A leading centre of innovation and academic excellence in Berlin
The German capital's oldest and most central university is situated right at the heart of Europe. With its wide selection of study programmes, excellent global network and academic reputation it makes for a unique environment to study and do research at the highest level.
Since 1810, this institution has been a major player in shaping the higher education sector, drawing from the ideas of its namesakes, Wilhelm and Alexander von Humboldt. Wilhelm von Humboldt’s revolutionary model of education combines research and teaching, academic freedom and broad, cross-disciplinary learning. This ideal changed how modern universities educate and inspire their students, making Humboldt-Universität a global role-model.
At Humboldt-Universität, students and academics benefit not only from the outstanding research infrastructure and intellectual vibrancy of Berlin. They also get to take advantage of an abundance of international networks and partnerships, allowing them to follow in the footsteps of quintessential travelling researcher Alexander von Humboldt.
Here, over 160 degree programmes and world-class teaching create a student experience like no other – an ideal launchpad for careers in academia and beyond. Counting 30 Nobel laureates to date, Humboldt stands for excellence and innovation. As part of the university's recipe for success, early-career researchers are empowered to drive bold, interdisciplinary projects across a wide range of fields.
Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin and Circle U.
Within Circle U., Humboldt-Universität coordinates the Knowledge Hub on Climate and the alliance's efforts to advance equity, diversity and inclusion. In addition, Humboldt's Collaborative Online International Learning (COIL) initiative fosters innovative digital teaching cooperation among the Circle U. universities. Humboldt President Julia von Blumenthal currently serves as Alliance President.
Latest news at Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin
From Campus to Career: Helping Students Turn Language Skills into a Career Asset
Events
Discover COIL: Bringing International Collaboration into Your Teaching
Circle U. for Early Career Researchers: Funding, Mobility and more
Circle U. Student Info Session & Welcome Day
Open Conversation: How Can We Act Sustainably in Everyday Life?
Meet the Circle U. team at Humboldt-Universität
Do you have questions about Circle U.?
Get in touch with our local Circle U. coordinator Fritzi-Marie Titzmann at berlin@circle-u.eu
Management Board member
Yoan Vilain
- Vice-Provost for International and European Affairs
- Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin
Yoan Vilain
- Vice-Provost for International and European Affairs
- Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin
Yoan Vilain studied law in Lyon, Paris and Berlin and received his doctorate at Sorbonne (Paris 1). He is Vice-Provost for International and European Affairs at Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin and visiting law professor at Sciences Po Paris and Strasbourg. His research encompasses German, French, European and comparative constitutional law, methodology of comparative Law, with special attention to questions of state organisation and federal theory.
As Vice-Provost, Yoan oversees and works to advance international academic initiatives, extending the global reach of Humboldt-Universität's research and teaching activities. He shares responsibility for supporting the community of international students, scholars, and faculty in Berlin as well as for guiding Humboldt-Universität's overall global strategy and sustaining its ongoing development as a global university.
He serves on numerous scientific committees and academic boards. He has been elected to the board of the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD), the CIERA and acts as president of the European University Foundation (EUF). He has received several scientific prizes, among others the German-French Parliamentary Prize awarded by the Assemblée nationale and the Bundestag. For his services to universities, education, and science, he was awarded the order of merit Ordre des Palmes académiques by the French Republic in 2024.
Academic Chairs
Prof. Dr. Marcel Robischon
- Knowledge Hub on Climate
- Academic Director
Prof. Dr. Marcel Robischon
- Knowledge Hub on Climate
- Academic Director
Prof. Marcel Robischon is a forest scientist, plant biologist and head of the Division of Agricultural Ecology at Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin. His scientific focus includes agricultural ecology and in particular developmental biology and ecology of woody plants. He further studies world natural and agricultural heritage in agricultural learning and teaching.
Profile page and contact details
Faculty of Life Sciences
Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin
Prof. Dr. Stephan Breidbach
- CU.til
- Academic Chair
Prof. Dr. Stephan Breidbach
- CU.til
- Academic Chair
Prof. Dr. Stephan Breidbach holds a PhD in Foreign Language Pedagogy and is a trained secondary teacher of English, Social Studies/History, and Drama. He heads the English Language Education unit and currently serves as Director of the Professional School of Education at Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin. His research focuses on CLIL, teacher/learner identities, foreign language teaching policies, and sociocultural contexts of language education. He is involved in several international research projects. He works with the Circle U. TENet group aiming for sustainable educational innovation in initial teacher education across Circle U. based on international mobility formats and research-driven professional learning.
Profile page and contact details
Faculty of Languages and Literatures
Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin
Prof. Dr. Heike Wiese
- CU.mil
- Academic Chair
Prof. Dr. Heike Wiese
- CU.mil
- Academic Chair
Heike Wiese holds the chair of German in Multilingual Contexts at Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, after a professorship at University of Potsdam and visiting posts at Yale University and Brandeis University. Wiese is a member of the Academia Europaea and of the German Council for Migration, as well as a speaker of the Centre “Language in Urban Diversity”. She is an expert on the dynamics of multilingual settings, with foci on grammatical developments and on monolingual ideologies, linguistic discrimination and empowerment. In outreach activities, Wiese cooperates with multilingual communities, kindergartens and schools, educational policy makers and museums.
