TU Berlin appoints Renske van der Veen as professor

Dr. Renske van der Veen investigates catalytic processes at BESSY II, which are crucial for the production of green hydrogen, among other things.

Dr. Renske van der Veen investigates catalytic processes at BESSY II, which are crucial for the production of green hydrogen, among other things. © M: Setzpfandt/HZB

For the past two years, Dr Renske van der Veen has led a research group in time-resolved X-ray spectroscopy and electron microscopy at HZB. Her research focuses on catalytic processes that enable, for example, the production of green hydrogen. She has now been appointed to a S-W2 professorship at the Institute of Optics and Atomic Physics (IOAP) at the Technische Universität Berlin.

 

Dr Renske van der Veen specialises in ultrafast X-ray methods, which she uses at BESSY II to study the fast processes involved in catalysis. Van der Veen is also contributing her expertise to the scientific requirements profile for the successor X-ray source BESSY III.

Renske van der Veen studied at the ETH Zurich and completed her PhD at the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL). She went on to do research at the California Institute of Technology, the Max Planck Institute for Biophysical Chemistry in Göttingen and the University of Illinois, where she was also an assistant professor. She has received the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation's Sofja Kovalevskaja Award and the Packard Fellowship for Science and Engineering.

arö

  • Copy link

You might also be interested in

  • A New Era in Catalysis: ASCEND Launch in Berlin, €30 Million in Funding
    News
    12.06.2026
    A New Era in Catalysis: ASCEND Launch in Berlin, €30 Million in Funding
    On 11 June 2026, the Helmholtz-Zentrum Berlin (HZB) in Adlershof hosted the launch of ASCEND (Accelerated Solutions for Catalysis using Emerging Nanotechnology and Digital Innovation). The event took place in the presence of the Minister of Research, Dorothee Bär, President of the Helmholtz Association, Prof. Dr. Martin Keller, and President of the Max Planck Society, Prof. Dr. Patrick Cramer. Bringing together leading partners from industry and research, ASCEND is supported by BMFTR with €30 million in funding and officially started on 1 April 2026. The initiative aims to accelerate the discovery of next-generation catalysts and enable more sustainable chemical processes.
  • Magnon momentum microscopy: A new window into nanoscale spin-waves
    Science Highlight
    08.06.2026
    Magnon momentum microscopy: A new window into nanoscale spin-waves
    An international team lead by the Max Born Institute has developed a new type of momentum microscopy to image magnons — the quanta of collectively excited spins — directly in two-dimensional reciprocal space using soft X-rays. Measurements have taken place at BESSY II and PETRA III, first author ist the HZB physicist Steffen Wittrock. Owing to its remarkable sensitivity, simplicity, and access to nanometer-scale wavelengths, this novel technique establishes a powerful and versatile platform for exploring nonlinear magnon interactions, which are promising for future computing schemes.
  • AI agents deliver results – but do they reason scientifically?
    News
    01.06.2026
    AI agents deliver results – but do they reason scientifically?
    A research team co-led by Kevin Maik Jablonka from the Helmholtz Institute for Polymers in Energy Applications Jena (HIPOLE Jena) and N. M. Anoop Krishnan from the Indian Institute of Technology Delhi has developed Corral, a new benchmark for AI agents in science. The preprint “AI scientists produce results without reasoning scientifically” has been published on arXiv (https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2604.18805). The analysis shows that current systems can execute scientific workflows and deliver results; however, they often do not follow the basic principles of scientific testing and reasoning.