Function and Responsibilities:

GFZ-Director for Topic 2 "Oceans and Cryosphere in Climate Change"
Head of Research Group "Dynamics of Atmosphere and Hydrosphere"

Research Interests:

• High-frequency mass transport processes in atmosphere, oceans, and the continental hydrosphere
• Numerical simulations of mass variability phenomena, in particular in relation to the ocean general circulation
• Atmospheric tides and their oceanic response
• Identification and separation of geophysical signals in observations from various geodetic techniques
  
• Atmosphere-ocean background modelling for the satellite gravimetry missions GRACE and GRACE-FO
• Scientific requirements on future satellite gravimetry missions
  

Career:

• Since 2024: GFZ-Director for Topic 2 "Oceans and Cryosphere in Climate Change"
  
• Since 2012: Head of research group "Dynamics of Atmosphere and Hydrosphere"
  
• Since 2007: Research Scientist, GFZ Potsdam, Section 1.3: Earth System Modelling
• 2003–2007: Research Scientist, TU Dresden, Institute for Planetary Geodesy
• 2007: Ph.D. (Dr.-Ing.), TU Dresden, "Modelling of High-Frequency Ocean Dynamics for the Correction and Interpretation of Geodetic Satellite Data", doi:10.2312/GFZ.b103-07103
• 2003: Diploma (Dipl.-Ing.) in Geodesy, TU Dresden, "Combined Use of Recent Altimetry and Gravimetry Satellite Data for Oceanographic Applications"

Projects:

• Project "GRACE-FO in the Third Party Mission Program: Science Phase" funded by the European Space Agency (ESA), 2021 -- 2023
• Collaborative Research Cluster "Relativistic and Quantum-based Geodesy" funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG), sub-project "Atmosphere-Ocean Background Modelling for Terrestrial Gravimetry", 2021 -- 2024
• Project "Disentangling Climate Signals in Earth Orientation Parameters" funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG), 2021 -- 2023
  
• Research Group "New Refined Observations of Climate Change from Spaceborne Gravity Missions" funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG), sub-project "Next-Generation Atmosphere and Ocean De-aliasing Model", 2020 -- 2025
  
• Project "Independent Generation of Earth Orientation Parameters" funded by the European Space Agency (ESA), 2017 -- 2020
  
• Project "Atmosphere-Induced Short Period Variations of Earth Rotation" jointly funded by the Austrian Research Council (FWF) and the German Research Foundation (DFG), 2015 -- 2018
  
• Project "Updating ESA's Earth System Model for Gravity Mission Simulation Studies" funded by the European Space Agency (ESA), 2013 -- 2015
• Coordinated Project "Realisation of the GRACE-FO Satellite Mission" funded by the German Ministry for Education and Research (BMBF), sub-project "De-Aliasing of Atmosphere and Ocean Mass Variability", 2013 -- 2015
• Research Programme "Decadal Climate Predictions" funded by the German Ministry for Education and Research (BMBF), sub-project "Geodetic Satellite Observations for Climate Model Validation", 2011 -- 2015
• Priority Programme "Mass Transport and Distribution in the Earth System" funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG), sub-project "Improved Modelling of Non-Tidal Mass Variations for Optimized Gravity Field Analysis", 2011 -- 2013

Research Boards and Committees:

• Member of the GRACE/GRACE-FO Science Data System (since 2007)
• Co-Chair Joint Working Group "Climate Signals in Earth Orientation Parameters" of the International Association of Geodesy (IAG; since 2020)
• Co-Chair Working Group "2nd Earth Orientation Parameter Prediction Comparison Campaign" of the International Earth Rotation and Reference Systems Service (IERS; since 2021)
• Member of GFZ's Internal Scientific Council (since 2020)
  

Awards:

• 2007: Bernd Rendel Prize, awarded by German Research Foundation (DFG)