Profile page and contact details
Faculty of Language, Literature and Humanities
heike.wiese@hu-berlin.de
Prof. Dr. Hannes Grandits
- Open Campus
- Academic Chair
Prof. Dr. Hannes Grandits
- Open Campus
- Academic Chair
Hannes Grandits is professor of Southeast European history at Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin where he teaches the history of Southeast and Central Europe, with a special interest also in European com-parative and global perspectives.
Among other things, he is the author of the recently published mono-graph The End of Ottoman Rule in Bosnia (Routledge 2021), the co-editor, with K. Clewing, of Staat-lichkeit und Politik in Sudosteuropa nach 1800 (De Gruyter Oldenbourg 2024), and one of the co-authors of Phantomgrenzen im ostlichen Europa (Wallstein 2015). He is also – with Heike Wieters – in charge of the international study program “Joint Master European History.”
Profile page and contact details
hannes.grandits@hu-berlin.de
Faculty of Philosophy
Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin
Dr. Claudia-Yvette Matthes
- Knowledge Hub on Democracy
- Academic Chair
Dr. Claudia-Yvette Matthes
- Knowledge Hub on Democracy
- Academic Chair
Claudia-Y. Matthes is a Senior Lecturer at HU Berlin’s Department of Social Sciences and Director of its international MA Programmes. She has been a Circle U Chair for Democracy already since 2021 and is currently also leading the Jean Monnet Chair "ShapingEU". Her specialisation includes European integration, comparative democracy studies, institutional and actor-centred approaches to political science and German domestic politics. Since 2016, she has been acting as the department’s Erasmus Coordinator and teaches regularly at the Middle East Technical University in Ankara/Turkey and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Profile page and contact details
Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities
Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin
Prof. Dr. Heike Wieters
- Open Campus
- Academic Chair
Prof. Dr. Heike Wieters
- Open Campus
- Academic Chair
Heike Wieters has been Junior Professor of Historical European Studies at the Institute of History at Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin since October 2019. Together with Hannes Grandits, she coordinates the Master of European History and won the Humboldt Award for Good Teaching in 2023 (also together with H. Grandits). The internationalization of teaching and research is a particular concern of hers.
Her research focuses on the contemporary history of European integration, global welfare (state) history – especially pension provision in Europe – and on the history of transnational relations and interactions between state and private actors in business and society.
Profile page and contact details
Department of History
Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin
Priv.-Doz. Pascal Grosse
- Knowledge Hub on Global Health
- Academic Chair
Priv.-Doz. Pascal Grosse
- Knowledge Hub on Global Health
- Academic Chair
Pascal Grosse is a historian and practising neurologist with a sub-specialisation in neurological sleep medicine. He studied medicine, history, psychology, and history of medicine at Freie Universität Berlin and has been working at Charité – Universitätsmedizin Berlin since graduation. The focus in his historical work lies on the theory and practises of biopolitics including especially European and German colonialism, but also many other topics with bio-political implications. He has also become involved in innovations in medical education, as such he currently serves as an Academic Chair in the Circle U - European University Alliance to push forward topics related to Global Health in a broad European context.
Contact details
Faculty of Medicine
Charité - Universitätsmedizin Berlin
pascal.grosse@charite.de
Dr. Valentin Domann
- Knowledge Hub on Democracy
- Academic Chair
Dr. Valentin Domann
- Knowledge Hub on Democracy
- Academic Chair
Valentin Domann is a geographer and postdoctoral researcher at Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin. His research focuses on the spatial dimensions of authoritarian formations and socio-spatial transformation processes, with particular attention to conflicts over space, political ecology, and planning for just socio-ecological transitions. A key feature of his work is collaborative knowledge production across research and teaching, including transdisciplinary cooperation with practitioners and collective forms of writing and publishing.
Profile page and contact details
Geography Department
Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin
Prof. Dr. Niels Pinkwart
- Knowledge Hub on Artificial Intelligence
- Academic Chair
Prof. Dr. Niels Pinkwart
- Knowledge Hub on Artificial Intelligence
- Academic Chair
Prof. Dr. Niels Pinkwart completed his PhD with a dissertation on collaborative modeling systems in education. After a post-doctoral researcher position at the Human-Computer Interaction Institute of Carnegie Mellon University, he accepted offers for Assistant Professor and Associate Professor positions at Clausthal University of Technology. In 2013, he moved to Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin where he heads the research group "Computer Science Education / Computer Science and Society". Prof. Pinkwart has authored more than 250 peer reviewed publications and currently acts as associate editor of the International Journal of Artificial Intelligence in Education and as member of the editorial boards of the Journal of Educational Data Mining.
Profile Page and contact details
Department of Computer Science
Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin
