Thinking Discursively

It is not only due to our name that we agree with the founder of the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, Abraham Flexner, who wrote in 1930: "A university, like all other human institutions (…) is not outside, but inside the general social fabric of a given era. It is not something apart, something historic, something that yields as little as possible to forces and influences that are more or less new. It is on the contrary (…) an expression of the age, as well as an influence operating upon both present and future."

For us, "university" also means more than the sum of its various research branches. Our aim is to bring together scholars from a wide range of disciplines and national contexts, on the one hand to foster cooperation, but also to discuss issues of general interest. Science cannot and should not reside and operate outside the realm of public discourse.

Search for Meaning

No less than the meaning of life is the focus of the lecture series, which is a product of the CAS Research Focus of the same name (led by Claudia Bausewein, Nikolaos Koutsouleris and Christof Rapp). The series begins with a conversation with Nobel laureate Paul Nurse (London) on the question "What is Life?". Other aspects of this expansive question will be discussed by scholars including Abigail Marsh (Georgetown), and Michael F. Steger (Colorado State).

17 April 2026, 4.15 p.m.
Prof. Paul Nurse, Ph.D. (London), Prof. Dr. Christof Rapp (LMU): What is Life? Perspectives from Biology and Philosophy
(LMU Main Building, Room: A140)

Exploring Interdisciplinarity

Space
Space missions have an astonishingly large influence on the development of technology and research on Earth. In this context, Munich, the Munich universities, and LMU in particular, play a strategically important role. The new CAS Research Focus opens with a fulminant panel discussion, bringing together former astronaut Thomas Reiter, the President of the Bundeswehr University Eva-Maria Kern, and the Managing Director of the Aerospace Network Munich Andreas Lermann with the Research Focus spokespersons Heiner Igel and Alexander Choukér.

21 May 2026, 7 p.m.
Panel discussion Mission Space: Luxury or Necessity?

Narrations
Our ideas of illness and medical care are strongly influenced by stories. Narrative structure plays a central role from diagnosis all the way to cultural communication through novels (The Magic Mountain), films (Rain Man), or series (ER). The new Research Focus "Narrations of Medicine" addresses the question of how such narratives operate from a transdisciplinary perspective (led by Martin Fischer (University Hospital, LMU), Mike Rüb (Charité/LMU), Berenika Szymanski-Düll (LMU)).

Stress
Cells are under constant stress: DNA and RNA are continually exposed to internal and external pressures that threaten their function and the stability of the genome. Sophisticated control and repair systems counteract this and ensure the precision of gene expression. The Research Focus Group (led by Roland Beckmann (LMU) and Rachel Green (CAS Fellow/Johns Hopkins University)) is united by its interest in such processes in order to gain new insights into the regulation of cellular stress responses and their consequences.

One Planet – Many Questions

CAS is once again hosting a science slam: six researchers will compete against one another, presenting their work in a comprehensible and engaging way, including a healthy portion of entertainment. The topics are as diverse as the people behind them – from the health of our planet and unusual research subjects to surprising discoveries and the all-encompassing questions of our time. Whether on stage or in the audience: join in, get caught up in the excitement, and cheer on your favorite!

17 June 2026, 7 p.m.
CAS Science Slam: One Planet – Many Questions
(LMU Main Building)

Securing Results

In the summer semester, the work of both CAS Research Groups will enter the final phase of the research year. They will hold their major concluding conferences, present their results, and publish their findings.

11 and 12 June 2026
Femicide in Premodern History. Current Research Trends and Debates
Concluding Conference of the CAS Research Group, led by Julia Burkhardt

29 June to 3 July 2026
Motifs and Motives
Concluding Conference of the CAS Research Group, led by Nikita Geldhauser

Expanding Networks

About 50 Fellows will be working at CAS this summer. It is not only the two Research Groups that are in close contact with their international members, but also the Research Focuses have invited renowned scholars to Munich: Shahar Mendelson (Texas A&M University) is a Fellow in the Research Focus “Medical Data Processing” and Stephen Sitch (Exeter) in the Research Focus “Planetary Health”.

Short-Term Fellows coming to Munich include the Nietzsche specialist Babette Babich (Fordham), the chemist Suhrit Ghosh (Kolkata), and the economist Garima Sharma (American University).

Transnational cooperation

CAS Fellow Elizabeth Kattner of Oakland University and Mariama Diagne, Professor of Dance Studies and member of the CAS Young Center, are working together on representations and stagings of mermaids between German fairytales, European water myths and transnational rituals along the transatlantic coast.

Concentrated Research

Four postdocs will be conducting research at CAS this summer: Valeria Burdea (Economics) is investigating how people form mental models of complex causal relationships. Giuseppe Casalicchio (Statistics) is working on interpretable machine learning. Maurice Fürstenberg (Linguistics) is examining the impact of AI-generated feedback on the writing processes of school pupils. The historian Brendan Röder is conducting research on preventative practices in urban risk management.

Read the latest news

The CAS blog provides access to results from the various support programs. Particularly relevant are the articles by Cornelia Vossen on curatorial practice and by Gertrude Lübbe-Wolff on the opportunities and problems presented by dismantling bureaucracy.

Click on Science

Many brilliant lectures are held at CAS. To keep these accessible to a wider audience and for a longer period of time, many of the events are available on YouTube and Apple Podcasts.

We definitely recommend listening to:
Menno Schilthuizen/Kärin Nickelsen/Axel Imhof: The Speciation Puzzle

Olaf Probst: KATASTROPHÄE IX + hi s stoeryies

In his artistic work, Olaf Probst explores the relationship between language, writing, text, and pictorial form. Using the motif of the mushroom cloud, he demonstrates how images become texts and texts become images. Olaf Probst studied at the State Academy of Fine Arts Stuttgart with Rudolf Schoofs, Sotirios Michou, and Jürgen Brodwolf. He lives and works in Munich.

15 April 2026, 7 p.m.
Vernissage
Introduction: Prof. Dr. Juliane Prade-Weiss (Comparative Literature Studies, LMU)