Aurora
Annual Conference 2026

Professor Barbara Albert serves as Rector of University of Duisburg-Essen. She is a distinguished expert in the field of solid-state chemistry, former president of the German Chemical Society and member of the Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences and Humanities. Prior to joining University of Duisburg-Essen, she held professorships at the universities of Hamburg and Darmstadt. At Technical University of Darmstadt, she also was Dean of the Department of Chemistry and Vice President of Research and Early Careers.

Veronika Sexl is a renowned cancer researcher specializing in tumor surveillance and signaling in leukemogenesis, with over 200 peer-reviewed publications and numerous awards. She maintains extensive international collaborations and serves on various boards, including the European Hematology Association (EHA). Since March 2023, Veronika Sexl is Rector of Universität Innsbruck.

Margrethe Jonkman has served as the President of the Executive Board of Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam since November 2023. A scientist by training, she earned her PhD in Food Science and Technology from Wageningen University before embarking on a distinguished 25-year career at Friesland Campina, where she eventually rose to the position of Chief Technology Officer. In her leadership role at VU Amsterdam, she focuses on bridging the gap between scientific research and societal impact, with a strong emphasis on sustainability, diversity and multidisciplinary innovation.

Ramon Puras is the Secretary General of Aurora. In this role, he leads strategic initiatives that enhance transnational collaboration, institutional development, and higher education policy alignment at the European level. Before joining Aurora, Ramon held several leadership positions in Dutch higher education, including serving as Dean of the Amsterdam University of Applied Sciences, Vice-Dean at the Amsterdam University College, where he played a key role in strengthening interdisciplinary education, global engagement, and academic innovation.

Ramon holds a PhD in Biochemistry and his passion for teaching the interdisciplinary course Gastronomy, the Art and Science of Cooking, reflects his blend of interests in science, cooking, and education.

Alma Ágústsdóttir graduated with a Master’s in Translation Studies from the University of Iceland. She was President of the Aurora Student Council from 2021 to 2023, prioritising the longevity and institutional memory of the Council, and integrating student representation into Aurora 2030. She now works at the International Division at the University of Iceland and leads Task Team 7.1 – Coordination of Student Support Services and Engagement.

Marlene Altenmüller is a junior professor and head of the Science Reception Lab at the Leibniz Institute for Psychology (ZPID) in Germany. Her work investigates how laypeople – but also researchers – view science, putting a particular focus on trust (with)in science. She further links this research to art reception and the museum experience as well as to social justice perspectives, asking how different people in different contexts perceive, understand and accept or reject science and its role in society. Marlene Altenmüller holds degrees in psychology and art history from the University of Marburg and obtained her PhD in social psychology on the topic of ‘Trust in Science’ at LMU Munich.

Robin Banerjee is Professor of Developmental Psychology and the inaugural Pro-Vice-Chancellor for Global and Civic Engagement at University of Sussex. Formerly Head of the School of Psychology, his research focuses on the social and emotional development of young people, and he works closely with practitioners and policymakers in the areas of education and mental health. In his current role as Pro-Vice-Chancellor, Robin is the University’s strategic lead for global and civic engagement, establishing and strengthening institutional relationships with stakeholders and partner organisations in the local community as well as internationally.

Silvester Draaijer is a Programme Manager at the Centre for Teaching and Learning at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, where he focuses on innovation in education. He also serves as WP2 co-lead, and is the leader of Aurora’s Digital Society and Global Citizenship Hub. His expertise includes blended learning, active learning, AI, and computer-based testing and assessment.

Laure Garrigue-Antar has been a Full Professor at University Paris-Est Créteil (UPEC) since 2009. She is a biochemist and her work aims at understanding the impact of emerging environmental micropollutants on water quality, human and ecosystems health.

Appointed UPEC Open Science delegate in 2022 and Vice-Rector for Science and Society in October 2025, she coordinates initiatives to promote high-quality research, data transparency and open access to publications. She also develops the ‘Science with and for Society’ strategy, raising awareness about research dissemination and supporting PhD students and academic staff in science communication. She also contributes to initiatives addressing research challenges by engaging a wide range of stakeholders, including the university community, students, businesses, institutional and local stakeholders, and the general public.

