Schellnhuber, Hans Joachim

Prof. Hans Joachim Schellnhuber has been Director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK) since he founded the institute in 1992. He holds a Chair in Theoretical Physics at Potsdam University and is an External Professor at the Santa Fe Institute (USA). Currently he serves as Co-Chair of the German Advisory Council on Global Change (WBGU) and Governing Board Chair of the Climate-KIC of the European Institute of Innovation and Technology (EIT).

Schellnhuber has been appointed to a number of prestigious academies such as the Pontifical Academy of Sciences, the US National Academy of Sciences (NAS), the Academia Europaea, the German Academy of Sciences (Leopoldina), and the Max Planck Society. He has been a long-standing member of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and has served as principal advisor to top policy-makers like Angela Merkel, Chancellor of Germany, and José Manuel Barroso, former President of the European Commission, and Pope Francis in the context of his Encyclical Laudato Si.

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