The Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Foundation) has a new Vice President: at its session on Wednesday, 2 July 2025, during the DFG’s annual meeting in Hamburg, the General Assembly elected economist Professor Dr. Caren Sureth-Sloane to the Executive Committee of Germany’s largest research funding organisation and central self-governing body for science and the humanities. Alongside the newly elected Vice President, physicist Professor Dr. Karin Jacobs and chemist Professor Dr. Peter H. Seeberger were confirmed for a second term in office. Sociologist Professor Dr. Matthias Koenig is stepping down from the Executive Committee.
Caren Sureth-Sloane is Professor of Business Administration, with a focus on business tax theory, at Paderborn University. Her research explores the effects of taxation on entrepreneurial decision-making, especially in the context of risky investments, as well as international corporate taxation and the causes and consequences of tax complexity and transparency. Sureth-Sloane served as a member of the DFG’s Economics review board from 2020 to 2021 and has been a member of the DFG Senate since 2021. Following her election to the Executive Committee, she will step down from the Senate at the end of the year. From 2020 to 2023, she was also a member of the DFG’s Interdisciplinary Commission for Pandemic Research. Sureth-Sloane additionally serves as spokesperson for the CRC/Transregio “Accounting for Transparency”. She is the recipient of numerous awards and has received honorary doctorates from the universities of Graz and Bremen in 2021 and 2022.
The re-elected Vice President Karin Jacobs heads the Chair of Experimental Physics at Saarland University. From 2006 to 2012, she was a member of the DFG’s Senate Committee on Collaborative Research Centres, and from 2016, she served for several years on the German Science and Humanities Council (Wissenschaftsrat, WR), where she chaired the Evaluation Committee. From 2017 until the start of her DFG vice-presidency, she was also a member of the Committee of Experts for the Excellence Strategy. In her first term as DFG Vice President, which began in 2021, Jacobs championed researchers in early career phases and was active in the Presidential Working Group on Sustainability and the Senate Ad Hoc Working Group on the Digital Turn.
Re-elected Vice President Peter H. Seeberger has served since 2009 as Director of the Max Planck Institute of Colloids and Interfaces in Potsdam and as Professor at the Freie Universität Berlin. He is also the founding director of the Center for the Transformation of Chemistry in Delitzsch and Merseburg – a new major research centre that aims to drive the transformation of the chemical industry towards a circular economy. During his first term as Vice President, Seeberger chaired the selection committee for the Heinz Maier-Leibnitz Prizes. He also chaired the committee for the German-Israeli Project Cooperation programme and represented the Executive Committee on the Audit Committee.
After the elections, DFG President Professor Dr. Katja Becker bid farewell to outgoing Vice President Matthias Koenig, who chose not to stand for re-election and will step down from the Executive Committee at the end of the year. A professor of macrosociology at the Max Weber Institute of Sociology, Heidelberg University, Koenig played a key role during his term (2021–2025) as a member of the Science Europe Governing Board in shaping European science policy in line with the DFG’s mission. Among other contributions, he worked to improve research assessment, particularly within the Coalition for Advancing Research Assessment (CoARA), where he also served as a member of the Steering Board. In addition, he established close ties between the DFG and countries in sub-Saharan Africa, holding numerous bilateral talks on the ground with representatives of partner organisations, particularly in Francophone African states.
In addition to DFG President Katja Becker, newly elected Vice President Caren Sureth-Sloane, and re-elected Vice Presidents Karin Jacobs and Peter H. Seeberger, the members of the DFG Executive Committee are: legal scholar Professor Dr. Marietta Auer, molecular biologist Professor Dr. Axel A. Brakhage, art historian Professor Dr. Johannes Grave, engineering scientist Professor Dr.-Ing. Hans Hasse, computer scientist Professor Dr. Kerstin Schill and medical researcher Professor Dr. Britta Siegmund. The President of Stifterverband is a member of the Executive Committee in an advisory capacity by virtue of their office. DFG Secretary General Dr. Heide Ahrens likewise participates in the meetings of the Executive Committee in an advisory capacity.
The Vice Presidents are elected by the General Assembly for a maximum of two terms of office of four years each. They stand in for the President if she is unable to fulfil her duties. In addition, they are guest attendees at the meetings of the Senate and of the Joint Committee, the former being the DFG’s highest scientific body and the latter its central decision-making body.