FACULTY OF

COMPUTER SCIENCE

Have you ever wondered how your future professors had to qualify to teach you? In the following, we will explain the path taken, at least at research universities in Germany like Otto-von-Guericke University of Magdeburg. Indeed, they are all highly qualified teachers and researchers who have gone through two decades of training to get where they are.

1. Undergraduate studies toward a bachelor’s degree

Of course, the first step after attending school is to partake in academic studies. Most academics who later become professors go to universities, and not universities of applied sciences, because the skills needed in the professorial profession are ones which are conveyed in the former, not the latter.

2. Graduate studies toward a master’s degree

Future professors generally do an MSc or an MA next, sometimes at the same university as their bachelor’s, some move on to another university for their MSc.

3. Doctoral studies

The next step is intensive research training which is carried out in a doctoral program. The candidate has one or more “supervisors” (sometimes called “advisor”) as mentors who do regular one-on-one consultations with their doctoral students. As a result, usually several papers are written and published, often together with the supervising professor. They are put together in what’s called the dissertation, or “doctoral thesis”. This generally takes about 5 years after completing an MSc.

4. Postdoctoral Fellows

Most future professors spend some time (typically between one and three years) as a “postdoctoral fellow” (“postdoc” for short), often at another university than the one at which the doctorate was granted. Postdocs tend to do very little teaching, if any at all, and are free to carry out research projects on their own. By the end of the postdoc, most academics have spent at least some time abroad.

5. Staff Scientist

Payback time begins: In these typically 6 years, often longer, seldom less, the future professor will generally begin teaching in their own right at the BSc or MSc levels. They also carry out their own research projects, usually creating a unique focus and tying together the results in a coherent manner. They publish their research results, sometimes with their own students. In many areas, this time as a staff scientist culminates in them writing another thesis, called a “Habilitation Thesis”. Besides the research necessary for the thesis, they also have to demonstrate their ability to teach at the university level – typically by accumulating a good track record of teaching and demonstrating it through a sample lecture. For the research, the Habilitation degree may be granted by the faculty. For the ability to teach, the so-called venia legendi, the right to carry out independent teaching at the university level in their academic area is granted. Having the Habilitation and the venia legendi, they may use the title “Privatdozent” (abbreviated “PD”).

6. “Privatdozent”

Now future professors have the formal qualification to apply for professorships. The time spent as a “Privatdozent” is usually a small handful of years. Generally, they continue to have fixed-term appointments (i.e. one-year jobs, sometimes 3 or even 5 years). Some have permanent positions as staff scientists at their universities and some do not move on to their own professorships. “Privatdozenten” (abbreviated “PD” before the “Dr.”), usually have a mixture of teaching and research assignments. Formally, a “Privatdozent” has the same rights and responsibilities as a professor, such as supervising doctoral theses, but neither the title nor the position.

7. Professorship

Whereas most future professors switch universities at least once somewhere along the way, German law dictates that universities that hire professors may not hire their own “Habilitation”-Graduates, let alone their own staff scientists. Hence a transition between being a “Privatdozent” and a Professor force scientist to switch universities so as to avoid “academic inbreeding”. Professorships are always advertised and with the help of appointment committees that perform a rigorous selection process, the “best” candidates are “called” to the positions. A professorship is generally a job with an unlimited term and comes with funding for staff scientist positions, administrative support, and equipment. Professors also carry responsibility for the academic well-being of a faculty and the university by engaging in “institution building”. Professors are sometimes called upon to develop new study regulations, new degree programs (like the BiBa), collaborative projects with others, or new research institutes. They often spend two or more decades in their positions, until they retire around the age of 67. Professors only seldomly move from one university to another. Of course, not every professor in Germany has gone through exactly these steps. For example, a slowly increasing number of young scientists get coveted positions as “Junior Professorships” instead of “Staff Scientist” positions; after 3 and 6 years they are evaluated, and if they pass, they skip the Habilitation and therefore also the level of “Privatdozenten” to move up to professorships directly. To give you an idea of the “funnel” that your future professors will have gone through, the following table shows the number of people completing each of the stages at the University of Magdeburg in 2022. The average age to become a professor in Germany is about 42 after spending some 20 years, often more, preparing for the position.

You can be proud of your professors at OVGU, everyone of them!

Source: Controlling Dept. OVGU

Source: https://de.statista.com/

Spotlight on “Privatdozenten“: PD Dr. Gabriel Mistelbauer

PD Dr. Mistelbauer’s career is a picture-book version of the scheme explained in the previous article. Currently he
is a Senior Research Engineer at Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA, USA. He spent the years
2016 to 2022 at the University of Magdeburg in the research team of Professor Bernhard Preim and worked toward his Habilitation during this time. He took the formal exam for his Habilitation in June, 2024 and earned the venia legendi for the subject “Computational Visualistics”. The title “Privatdozent” in Magdeburg means that he will be doing a bit of teaching in our faculty while holding down his job in Stanford. Students will thus continue to have the opportunity to get to know him.

Gabriel is an Austrian citizen who grew up in Vienna. He went to the Vienna University of Technology where he earned his BSc in Media Informatics and Visual Computing in 2007, his MSc in Visual Computing in 2010, and his doctorate (in his case a “Dr.techn.”) in 2013. His research focuses on visual computing in medicine and medical image processing, in particular on the analysis of vascular structures.

An example of the kind of images which Gabriel is working on is shown in the middle of this page and involves visualizations of the human aorta suffering from a dissection. Gabriel explains the images: The cardiovascular disease aortic dissection is characterized by the formation of a secondary flow channel that divides the aorta into two channels (true and false lumen) separated by the thin elastic dissection flap. It is a serious condition with a high risk of late complications, such as aortic rupture. A comprehensive analysis, involving a multidisciplinary team of experts, is required for an informed diagnosis and treatment. This analysis typically starts with segmentation of the true lumen (red) and the false lumen (blue) in computed tomography angiography data using machine learning (left image). The middle images show a slice of the segmentation (top), and the subsequently calculated surface meshes with the outer vessel wall (bottom). Computational fluid dynamics simulations are then carried out and the results are visualized with ray tracing (right image).

Already confused? Join Gabriel’s class and learn all about it.

Gabriel is not just a computer scientist, but was an accomplished figure skater in his youth. He then moved to ice dancing from 2000 until 2005 and qualified to coach figure skaters through a series of exams from 2005 to 2010. Until today he enjoys skating as a past-time, even if where he currently lives, California, provides more opportunities for surfing than skating!