On Sunday, the 9th HLF kicked off to an auspicious start. The Opening Ceremony was held in the New Auditorium of the New University building in Heidelberg, for a week with more than 400 attendees, among them about 200 young researchers and more than 25 laureates.

To great fanfare, the audience rose to welcome the attending laureates. The Opening was moderated by two emcees, Jie Li and Pooja Bharadwaj, two alumnae themselves of the HLF.

The Chairperson of the HLFF and Managing Director of the Klaus Tschira Foundation, Beate Spiegel, stressed the importance of the scientific community, particularly in difficult times, to come together and pursue solutions to many of the world’s problems. She also remarked on how joyful it was to see everyone back in Heidelberg in person after two years of remote digital events.

Beate was followed on stage by the HLFF Scientific Chair Anna Wienhard, who spoke with the emcees about her expectations for the Forum, as well as some of her favorite aspects of the event.

The audience was then treated to a short video introducing a few of the young researchers in attendance, who spoke about how excited they were to finally be able to attend the HLF in person.

Continuing on, the audience heard addresses by German Federal Minister of Education and Research, Bettina Stark-Watzinger, the Rector of Heidelberg University, Bernhard Eitel, as well as Sabine Bendiek, the Chief People & Operating Officer, Labor Relations Director, and Member of the Executive Board at SAP.

Finally, representatives of the award-granting institutions, Yannis Ioannidis, President of the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM), Carlos Kenig, President of the International Mathematical Union (IMU) and Gunn Elisabeth Birkelund, General Secretary of The Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters (DNVA) were introduced onstage for a short interview.

To close out the ceremony, Beate Spiegel, Anna Wienhard and the award-granting institutions’ representatives officially opened the 9th HLF 2022.

The Ceremony was followed by a reception.

Official photos can be found on the HLF’s Flickr account.

Check out our HLFF Blog for fascinating articles about the 9th HLF.

Find all talks and panels from the 9th HLF, as well as our Vlog on our YouTube channel.

Follow the HLF with the hashtag #HLF22