The Junge Akademie has admitted ten new members during a festive event last weekend. The Psychologist Dr. Jakub Limanowski from the Technische Universität Dresden is one of them. With his membership, the Freigeist Fellow wants to actively shape the German research landscape. He sees particularly great potential in the interdisciplinary cooperation between the members, which shall enable the application of scientific insights to contemporary societal problems.

On June 4, ten young scientists from various disciplines were inducted into the Junge Akademie. The Junge Akademie now offers them the opportunity to work on joint projects and formats at the interface of science, art and society for five years, and to contribute their ideas for shaping the science system.

Dr. Jakub Limansowksi, Junior Research Group Leader at the Faculty of Psychology and the Cluster of Excellence Centre for Tactile Internet with Human-in-the-Loop (CeTI) at Technische Universität Dresden, is one of the ten new members and is very much looking forward to the opportunities that Junge Akademie offers him: "It is a unique opportunity to actively help shape the German research landscape and the international representation of young German scientists. I am particularly attracted by the cross-disciplinary dialogue with committed young scientists from other disciplines and artists.”

In his research at TU Dresden, Jakub Limanowski focuses on describing and explaining the neurocognitive mechanisms underlying human embodied self-experience. In particular, he is concerned on how strongly and how long the use of "alternative" or augmented body models for interaction, such as avatars in virtual realities or robotic body augmentations,  changes the perception of one's own body and the underlying neural representations in the brain. In addition to gaining fundamental knowledge about human cognition, with his work, he wants to contribute to making these novel scenarios, such as virtual realities, metaverses, and human-machine interactions  more intuitive and safe. He also wants to pursue this approach in the Junge Akademie: "I would like to establish an interdisciplinary working group on this; where I would also like to make corresponding interactive scenarios tangible and accessible in workshops as well as in public exhibitions and experiments. I see significant challenges to the human "embodied" sense of self in some current technological developments, such as virtual reality and human-machine interactions. Although neuroscientific experiments can make a very significant contribution to answering this question, it also raises some classical philosophical issues, such as the stability of the "self". Artistic, creative approaches can also open up new ways of experiencing the (positive and/or problematic) effects of the respective technological developments "on one's own body.""

About the Junge Akademie
The Junge Akademie is the world's first academy for young scientists. Its aim is to give young scientists and artists the opportunity, alongside their own research, to actively and creatively shape the dialogue at the interface of science, art and society. Prerequisite for membership is an outstanding doctorate or an outstanding artistic qualification work and at least one other excellent scientific work or artistic profile.
For more information on the Junge Akademie, visit http://www.diejungeakademie.de/

Media inquiries:
Dr. Jakub Limanowski
Freigeist Fellow
CeTI - Cluster of Excellence