Simona Gibalová is a fourth-year General Medicine student at Pavol Jozef Šafárik University in Košice. As current President of the Aurora Student Council 2025/2026, she leverages her extensive experience ranging from collaboration on creating the Aurora Students’ Rights Charter to representing Aurora in the European Student Union. Simona brings a unique perspective from an Aurora Associate Partner university to the ASC board for the first time.

Erin Gourves is a double master’s student in Conflict Studies and Global Politics, currently completing her first year at St. Paul University in Ottawa, Canada. She serves as an Assessor for International Affairs at the Université Paris-Est Créteil (UPEC) and represents her university as a member of the Aurora Student Council. She is committed to promoting student inclusion and a cross-border student community.

Anne-Karen Hueske is an Assistant Professor at Copenhagen Business School. Her research focuses on sustainability transformation of and through business, with a particular emphasis on social entrepreneurship, sustainable innovation implementation and responsible management education. She earned her PhD at Dresden University of Technology and was founding managing director of PRISMA – Centre for Sustainability Assessment and Policy. She is CBS’s Institutional Coordinator and academic co-lead on social entrepreneurship education within Aurora universities and MSCA DN seizmic.

Kai Hockerts is a Professor of Social Entrepreneurship at Copenhagen Business School (CBS), where he also serves as Academic Coordinator for the Aurora Alliance. His research focuses on corporate sustainability, social entrepreneurship and impact investing. Prior to CBS, he was an Adjunct Professor at INSEAD.

Holding a PhD from the University of St. Gallen, Kai is a widely published scholar in leading journals such as the Journal of Business Venturing and the Journal of Business Ethics. He also serves as a section editor and editorial board member for several prominent academic publication venues in his field.

Anthropology student Elena has been involved in numerous SU activities, including a role as activities & events officer in the Sustainability Committee and taking a leading role in the Oxfam Society. Priorities for the year: Improve student housing and tackle the cost of living; Improve transport to campus; Create opportunities to improve student wellbeing sustainably.

Eliška Karasová is currently serving as Vice President of the ASC for the 2025/2026 term while studying War and Peace Studies and European Studies at Palacký University Olomouc. She had the opportunity to represent her university and country in various international settings, including Erasmus exchanges and collaborative programmes. Eliška enjoys working on projects that bring people together and create space for meaningful dialogue. She has also helped organise events and initiatives that connect students across borders. This year, Eliška is set to represent Aurora at the European Student Assembly in Strasbourg and the European Student Ambassador Forum in Warsaw.

Fanney Karlsdóttir has served as the Aurora Institutional Coordinator at the University of Iceland since 2022. She leads the UI Aurora team, which consists of three employees and focuses primarily on facilitating student and staff engagement within Aurora. Fanney holds an undergraduate degree from UI in Anthropology and an MA in International Studies from the University of Queensland. Her professional background includes various roles in the public and private sectors, specialising in sustainable development and project management.

Catherine Letcher Lazo earned her PhD at the University of Bonn and currently serves as Head of Department at the DAAD Centre for International Academic Cooperation (well-known in Germany under its abbreviation KIWi). In this capacity, she is very well versed in science diplomacy and science communication.

Alexander Lindemans is Programme Manager of Aurora. Originally from the Brussels region of Belgium, he holds a BA and MA in History from Ghent University and Charles University in Prague, and an MA in European Studies from the University of Amsterdam. He has worked in international education for a while, in various roles at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam.

Annie McEntee is the Wellbeing Officer at the University of Sussex Students’ Union in Brighton. Originally from Ireland, she completed a Bachelor’s degree in Law at the University of Sussex, spending a year abroad at Uppsala University in Sweden where she really enjoyed learning more about the student movement in Europe. She now represents the students at Sussex and is very excited to learn and share ideas about how to improve students’ lives and empower them to stand up for themselves and make the most out of their University education.

Matt Montgomery is the Head of Sustainability at the University of Sussex, where he leads the strategic delivery of the ‘Sustainable Sussex’ programme. His work centres on implementing the university’s ambitious goal to become one of the most sustainable higher education institutions in the world, with a primary focus on achieving net-zero emissions. He oversees a wide range of initiatives, from large-scale decarbonisation and campus infrastructure improvements to developing policies for sustainable procurement and travel. In addition to operational management, he plays a key role in fostering student-led innovation and works to integrate environmental accountability across all levels of the university’s research and professional activities.

