seminars are focused on teaching and learning German Federal Ministry theories, others on field-specific knowledge, and of Education and Research. Teachers Become Moderators still others are on pedagogical know-how. In everyday working life, however, teachers need The idea is that when the students work with to call upon their field-specific, subject-based the material in this manner, they can still recall pedagogical, and theoretical knowledge sponta- and apply what they have learned even years neously and often also simultaneously to act in a later. The model also appears to foster autono- professional way. According to the two educa- Further Reading mous learning. Kreutz put a lot of time into pre- tional scientists, 4C/ID can help to bring these paring her seminar. The role she took on during three disciplines together. It is also thanks to the Stohler, U. / Klein, C. (2016): Application the 4C/ID model to the training of class meetings was then more that of a moderator. interdisciplinary team at FACE that the model can assessment skills for teachers of Russian. In: Švrčinová, M./Vlasáková, The students did most of the work, and they ap- be used to integrate different academic disciplines. Z. (Eds.) (2016): Metody výuky a testování cizích jazyků (včetně češtiny preciated the opportunity: In a short evaluation FACE is devoted to practice-based instruction pro cizince)/Foreign language teaching and testing methods (including during the last class meeting, 75 percent of them and offers higher education teaching and learn- Czech for foreigners): Sborník z mezinárodní konference: Poděbrady, stated that they had felt “more active” than in ing courses designed to help teachers develop 21–22 June 2016. Prag, pp. 182–190. http://ujop.cuni.cz/upload/stories/ other courses. In addition, 87.5 percent found the professional working strategies as defined by vtc/konference/01_PDBY_2016_konference_sbornik.pdf authentic and whole learning tasks “very appro- 4C/ID – as well as one-on-one advising, workshops, priate” and another 12.5 percent “appropriate.” opportunities for exchange among colleagues, Francom, G. M. / Gardner, J. (2014): What is task-centered learning? One course participant noted on her question- and a wealth of online material. The goal is to In: TechTrends 58/5, pp. 27–35. http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/ naire that the theoretical knowledge remained meet the complex demands of good instruction. s11528-014-0784-z longer in her memory because she was able to School students will presumably give their seal apply it in practice and learn it step by step. of approval – and so would E.T., should he one Merriënboer, J. J. G. van / Kirschner, P. A. (2013²): Ten steps to complex The four-component instructional design model, 4C/ID for short, incorporates Moreover, wrote another participant, the tasks day really decide to become a world traveler. learning: A systematic approach to four-component instructional design. active learning and fosters the acquisition and long-term retention of knowledge were oriented closely toward his future working New York/London. and abilities. Photo: robynmac/Fotolia life at school: “That shows the point of it all.” www.face-freiburg.de

