News

To wrap up a successful year 2025, we invited all current cohorts to our December Cognition Academy taking place at Harnack Haus in Berlin. We enjoyed several interesting talks, workshops and some holiday spirit as well. more

On September 24th 2024, we celebrated the arrial of the new cohorts for all 3 Max Planck Schools at Harnack Haus in Berlin. The attendees listened to great “Passion for Science” lectures, participated in workshops and a panel discussion about freedom in academia. And it was all finished off with food and music. more

We welcomed our newest cohort in Berlin this week with the Welcome Days at Harnack Haus. Many exciting talks by students and faculty and a pleasant atmosphere of getting to know each other made for a fantastic week.

Our Faculty Member Christian F. Doeller opens the  Cognition Colloquium series in 2024 by presenting a talk about “Structuring experience in cognitive spaces”.
Click “more” to find the abstract and join here: https://zoom.us/j/93526030034?pwd=ZkJnYlFVOEthU2lDeE5nVmV6TlZLZz09 more

The MPSCog’s Speaker and Faculty Member Arno Villringer will give a presentation on “Heart-brain interactions: Of love and death” in our November colloquium.
Click “more” to find the abstract and join here: https://zoom.us/j/93526030034?pwd=ZkJnYlFVOEthU2lDeE5nVmV6TlZLZz09 more

On October 16th 2023, the three Max Planck Schools (Photonics, Matter to Life, Cognition) celebrated the new doctoral candidates of their programs with the annual Max Planck Schools’ Day. It started at the Arena in Berlin with an address by the president of the Max Planck Society, Prof. Cramer, followed by a panel discussion on the “role of fundamental science admidst the current crises”, and a “passion for science” lecture by our own faculty member, Prof. Isabel Dziobek.

The MPSCog’s Speaker and Faculty Member Katrin Amunts will give a presentation on “Cytoarchitectonics – Decoding functional specialization, brain parcellation, and variation” in our October colloquium.
Click “more” to find the abstract and join here: https://zoom.us/j/93526030034?pwd=ZkJnYlFVOEthU2lDeE5nVmV6TlZLZz09 more

In the September Colloquium, our faculty member John-Dylan Haynes examines the question "Predicting free choices in real time: What does(n’t) brain decoding tell us about the problem of free will?"
Click “more” to find the abstract and join here: https://zoom.us/j/93526030034?pwd=ZkJnYlFVOEthU2lDeE5nVmV6TlZLZz09 more

The new academic year has started with a new group of doctoral candidates in our program with the Welcome Days in Berlin at Harnack Haus. Candidates were introduced to the structure and expectations of the program but also presented their previous research and plans within the School. We are excited to support the new step in their career path.

In July, the MPScog was present for the first time at the Society of Neuroscientists of Africa (SONA) meeting in Johannesburg, South Africa. The meeting welcomes neuroscientists from all over the African continent and across the globe.
SONA is a non-profit organization registered in Nairobi, Kenya since 1993. It functions as the umbrella organization for the regional and national neuroscience societies and groups across Africa. SONA is also a member society of the International Brain Research Organization (IBRO).
The aim of MPSCog was to reach out and form connections with researchers from across Africa to establish future relations and promote the program on the continent. more

Next speaker in our monthly colloquium is our Faculty Member Nikolaus Weiskopf. His talk is entitlted “Characterizing brain microstructure using magnetic resonance imaging: Towards in-vivo histology”.
Click “more” to find the abstract and join here: https://zoom.us/j/93526030034?pwd=ZkJnYlFVOEthU2lDeE5nVmV6TlZLZz09 more

In our Cognition Colloquium in May, our faculty member Caroline F. Rowland will speak about “How humans learn language”.
Click “more” to find the abstract and join here: https://zoom.us/j/93526030034?pwd=ZkJnYlFVOEthU2lDeE5nVmV6TlZLZz09 more

