Newsroom

Interview 08 June 2020

How the corona crisis reveals the balance of power in medicine

Freigeist Fellow Dr. Tine Hanrieder talks about how the pandemic is impacting on her research – and what she would like to see happen for people working on the front lines of global health care.

Story 02 June 2020

When the black box talks to us

Thanks to increasingly sophisticated voice control, communication between man and machine is making great strides. Will the dialog with intelligent systems change our society?

Story 11 May 2020

How do children learn to speak?

The linguist Birgit Hellwig is researching the language acquisition of small children – on the example of Qaqet, an endangered language in Papua New Guinea.

Interview 05 May 2020

Global Issues

New impetus for the Volkswagen Foundation’s international funding: Interview with Dr. Adelheid Wessler, head of the 'International' funding team, on the 'Global Issues' program.

News 30 April 2020

Empowering citizens to become AI co-designers

Dr. Diana Serbanescu believes that theater and artistic practices help to engage the public in a promising dialog with research and technology.

News 14 April 2020

"explore" - the Volkswagen Foundation and its international focus  

In its new English-language brochure "explore", the Volkswagen Foundation provides information on how it understands its task of supporting  research and higher education – in Germany and all over the world.

Stories

Portrait eines Mannes
Story 09 July 2025

How does working with AI impact on research?

As a tool of science, artificial intelligence entails numerous risks, opportunities, and ambivalences. These need to be identified and classified. However, there is no revolution in sight, according to Jens Schröter.

Eine Illustration einer Person mit Handy, die schlangenhaft von Social media Beiträgen angegriffen wird. Eine Person, die einen protesteanten interviewt. Die Karte von Deutschland, aus der schwarz-rot-goldene Tropfen heraustropfen.
Story 22 May 2025

What fascinates young people about the far right?

Hostility towards democracy is on the rise in Germany. Yet politicians and academics pay little attention to the attitudes of a particularly important group: young voters. An interdisciplinary project in eastern Germany is determined to change that.