Life Time Achievement Award for Roland Müller
Sharing knowledge is a pleasure for Roland Müller. Here he explains to his granddaughter how BESSY II works. © Privat
Accelerator and control systems expert Roland Müller received the ICALEPCS Lifetime Achievement Award. In the more than thirty years of his career at BESSY, the physicist has advanced many projects on control systems at accelerators and has been particularly committed to the international exchange of knowledge.
At this year’s "International Conference on Accelerator and Large Experimental Physics Control Systems" (ICALEPCS) in Shanghai, Roland Müller (HZB) and Andy Götz (ESRF) were jointly honored for their lifetime achievements. The ICALEPCS Lifetime Achievement Award recognizes individuals who have both made significant contributions to their field of expertise and influenced the international practice of control systems development through vision and leadership. This honor is awarded only irregularly, most recently in 2019, and is therefore a special distinction.
Over the past thirty years, Roland Müller and Andy Götz have not only led many important projects in the field of control systems to success at their own research facilities, but have also advanced the exchange in the professional community for control and operation of large physics experiments, i.e. telescopes, fusion research facilities, detectors, and especially accelerators. Thus, through great dedication and organizational skills, they have helped to build ICALEPCS into the landmark conference for control systems at large-scale research facilities.
In his acceptance speech, Müller addressed current demands on research that move him and Andy Götz, in particular the responsibility of science towards society. In consequence acquisition and storage of scientific data must be done according to FAIR principles. Data need to be Findable, Accessible, Interoperable and Repurposable. “Only sharing acquired data allows to look for results, nobody thought about at the moment the experiment was performed. The goal is a truly sustainable exploitation. It will add new scientific values. The rapid progress in fighting the Corona virus gave a glimpse into what can be achieved with a large pool of FAIR data. I am curious to see this evolve.”
Roland Müller has worked at the Berlin electron storage rings BESSY and MLS in the field of control systems since receiving his doctorate in 1988 and has held leading positions in machine operation. He retired in 2019, but continues to contribute his expertise: he is currently working on a digitization concept for BESSY III.
- Helmholtz Doctoral Award for Hanna TrzesniowskiDuring her doctoral studies at the Helmholtz Centre Berlin, Hanna Trzesniowski conducted research on nickel-based electrocatalysts for water splitting. Her work contributes to a deeper understanding of alkaline water electrolysis and paves the way for the development of more efficient and stable catalysts. On 8 July 2025, she received the Helmholtz Doctoral Prize, which honours the best and most original doctoral theses in the Helmholtz Association.
- New department at HZB: ‘AI and Biomolecular Structures’Since 1 July 2025, Dr. Andrea Thorn has been setting up the new AI and Biomolecular Structures department at HZB. A biophysicist with many years of experience in AI-based tools for structural biology, she is looking forward to collaborating closely with the macromolecular crystallography team at the MX beamlines of BESSY II.
- Almost 4,000 People at the Long Night of the Sciences at HZBHelmholtz-Zentrum Berlin was delighted to welcome nearly 4,000 visitors to its Adlershof campus for the Long Night of the Sciences. It was a fantastic celebration of science, and we thank all our guests for their great interest.