Antje Boetius has held a professorship for Geomicrobiology at the University of Bremen since 2009. She also leads the Research Group Microbial Habitats at the Bremen Max Planck Institute for Marine Microbiology as well as the Helmholtz-Max Planck Joint Research Group for Deep-Sea Ecology and Technology at the Alfred Wegener Institute, Helmholtz Center for Polar and Marine Research in Bremerhaven.

Challenging expeditions

In their grounds for the award, the Braunschweig Scientific Society praises the Bremen marine biologist for her research on deep-sea ecosystems, citing in particular her groundbreaking use of underwater robots. She earned an international reputation for her discovery of the key organisms of anaerobic methane conversion. The bestowal document proclaims “Antje Boetius belongs to the group of illustrious researchers who combine technically challenging expeditions in the unmapped regions of our planet with precision laboratory work, and are at the same time able to put their research results in a global context “. In her laudatory speech, Dr. Antje Schwalb from the Technical University of Braunschweig added: “Her interdisciplinary strands of research create bridges between Biology, Chemistry, and Geoscience” .