Our Faculty Member Simon B. Eickhoff will talk about “Technical, conceptual and practical considerations on neuroimaging-based prediction of cognitive phenotypes” in the April Colloquium.
Click “more” to find the announcement and join here: https://zoom.us/j/93526030034?pwd=ZkJnYlFVOEthU2lDeE5nVmV6TlZLZz09 more

In March, our Faculty Member Isabel Dziobek will give a lecture entitled “From social robotics to participatory research:  What we can learn from the study of autism for mental health challenges of the 21st century”.
Click “more” to find the announcement and join the talk via the following link: https://zoom.us/j/93526030034?pwd=ZkJnYlFVOEthU2lDeE5nVmV6TlZLZz09 more

The pilot phase of the Max Planck Schools will come to an end the fall of 2025. To ellow for a continuation of the project and to initiate other Max Planck Schools, a final evaluation was necessary. The Max Planck School of Cognition was evaluated at the end of January of 2023. This was also a welcomed opportunity to look back at past milestones and forward into a creative future.

The first female speaker in the Cognition Colloquium will be Yee Lee Shing from Goethe-Universität Frankfurt am Main. On 13 February 2022, she will talk about “Memory and predictive processing across the lifespan”.
Click “more” to find the announcement and join here: https://zoom.us/j/93526030034?pwd=ZkJnYlFVOEthU2lDeE5nVmV6TlZLZz09 more

We are very happy about our next speaker in the Colloquium Series - Patrick Haggard who will talk about “Postulating and studying mental processes: The case of volition”. Mark your calendar for 4 pm on 16 January 2022. 
Click “more” to find the announcement and join here: https://zoom.us/j/93526030034?pwd=ZkJnYlFVOEthU2lDeE5nVmV6TlZLZz09 more

This month, we were able to host the first complete Cognition Academy with 4 cohorts at Harnack Haus in Berlin. Many scientific talks, networking events, student presentations, soft skill courses, and a murder mystery dinner made the week a successful mini conference for all participants. more

On 17 October at 4 pm CET, Daniel Margulies will be the first speaker in our new colloquia series. The title of his talk is "Cortical gradients of functional integration". The abstract can be found under “more”.
https://zoom.us/j/93526030034?pwd=ZkJnYlFVOEthU2lDeE5nVmV6TlZLZz09 more

The Max Planck School of Cognition invited the new doctoral candidates of 2022 to Harnack Haus in Berlin for the Welcome Days. Candidates were presenting their previous work, learnt about the program and were introduced to all things School of Cognition. 

The Max Planck Schools were able to celebrate the new cohorts of all three schools on September 5th 2022 at Harnack Haus in Berlin again this year.
Many inspiring talks by faculty and students, a panel discussion on Interdisciplinarity, as well as BBQ, drinks, and networking made the day a great event for everyone invited and provided the perfect initiation of the new students.

The July 2023 Cognition Academy took place in the beautiful Schloss Eckberg in Dresden. Speakers from all over the world joined us online or in person. We had workshops, talks, student networking events and student presentations. Science was not the only highlight, however. Planned and unplanned social events took place throughout the week. All in all, science, summer vibes and—for once—students of all cohorts and the Coordination Team came together at a castle overlooking the Elbe river during this past Cognition Academy.

On July 12th 2022, the organisation Research in Germany invited foreign students and researchers to the German Embassy in Paris for a informal networking event to discuss options to study or work in Germany. The Max Planck School of Cognition was part of the initiative. more

Prof. Katrin Amunts received two very special awards for her outstanding commitment to the field of neuroscience this month. She was presented with the Cross of Merit 1st Class of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany as well as the prestigous Hector Science Award. more

Tomoko Koda and Tzu-Huan Lin are the Learning Designers of the Max Planck School of Cognition and Photonics. Their job is to make the schools’ teaching and learning format as engaging and effective as  possible. For this, they have been supporting the Flipped Classroom model which this article will talk about.   more

