Leibniz Laureates

The Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Awards presented every year to ten pre-eminent German scientists and scholars by the German Research Foundation (DFG) are sometimes called the "German Nobel Prizes," for no other science award in the Federal Republic is endowed with comparable amounts of money. Laureates may receive up to 2.5 million euro.

2009: Professor Holger Braunschweig, Chemistry

The expert on Anorganic Chemistry works in the fields of Metallic and Elemental Chemistry. He focuses on investigating transition metal complexes with boron-centered ligands. His studies, in which he literally "tamed" the element of boron by compounding it with metals, are considered groundbreaking achievements. In this way, his team has created new molecules and given them new properties. It is expected that these new molecules will significantly influence catalysis and the Materials Sciences.

2006: Professor Thomas Mussweiler, Psychology

The social psychologist addresses the question as to the role played by comparison processes in judgments and decisions. His studies are of high importance for psychological decision research, while also possessing economic relevance. Mussweiler worked at the University of Würzburg from 1995 to 2004, then moving on to become Professor of Social Psychology and Differential Psychology at the University of Cologne. He received the Leibniz Award essentially for his studies at Würzburg.

2001: Professor Ulrich Konrad, Musicology

Ulrich Konrad has held the Chair for Musicology at the University of Würzburg since 1998. According to the DFG, his studies are informed by the wide range of his interests: "As a Mozart scholar, who achieved a fresh reconstruction of Mozart's approach to his work on the basis of more than 300 musical sketches, he has made a name for himself all over the world. Additionally, he is a dedicated student of composers and compositions of the 19th century." In the field of Recent Music History, his subjects of interest include Richard Strauß, Franz Schmidt, and Alban Berg.

1999: Professor Martin Lohse, Pharmacology

Lohse, who has held the Chair for Pharmacology and Toxicology at the University of Würzburg since 1993, studies receptors for hormones and vectors of the nervous system. These receptors recognize and bind messenger substances and trigger reactions in the cell. With their aid, for instance, adrenaline accelerates the heartbeat, or insulin increases sugar absorption. Receptors also are a preferred point of application for medicinal drugs.

1990: Professor Bert Hölldobler, Zoology

The expert on the sociobiology of insects has published groundbreaking studies, particularly on the social behavior and the ethoecology of ants. He investigates the social life of these animals both in natural ecosystems and in laboratory experiments. In 1969, Hölldobler went to Harvard University, where he and his colleague Edward O. Wilson wrote the textbook "The Ants," which earned them the Pulitzer Prize in 1991. In 1989, he returned to the University of Würzburg and held the Chair of Zoology II until 2004.

1990: Professor Ingrid Grummt, Biochemistry

Professor Grummt moved from Würzburg University to the German Cancer Research Center, Department of Molecular Biology of the Cell.

1987: Professor Hans-Peter Zenner, Ear, Nose, and Throat Medicine

Zenner accepted an appointment to the Chair of ENT Medicine at the University of Tübingen.

1986: Professor Otto Ludwig Lange, Botany/Ecology

Professor emeritus today, Lange held the Chair of Botany II of the University of Würzburg from 1963 until his retirement in 1992. He is one of the founding fathers of Phytophysiological Ecology. His main field of study is the ecophysiology of lichens, cyanobacteria, algae, and mosses.

1986: Professor Ulrich Heber, Botany/Physiology

Heber was Professor of Botany at the University of Würzburg from 1971 up to his retirement in 1996. His major fields of investigation included the biochemistry of stress in plants (freezing resistance, water balance, air pollutants, such as sulfur dioxide or ozone).