Christoph Helbig "has been an active member of ISIE since 2015 and has contributed significantly to the society's activities", writes the organization. The ISIE award committee is "deeply impressed" by Helbig's "outstanding scientific contributions", which includes works on the criticality of raw materials, geopolitical risks and dissipative losses in Life Cycle Impact Assessments. The jury is made up of the renowned scientists Stefanie Hellweg, ETH Zurich, Switzerland, Ming Xu, Tsinghua University Beijing, Andrea Hicks, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Shinichiro Nakamura, Waseda University Tokyo and Yuan Yao, Yale University.

The award is named after Robert Laudise, a pioneer in the growth of quartz crystals who served as Director of Materials Research at Bell Labs, among other positions. It is awarded every two years to researchers under 36, Helbig is 34 years old. ISIE promotes industrial ecology as a way to tackle the challenges of sustainability and realize a circular economy. It connects scientists, engineers, policy makers, managers and advocates who are interested in better integrating environmental concerns and economic activities.

Helbig holds the Chair of Ecological Resource Technology. This research group was founded in February 2022 at the Faculty of Engineering at the University of Bayreuth. The aim here is to make global material and energy flows more sustainable. To this end, the chair is dedicated to three sets of questions:

· Which material flows of metals and mineral resources occur, on which technological and social developments do they depend and how can we manage these resources more effectively in the cycle? This can be used, for example, to determine the recycling potential for lithium in the electric vehicles of tomorrow.

· What impact does the use of these resources have on the environment and human health and what processes, from mining to recycling, can we use to make this use more sustainable?

· Which processes and materials are particularly critical for the key transformation processes: the energy transition, digitalization and the circular economy? 

Helbig says: "For me, receiving the Laudise Medal is an honor in recognition of ten years of research in the field of industrial ecology since I graduated from the University of Augsburg. The award is an incentive to continue working in the field of material flow analysis for metals, critical raw materials and life cycle assessment for material cycles. We continue to dedicate ourselves to these topics at the Chair of Ecological Resource Technology of the University of Bayreuth. I thank the ISIE and the committee for the award and I look forward to further actively contribute to the society."

The ISIE organises an online symposium regarding the award of the Laudise medal for Christoph Helbig on Tuesday, 30 January 2024, 15:00h. Registration is possible on the website of the ISIE: https://is4ie.org/

Christoph Helbig

Prof. Dr.-Ing. Christoph HelbigProfessor for Ecological Resource Technology

Phone: +49 921 55-7540

Mail: christoph.helbig@uni-bayreuth.de

Anja-Maria Meister

Anja-Maria MeisterPressesprecherin der Universität Bayreuth

Universitätsstraße 30
D - 95447 Bayreuth
Tel: +49 (0) 921 / 55 - 5300
Mail: anja.meister@uni-bayreuth.de

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