New DFG research group  [14.12.23]

Whether one looks at long-term climate forecasts or the prediction of storms, drought, and heavy rainfall – the interaction between land and atmosphere plays a major role. The German Research Foundation (DFG) is setting up the “Land-Atmosphere Feedback Initiative (LAFI)” research group on this topic at the University of Hohenheim. The DFG research group’s designated spokesperson is Prof. Dr. Volker Wulfmeyer from the Institute of Physics and Meteorology.

In Earth system research, it is crucial that the interactions between land and atmosphere are precisely understood. Among other things, the information is crucial for improving the prediction of extreme events and simulations of climate models.

LAFI therefore wants to find out more about feedback effects in the land-atmosphere system and the underlying processes. “For many years, we have been researching to gain a better understanding and more precise observations of wind, temperature, and humidity fields in the lower atmospheric layers,” said Wulfmeyer, weather and climate researcher and designated spokesperson for the DFG research group. “Predicting whether or when a drought will occur depends to a large extent on how well the model can simulate these complex fields.” However, current models still have deficits in that regard.

Two research groups at the University of Hohenheim are involved in the DFG research group – in addition to the Institute of Physics and Meteorology, the Department of Biogeophysics under the director of Prof. Dr. Thilo Streck – and they have teamed up with other organizations such as the Universities of Augsburg, Bayreuth and Tübingen, the Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität (LMU) in Munich, and the TU Dresden, the DLR in Oberpfaffenhofen, the Lindenberg Meteorological Observatory – Richard Aßmann Observatory of the German Weather Service (DWD), the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT - Campus Alpin, Garmisch-Partenkirchen), and the Leibniz Center for Agricultural Landscape Research (ZALF). They are also working with the Luxembourg Institutes of Science and Technology (LIST).

The DFG funding is provided jointly with Luxembourg’s Fonds National de la Recherche (FNR), and the funding amount is around 4.5 million euros for the German partners.

The DFG is setting up a total of four new research groups. Together they will receive around 19.4 million euros. This was announced by the DFG on 8 December 2023. DFG research groups enable scientists to address current and pressing issues in their fields and establish innovative research directions. They are funded for up to eight years. In total, the DFG currently funds 189 research groups, twelve clinical research groups, and 16 centres for advanced studies in humanities and social sciences.

Text: Elsner