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was born in a practical context: “Our department grasp its basic structure or is it better read it sev- was always asked to say something about learn- eral times through? After Lisa has rated the various ing strategies in the first week of an introductory statements, the program calculates what she knows lecture at the Institute of Psychology. We com- about learning strategies in the background and plied with this request, but always in the knowl- then presents her with tasks tailored to her prior edge that you can’t teach anything that leads to knowledge in the three learning modules. substantial effects in the learners in this time. That gave us the idea of developing an online training platform,” explains Renkl. „Initially, students are Field test: 150 students completed the online completely overwhelmed with The platform received the University of Freiburg’s training course “ELIS.” Instructional Development Award (IDA) in 2015. the amount of material.“ Photo: Sandra Meyndt The psychologists used the 70,000 euros in funding from the award to refine the platform in the Lisa decides to begin with the module on lab and then test it on around 150 psychology resource-oriented learning strategies. They help students in an initial application phase in the to improve the learning environment, organize 2016/2017 winter semester. In contrast to the the learning process, and develop motivation. commercially available self-help literature on the One of the things Lisa learns in this module is topic, ELIS helps students to apply learning that she can lengthen her concentration span strategies in their daily lives. “This is the first actively by progressively increasing the time she systematic online learning strategy training plat- spends concentrating on a task. In the module form ever, and it is even connected to the authentic on cognitive learning strategies, Lisa learns how Ending the Illusion learning situation,” emphasizes Leber. to reduce the complexity of the learning material. The tool suggests that she should organize the The Platform Accounts for Prior Knowledge technical terms using visual representations like mind maps or concept maps. This is something of Understanding A cartoon fi gure, also named ELIS, guides users she already knows from school. Students do not through the three modules on various learning learn without any strategies at all, of that Renkl strategies. The strategies are illustrated in videos, is certain: “Most students learn in the course of How the online training platform “ELIS” teaches learning texts, and diagrams. “We were inspired in devel- time very well to organize the material. They strategies and helps students to apply them oping it by so-called MOOCs, massive open online make diagrams and underline important terms. courses, which enable individual learning,” explains But our training makes them better at these Endres. In contrast to MOOCs, however, the use things too.” by Sonja Seidel of the tool is not bound to a particular date and time. Hence, the users control their learning on The metacognitive learning strategies covered their own. They choose when to start each module in the third module serve to ensure that learning and review the material in several consecutive goals are actually reached. “Students often “ELIS” is the name isa is new at the university. The 18-year-old The University of Freiburg is now offering learning phases. And what’s more, ELIS adapts succumb to illusions of understanding. They do of the cartoon figure Lis studying psychology and will be taking her a new online training platform designed to help itself to fit the users’ prior knowledge. not monitor their understanding but rather think that guides students first exam in two weeks. Her desk is cluttered beginning students like Lisa: “ELIS” – “Erfolgreich that if they have already heard something once, through the University with piles of books. Lisa sorts, underlines, and Lernen im Studium” (“learn successfully in a When Lisa uses the learning platform, she they can do it. The tool is designed to make them of Freiburg’s new draws diagrams; she needs to work through hun- course of study”) – teaches students learning thus first takes a test in which she has to rate more critical,” says Renkl. One advisable method online training course. dreds of pages of literature. Time is short, her strategies and then helps them to integrate them several statements on her learning strategies is to compare learning goals and knowledge ELIS is satisﬁ ed. The The acronym stands pulse races – Lisa has only made it through half into their daily lives. “Initially, students are com- and study scenarios from daily life. What does progress, for instance with learning protocols: learning strategies are for “Erfolgreich Lernen of the reading material, and she doesn’t know pletely overwhelmed with the amount of material she do when she can no longer concentrate and The students ask themselves key questions to grouped into various im Studium” (“learn how she’ll be able to remember the many terms. they are required to learn,” reports Prof. Dr. is behind schedule? Does she take a twenty- test for themselves how much they already know modules and are successfully in a She begins to doubt whether she’ll be able to Alexander Renkl from the University of Freiburg’s minute nap, or does she change her learning about a topic. This works best directly after a designed among other course of study”). pass the exam at all. She always had good grades Institute of Psychology. That’s the reason why environment? What tactic helps her when she’s study session, when the material is still fresh in things to help students in school, but now she’s wondering whether the Renkl and his assistants Jasmin Leber and Timo under a lot of pressure? Should she start by the student’s mind, and then again several days to plan and control Illustrations: Steffen Weyreter/ University of Freiburg university is really the right place for her. Endres developed the platform. The idea for it skimming through a text for a seminar meeting to later. their learning processes.

