“Completely speechless” - that was Professor Angkana Rüland's reaction when she received the call from the DFG informing her that she had been awarded the Leibniz Prize. “I had only just walked through the door into my office when the phone rang, and it was the DFG,” says the mathematician, who is also a member of the Transdisciplinary Research Area “Modelling” at the University of Bonn. Angkana Rüland would like to use the prize money to further develop her research group. ‘The research environment here in Bonn is already excellent. The Leibniz Prize will strengthen this immensely.’
In her research on microstructures, she is particularly interested in a class of alloys that have shape-memory properties. This means that, for example, a severely bent paper clip made of such a material will return to its original state, as if by magic, when it is heated up. The secret lies in special lattice structures that are combined in different ways, just like individual building blocks, and thus influence the material’s behavior. “This opens up many highly fascinating and challenging questions from a mathematical perspective.”
The mathematician also studies what is known as inverse problems, which are about reconstructing information from indirect measurements - such as is done with X-ray tomography or ultrasound scans, for instance. “This indirect information lets you infer information on someone’s body without having to take any tissue samples,” Angkana Rüland explains. Phenomena like this can also be found in nature, such as in the ultrasound echolocation of bats. “My research is primarily concerned with a specific class of these problems, the so-called Calderón problem, and nonlocal versions of it.
Making her way to the University of Bonn
Angkana Rüland is an alumna of the University of Bonn and took part in the mathematics branch of its “Fördern, Fordern, Forschen” (FFF) early studies program while she was still in highschool. After obtaining her Abitur, she continued her mathematics studies at the University of Bonn and helped to set up the Bonn Math Club for 13- to 16-year-olds. She completed her doctorate under Professor Herbert Koch at the Mathematical Institute in 2014, being awarded the “Hausdorff Memorial Prize” for the best doctoral thesis in mathematics.
Angkana Rüland then moved to the University of Oxford to work as a postdoctoral researcher, before being named head of a research group at the Max Planck Institute for Mathematics in the Sciences in Leipzig in 2017. She was appointed as a W3 professor at Heidelberg University in 2020. 2023 saw her return to Bonn, where she is enhancing what is already an outstanding group of top-level researchers at the Hausdorff Center for Mathematics as holder of a Hausdorff Chair.
Congratulations from the Rector
‘On behalf of the University of Bonn, a University of Excellence, I would like to congratulate Angkana Rüland on receiving one of the world's most prestigious academic awards,’ says Rector Prof. Dr. Dr. h.c. Michael Hoch. ‘Since her school days, Angkana Rüland has been closely associated with Mathematics at Bonn, which ranks among the best in the world. Having completed her studies and then a doctorate in Bonn and working at Oxford, Leipzig and Heidelberg, in 2023 we succeeded in recruiting her back for appointment to a Hausdorff Chair of our Cluster of Excellence HCM. There she is making pioneering contributions at an interface point between Mathematics, Physics and Engineering. Winning the Leibniz Prize represents another outstanding success, and above all extraordinary recognition for her cutting-edge research.’
20 Leibniz Prizes at the University of Bonn
Prof. Rüland's award is already the ninth Leibniz Prize for mathematicians from the Hausdorff Center for Mathematics; Prof. Catharina Stroppel received the prize as recently as in 2023. The University of Bonn now has a total of 20 Leibniz Prize winners among its faculty, making it the university with second most award winners in Germany since the prize was established in 1986.
In addition to Prof. Angkana Rüland, this year the DFG is honoring three other female scientists and six male scientists with the Leibniz Prize. The aim of the program is to expand the opportunities available to top researchers, relieve them of administrative duties and make it easier for them to employ particularly qualified early career researchers. The award is endowed with 2.5 million euros. The Leibniz Prizes will be presented on 19 March 2025 in Berlin.