Following his PhD in Geography at the University of Marburg (Germany), Jan Marco Müller’s early career included management positions at environmental research centres in Germany, Italy and the UK. After being an Assistant to the Director-General of the Joint Research Centre (JRC; 2009–2012), he managed the office of Dame Anne Glover, the first Chief Scientific Adviser to the President of the European Commission (2012–2015), and then helped set up the Commission’s current Scientific Advice Mechanism. From 2017 to 2020, he worked for the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA) as Coordinator for Science Diplomacy and acting Chief Operations Officer. From 2020 to 2022, he served as Science & Technology Advisor of the European External Action Service (EEAS), before joining the European Commission’s DG Research and Innovation, where he coordinates the development of a European Framework for Science Diplomacy. He is a Fellow of the International Science Council and currently chairs the global Foreign Ministries Science & Technology Advice Network (FMSTAN).

Dr. Mai Thi Nguyen-Kim is the holder of a doctorate in chemistry as well as a science journalist and author. She initially gained popularity in 2020 through her maiLab channel (produced by funk, the German public broadcasters’ network for youths). That year, her video ‘Corona geht gerade erst los’ (Covid is just getting started) was the most viewed YouTube video in Germany. Now numbering over 1.5 million subscribers, the YouTube channel has been renamed MAITHINK X and features topical videos to accompany her science programme MAITHINK X – Die Show, which has been running on the German TV channel ZDFneo since 2021. This year, her show won the Grimme-Preis, Germany’s most prestigious media award, in the entertainment category.

She hosted the TV show Quarks on the WDR channel from 2018 to 2021 before moving to the ZDF network where, in addition to her own show, she appears regularly in the Terra X documentaries. Her recent projects include documentaries entitled Vietnam and Chemie des Kochens (the chemistry of cooking), available for streaming on ZDF.

Mai Thi Nguyen-Kim also presented the third season (following a 12-year hiatus) of Nicht nachmachen! (Don’t try this at home!) together with Lutz van der Horst and Fabian Köster, carrying out dangerous experiments in four new episodes.

After the publication of her book Die kleinste gemeinsame Wirklichkeit, published by Droemer Knaur, the fourth book in her children’s series BIBIBIBER HAT DA MAL ‘NE FRAGE, published by Oetinger Verlag, came out in October 2025. In this innovative non-fiction series for children, she and author Marie Meimberg take the whole family into a world where science is explored in an exciting way. This series is also available as audiobooks with soundtracks.

Her work has earned her numerous awards including the Hanns-Joachim-Friedrichs-Preis, the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany, the Grimme-Preis and the Nannen-Preis. Mai Thi Nguyen-Kim also plays an active role in various scientific institutions, currently serving on the Senate of the Max Planck Society, the advisory board of the Deutsche Telekom Stiftung foundation and the supervisory board of the Science Media Center Germany gGmbH.

Dana Pietralla is co-founder of paged, a social-tech startup fostering inclusion of neurodiverse people in the digital space. During her studies she was involved in various research projects in the area of cognitive science, e.g. at University of California, Berkeley and New York University. With this background, she now devotes all her passion to paged, developing different AI and tech solutions to enable companies to make their digital content more accessible to neurodiverse people. She also works as a speaker and consultant.

Thanks to her commitment, Dana has been selected as a Voice of Economic Transformation by the Bertelsmann Stiftung.

Hannes Rothe is a Professor and holds the Chair of Sustainability and Innovation in Digital Ecosystems at the University of Duisburg-Essen, and is head of Place Beyond Bytes. He teaches Digital Innovation, Entrepreneurship and Machine Learning. His research focuses on digital innovation, entrepreneurship, and data and knowledge in digital ecosystems, with publications in leading journals such as Information Systems Research and the Strategic Management Journal. He has received multiple awards, including the Claudio Ciborra Award (2019). He actively mentors deep-tech ventures and co-founded the Digital Entrepreneurship Hub at Freie Universität Berlin. Previously, he held positions at ICN Business School and Freie Universität Berlin and was a visiting researcher at the University of Cambridge and TU Graz.