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The strategies presented on the online training uni’wissen, the research magazine of the University of Freiburg, is published twice a year. platform focus particularly on knowledge retrieval. “Most students learn by reading a text, reading it Publisher Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg, again, and then reading the summary. However, Rector Prof. Dr. Hans-Jochen Schiewer merely reading a text again is not a very effective Responsible for Content way to learn something by heart – that’s what our Rudolf-Werner Dreier, research indicates,” explains Endres. It is much Director of the Offi ce of Public Relations more effective to begin by calling back to mind Expert Advisory Board what one has read. Psychologists refer to this as Prof. Dr. Alexander Renkl Tino Endres Jasmin Leber Prof. Dr. Jürgen Bauhus, Forest Science the testing effect or retrieval-based learning. studied psychology at studied psychology at the ﬁ rst studied to become a Prof. Dr. Ralf von den Hoff, Archaeology “This links the knowledge to prior knowledge in RWTH Aachen University University of Innsbruck, secondary school teacher Prof. Dr. Gunther Neuhaus, Vice President for Research, Biology and at the University of Austria, and at the Univer- in English and Spanish at Prof. Dr. Sabine Rospert, Medicine the brain and consolidates it. The retrieval trains Prof. Dr. Margit Zacharias, Vice President for Innovation and Marburg. In 1991 he sity of Freiburg. Since the University of Freiburg the brain for the concrete exam situation, as it Technology Transfer, Microsystems Engineering earned his doctorate in 2014 he has worked as and then went on to study were,” adds Renkl. The tool communicates this psychology at the Uni- a research assistant at childhood development Editorial Staff principle on an individual basis: The system Judith Burggrabe (Head Editor) versity of Heidelberg, and the University of Freiburg and education at the Nicolas Scherger, Rimma Gerenstein, Katrin Albaum, tests Lisa’s newly acquired knowledge about in 1997 his habilitation Institute of Psychology Freiburg University of Sonja Seidel learning strategies between the learn- qualification at the Ludwig while writing a doctoral Education. In 2012 she ing phases by again asking her ques- Maximilian University of dissertation on learning returned to the University Address of Editorial Staff Presse- und Öffentlichkeitsarbeit tions from the initial test: Have Munich. After a stint as an through memory retrieval of Freiburg to complete Albert-Ludwigs-Universität her responses changed? Has educational psychology and the mechanisms of her master’s in education- Fahnenbergplatz, 79085 Freiburg she internalized the techniques? professor at the Schwäbisch the testing effect. In al science. She has Phone: +49 (0)761 203-4301 Gmünd University of addition, he has served served since 2013 as a Fax: +49 (0)761 203-4278 E-Mail: [email protected] In the second part, the pro- Education, he accepted a since 2016 as an editorial research assistant at the chair in educational psy- assistant for the journal University of Freiburg gram helps Lisa to come up with Print Run chology and developmental Unterrichtswissenschaft. Institute of Psychology and concrete situations for applying 9,000 copies psychology at the Univer- is currently writing a and practicing the learning strat- English Translation Illustration: sity of Freiburg. His research doctoral dissertation on Steffen Weyreter/ egies. This involves formulating Dr. David Heyde University of Freiburg focuses on example-based learning with adaptive so-called implementation inten- learning, self-explanations and adaptable multimedia Design, Layout Kathrin Jachmann tions, which follow an “if–then” pattern: If Lisa and instructional expla- systems. In 2014 Leber has finished reading a chapter in a textbook, for nations, learning from received the Johannes Cover Photo example, then she will apply learning strategy A. multiple representations Wildt Junior Researchers’ Svenja Kirsch Since Lisa has set these intentions beforehand (multimedia learning), Award for research on Advertisements with the help of the training platform, it’s easier learning by writing/journal higher education teaching Gregor Kroschel for her to actually apply the learning strategies in writing, and the pedagogi- and learning from the Phone: +49 (0)761 203-4986 cal and psychological Deutsche Gesellschaft für [email protected] daily life. knowledge of teachers. Hochschuldidaktik (dghd). Printing and Production Hofmann Druck, Emmendingen The online training platform ELIS has been available to all students at the Institute of Psy- uni’wissen is printed climate neutrally on 100-percent recycled paper. The paper is certifi ed chology since February 2017. “It currently serves Photos: Thomas Kunz with the “Blue Angel” environmental seal. a dual function. We are now at the point where Distribution we can already offer it to the students as a fully Offi ce of Public Relations functional tool, but we’re still testing in the back- Further Reading ground whether everything works right and Yearly Subscription Price 6 euros whether we can improve any of the content,” Endres, T. / Leber, J. / Renkl, A. (2017): Erfolgreich Lernen im Studium – uni’wissen is available free of charge says Jasmin Leber. “In the long term we envision ein adaptives Online-Lernstrategietraining für Studienanfänger for members of the university.

that it might also be used at other faculties.” (manuscript submitted for publication). ISSN 2194-8054

© Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg. All rights reserved. www.elis.vm.uni-freiburg.de Glogger, I. / Schwonke, R. / Holzäpfel, L. et al. (2012): Learning strategies Reproduction, also of excerpts, is only authorized with per- assessed by journal writing: prediction of learning outcomes by quantity, mission from the editors. Articles indicating the author’s quality, and combinations of learning strategies. In: Journal of Educational name do not necessarily refl ect the opinions of the publisher Psychology 104/2, pp. 452. or the editors. The editors reserve the right to edit or abridge articles sent in by external contributors.

Mandl, H. / Friedrich, H. F. (Eds.) (2006): Handbuch Lernstrategien. uni’wissen is available online at www.wissen.uni-freiburg.de Göttingen. 54 uni wissen 01 2017

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that it might also be used at other faculties.” (manuscript submitted for publication). ISSN 2194-8054

Mandl, H. / Friedrich, H. F. (Eds.) (2006): Handbuch Lernstrategien. uni’wissen is available online at www.wissen.uni-freiburg.de Göttingen. Presse- und Öffentlichkeitsarbeit Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Fahnenbergplatz, 79098 Freiburg Telefon 0761/203-4301 Fax 0761/203-4278 E-Mail [email protected] www.wissen.uni-freiburg.de

Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg