The University of Bonn has once again appointed an outstanding Schlegel Chair. Lawyer Prof. Dr. Dr. h.c. Birke Häcker came from the University of Oxford, where she headed the Institute of European and Comparative Law. She will establish new research fields and generate fresh impulses at the University of Bonn. Her main areas of expertise are core private law and comparative law with a special focus on the English common law. However, she is also particularly interested in the interfaces between private law and commercial and business law, tax law, as well as public law. She views herself as a bridge builder between the disciplines and the legal cultures in various different jurisdictions.

How can we make the formation of knowledge in museums and cultural heritage more sustainable and equitable? As the new Argelander Professor at the University of Bonn, Jun-Prof. Dr. Julia Binter is not only carrying out research into cultural, political and economic entanglements past and present but also seeking to reshape them in collaborative film and exhibition projects. In the transdisciplinary research area “Present Pasts,” the social and cultural anthropologist is currently co-leading the collaborative research, curation and restitution project “Confronting Colonial Pasts, Envisioning Creative Futures” for collections from Namibia together with research partners from Germany and Namibia.

Human-robot interaction and sustainable artificial intelligence (AI) will be the topics of discussion on Thursday, November 9th at an event organized jointly by the University of Bonn Institute for Science and Ethics (IWE) and the Women in AI and Robotics network. The event date marks the start of partnership between the two organizations, and is aimed at recruiting new members interested in joining Women in AI & Robotics. Held in English, the event will be held in the foyer of the IWE with address Bonner Talweg 57, from 5:00 to 7:00 pm. All interested parties are invited to attend.

Prominent ranking list providers Times Higher Education (THE) and Shanghai just recently published their annual subject rankings, in which the University of Bonn performed very well in numerous subjects. These international rankings are an indicator of performance in specific academic fields in global competition.

The Rector of the University of Bonn, Professor Michael Hoch, has been named as “Rector of the Decade” by the German Association of University Professors and Lecturers (DHV). The award was bestowed at the DHV office in Bonn.

Mature spermatozoa are characterized by an head, midpiece and a long tail for locomotion. Now, researchers from the University Hospital Bonn (UKB) and the Transdisciplinary Research Area "Life & Health" at the University of Bonn have found that a loss of the structural protein ACTL7B blocks spermatogenesis in male mice. The cells can no longer develop their characteristic shape and remain in a rather round form. The animals are infertile. The results of the study have now been published in the scientific journal "Development".

89th position in the THE ranking worldwide. 76th in the Shanghai ranking, fourth place in Germany. All in all, the University of Bonn achieved the best ranking results in its history in 2022. These outstanding achievements and numerous other awards, accolades and academic successes bestowed on Bonn researchers and teachers, are presented in the Annual Report of the Rectorate for the year 2022, which has now been published.

Scrape, cluck, lay eggs - that's it? Anyone involved in chicken farming knows that the animals are capable of much more. Researchers at the Universities of Bonn and Bochum, working with the MSH Medical School Hamburg, have observed clues that roosters might be able to identify themselves in a mirror. Furthermore, the setup of the experiment matters in whether the behavior actually occurs or not - an insight that could well be of significance for other animals species too. The study has now been published in the journal PLOS ONE.