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Prof. Dr. Sascha Oswald

Measuring Soil Moisture with Cosmic Radiation – New Network Collects Data on Brandenburg’s Water Balance

Brandenburg is one of Germany’s driest regions. Climate change is likely to make this situation even worse, turning water into a scarce resource in …
Profile of Prof. Dr Annegret Thieken

Making Risks Visible – How to Better Manage the Potential Impacts of Heavy Rainfall in Berlin and Brandenburg

Cars swept away like drifting buoys, entire neighborhoods underwater, basements becoming deadly traps—flooding caused by extreme rainfall can inflict …
Destroyed bridge in the Ahr Valley after the catastrophic flooding in July 2021.

Deadly Floods of 2021 – What Needs to Change in Risk Management

Media Information 04-09-2026 / Nr. 074

The catastrophic flooding in July 2021 claimed the lives of more than 200 people in Germany and Belgium. The high death toll makes it clear that …
Markus Rex im Portrait.

“We have to be incredibly fast in our research”—climate researcher Markus Rex on past and upcoming expeditions

Markus Rex is a climate physicist, a professor of atmospheric physics at the University of Potsdam, and head of the department of the same name at the …
A moraine-dammed lake below the Finger Glacier in Glacier Bay National Park, Alaska, in 2023.

Growing meltwater reservoirs – glacial lakes are both a resource and a habitat worthy of protection

Media Information 28-01-2026 / Nr. 013

Should growing glacial lakes be used for energy production and water supply – or remain protected as ecologically valuable systems? A research team …
Elephants in the savannah

Agriculture or Wildlife Conservation – How land-use change affects carbon storage in Africa

When humans and wild animals share a common habitat in the African savanna, decisions have to be made about how the land should be used in the future. …
View of the Lituya Glacier: the ice front still protrudes some 40 to 50 meters out of the water.

When Glacial Lakes Burst Out – Field Research in Alaska Close to the Pulse of Climate Change

August 1, 2024. A disaster alert goes off in the US city of Juneau. Within a very short time, the Mendenhall River swells, huge masses of water pour …
Dr. Georg Veh in front of Lake No Lake in British Columbia (Canada), this lake is dammed by the Tulsequah glacier in the background and empties several times a year.

Melting glaciers – Study shows growing lake areas, but flooding from smaller lakes

Medieninformation 18-02-2025 / Nr. 017

Does flooding from melting glaciers pose a growing danger in the high mountains? Not necessarily, as a study led by the University of Potsdam shows. …
Spokespersons of the University Research Focuses and Emerging Fields receive their certificates at the beginning of the new funding period.

Profiled – New Research Focuses of the University of Potsdam

In 2025, the University will sharpen its profile with new University Research Focuses. In addition to the already existing “Cognitive Sciences” and …
Savanna vegetation in Southern Africa

Diversity as survival strategy – How plants adapt to extreme climates in drylands

In a large-scale international study under leadership of the French research organizations INRAE/CNRS and the King Abdullah University in Saudi Arabia …