On Thursday, April 28, 2022, the information and networking event "Journey of a Researcher in Germany - Young Ambassadors Meet of Freie Universität Berlin and University of Cologne on opportunities in Geosciences and Meteorology" took place. This new initiative and format of the event was devised by the FUB Delhi office to target scholars from India of specific fields at FUB, and to strengthen the contact with existing Indian scholars to improve the content of outreach sessions for students.

After an introductory note by Ms Ritika Rana, interim head of the Freie Universität Liaison Office in New Delhi, and Dr. Amisha Jain, Representative of University of Regiona Head India and South Asia, the information sessions gave students the opportunity to learn about research careers in Germany and ask questions. The sessions were chaired by Ms Rana; Ms. Rovina Pinto, research scholar at the institute for geophysics and meteorology at University of Cologne, and Dr Brindha Karthikeyan, researcher at the hydrogeology working group at Freie Universität Berlin, led the information sessions and Q&As.

Brindha Karthikeyan is a Water Resources researcher by academic training with specialization in hydrogeology, managed aquifer recharge and climate change. She has a Master’s in Environmental Science and PhD in Environmental Geosciences from Anna University, India. Since January 2018, she is a Researcher at the Hydrogeology Working Group, Institute of Geological Sciences, Freie Universität Berlin. She recently completed her habilitation in hydrogeology (2022) from Freie Universität Berlin. Brindha has many years of post-doctoral experience from the National University of Singapore, International Water Management Institute- Lao PDR and Anna University, India. She was a Linnaeus Palme Fellow at the Uppsala University, Sweden (2010) and currently a ProFiL fellow at the Freie Universität Berlin. She is the PI of two Indo-German projects funded by DAAD.

The Department of Earth Sciences, Freie Universität Berlin is divided into three institutes: Geological Sciences, Geographical Sciences, and Meteorology. The department’s research focuses on the interactive physical, chemical, and biological processes taking place within the Earth, on the Earth’s surface, and the Earth’s atmosphere, as well as on the interactions between humans and the environment. The strength of the research at the Department of Earth Sciences is expressed through its involvement in the TOPOI cluster of excellence and in the fact that three German Research Foundation (DFG) Research Units are hosted here, in addition to several projects co-financed by industrial partners. 

More information: https://www.fu-berlin.de/en/einrichtungen/fachbereiche/fb/geowiss/index.html

The Department of Geosciences, University of Cologne consists of the Institute of Geography, the Institute of Geology and Mineralogy and the Institute of Geophysics and Meteorology. Geosciences are a key discipline of the 21st century. With the main theme "Environmental Dynamics and Global Change", the Department of Geosciences positions itself centrally in the crucial questions of the earth sciences, such as climate change, hazard research, and the structure and development of the earth and life. 

More information: https://geosciences.uni-koeln.de/en/https://geosciences.uni-koeln.de/gsgs