In an online article at the study portal FindAPhD,  Johanna Rapp from the central team for all three Max Planck Schools describes the new and innovative approach to digital learning at our program. more

24 June 2021
After an interim evaluation of all three new Max Planck Schools, the success and potential of these novel graduate programs are presented at a Max Planck Society's Senate Meeting. more

18 May 2021 
The Festival of Philosophy is taking place mostly virtually from May 26th though July 2nd 2021 in Hannover. This year, the theme is "Wisdom and Science" and is co-chaired by Martin Stratmann, the president of the Max Planck Society. We are proud to announce that our students Bojana Grujicic and Pietro Nickl as well as our fellow John-Dylan Haynes are part of the program. more

17 May 2021
As of October 01, 2021 onwards, 120 Fellows have been reappointed and 14 newly appointed.
134 scientists from German universities and research organizations have been appointed as “Fellows of the Max Planck Schools” by the President of the Max Planck Society, Martin Stratmann and the President of the German Rector’s Conference (HRK), Peter-André Alt. Amongst the highly distinguished Fellows are one Nobel laureate and 18 Leibniz award recipients. more

The Max Planck School of Cognition is proud to announce that our speaker and fellow Professor Katrin Amunts, who is also Director of the Institute of Neuroscience and Medicine at the Forschungszentrum Jülich and Professor of Brain Research at University of Düsseldorf in Germany, has been selected as one of the finalists for this year's Falling Walls Conference. more

13 June 2019
We had a wonderful time at the annual #OHBM the last days. Great scientific lectures and exciting discussions with you about our PhD program have given us a wonderful time. Thanks a lot for this.💙

09 June 2019
... was a British writer, who had passion for science and for satirical style. You may know him from the Science Fiction series The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. 💫

06 May 2019
..., clinical professor of psychiatry at the UCLA School of Medicine, explores which aspects of human life are affected by bonding experiences. 👨‍👩‍👧

18 April 2019
If you're still looking for the perfect program to do your doctorate, a new opportunity in Germany should be on your list. Plus, in Germany you can expect a fantastic research infrastructure and of course high-ranking science institutions such as the new Max Planck Schools. more

15 April 2019
... one of the most influential linguists of present times, brought the fields of linguistics, cognitive science and computer science together.

11 April 2019
We would like to extend a big thank you to all invited applicants who have met us in Berlin for the last two days for an interview. 🤝 Even if we will not be able to offer all candidates a place in our PhD program, we hope that everyone enjoyed the experience. 💛 Already looking forward to the next application period.

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20 March 2019
Yesterday we attended the MindBrainBody Symposium 2019 and were able to hear many exciting lectures on cognitive, affective and social neurosciences, cognitive neurology and neuropsychiatry, psychology and other behavioral and social sciences. In addition, we were able to make many new contacts. 🤝 🧠

11 March 2019
... is the science teacher you wish you'd had at school. 👩‍🏫

8 March 2019
Prof. Christine Heim, Director of the Institute of Medical Psychology at Charité Berlin, focuses her research on areas such as developmental psychobiology, neurobiology of depression and anxiety disorders, psychoneuroendocrinology, and the neural correlates of stress and emotion. She is also one of our esteemed fellows. 👍🏼 more

27 February 2019
Since its foundation in 1929, the Harnack House in Berlin has been a centre of international scientific exchange. Many well-known scientists have met here ever since, so it is the perfect place to meet with the invited applicants for interviews. We're looking forward to getting to know you. more

23 March 2019
... was an important philosophical author of the 20th century. 

7 February 2019
... is a prominent Portuguese neuroscientist and consciousness researcher. He examines the neural foundations of language and cognition as well as the connection between feeling, emotion and good sense. 🧠

2 February 2019
He is one of our Berlin-based fellows and professor for Biological Psychology and Cognitive Neuroscience at the Freie Universität Berlin – Hauke Heekeren. His lab mainly investigates the neuroscience of decision-making. more