Emelie Schultz is a Swedish master’s student in People and Business Development and the CEMS Master in International Management at Copenhagen Business School in Denmark. Last year, she graduated with a dual degree in Business Management and Psychology from the University of Oklahoma in the United States. As an Aurora Student Council Representative, Emelie is very grateful to be working together with the alliance to enhance Aurora’s mission and amplify student voices at local, national, and European levels. Emelie is a current representative for Aurora at FOREU4ALL.

Julia Schwanholz is a political scientist, senior lecturer, and Vice Dean for Digitalization at the Faculty of Social Sciences of the University of Duisburg-Essen. Her research interests include democratic legitimacy in the digital age, parliamentary studies and voter turnout. In her bi-weekly Politischer Pausen Podcast, she brings together scholars, political practitioners, journalists and civil society representatives in order to make political science research accessible to a broader audience and wider public.

Karen Shire holds the chair for Comparative Sociology and Japanese Society and is currently Vice Rector for University Culture, Diversity and International Affairs at the University of Duisburg-Essen. Her research is broadly focused on the comparative-historical study of work and organizational changes, how these shape transformations of employment and labor relations, as well as their consequences for social inequalities. Her research interests include the emergence of cross-border labor markets in Europe and the Asia-Pacific, the employment dynamics of welfare markets, gender regimes in historical and comparative perspective and the political economy of human trafficking. Karen Shire held the post of director for both the Institute of East Asian Studies and the Essen College of Gender Research in the past.

Louise Turton is a Global Partnerships Manager within the Global Engagement office at the University of Sussex. Her work is central to developing and managing the university’s international academic and research collaborations. She oversees key strategic initiatives, such as the European Partnership Development Fellowship (EPDF) scheme and the Mahidol Sussex Seed Fund, which facilitate joint projects between Sussex and its global partners. Louise plays a vital role in coordinating international visits, articulation degrees and virtual collaboration solutions aimed at strengthening the university’s global presence and fostering multidisciplinary research to address global challenges.

Donato Sitaro is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow in Medieval History at the University of Naples Federico II. He previously earned his PhD from the same institution with a thesis focusing on Western British ethnic identity in the Early Medieval period. A former research fellow at the University of Tübingen (2024), his work explores cultural and trade contacts along the Atlantic seaboard and the 19th-century historiography of the Migration Period. Within the Aurora Alliance framework, he operates in Task Team 10.2 (Open Science and Citizen Science), where he coordinates research seminars and workshops. In this role, he works to link his expertise in historical identities and cultural encounters with the broader frameworks of participatory research and societal involvement in European societies and beyond.

Janette Walde is a Professor of Statistics at the Department of Statistics and currently the Vice Rector for Teaching and Students at the Universität Innsbruck. Depending on the research group she is working with, she evaluates the causal effects of policy measures, analyses preferences for support of mega sports events, models the seasonality of winter tourism demand or identifies risk factors for multiple sclerosis. Thus, she works in highly interdisciplinary teams. As Vice Rector, her agenda focuses on strengthening education quality, promoting student-centered learning and advancing the digitalisation of education.

Tomasz Waliczko is a researcher and innovation professional working at the intersection of sustainability, digital entrepreneurship, and international collaboration. He works as an Aurora Coordinator at the University of Duisburg-Essen, guiding strategic cooperation and mobility across European universities. Previously, he led the Place Beyond Bytes incubator, mentoring teams to turn ideas into ventures. He teaches Sustainable Digital Entrepreneurship and Moonshot Innovation. With experience in Berlin’s startup ecosystem, he has built cross-border projects linking Eastern Europe and North Africa and collaborated with industry leaders such as Haniel and ThyssenKrupp. He contributes to initiatives like p2i: In Action (in collaboration with the University of Cambridge) and coordinates the Ruhr Fellowship Programme.

Livia Zimmermann is the founder of EPITHEL, building the first patent-backed skincare system for intimate skin longevity. Before EPITHEL, Livia spent 15 years launching over 200 consumer products and 3 other ventures across Brazil and Germany. She is currently Entrepreneur in Residence at Carbon 13, one of Europe’s most active climate tech investors, and leads Blue Factory, ESCP Business School’s entrepreneurship centre in Germany, where she supports a network of 88,000+ founders and innovators across Europe. Education: M.Sc. from TU Berlin, with executive studies at Stanford (AI) and Central Saint Martins. She is an alumna of Antler and Google Female Founders.