News: Leadership change: Michèle Heurs hands over to Oliver Gerberding as ET Germany’s National Representative

19.05.2026

Leadership change: Michèle Heurs hands over to Oliver Gerberding as ET Germany’s National Representative

After three years in office, Michèle Heurs hands over her role as German Representative in the ET Forum of National Representatives to Oliver Gerberding. Oliver was unanimously appointed to this role by the German Research Unit leaders.

Formally, the National Representative (NR) has two mandates:

The first is to be a member of the Forum of National Representatives (FNR), a forum within the ET Collaboration that shall “discuss organisational and scientific aspects of the ET collaboration at a higher and more aggregate level compared to the CB (collaboration board)” and the FNR shall support the need “to organise matters at a national level, e.g. arrange for national R&D programs with funding agencies” (see ETC bylaws).
The second mandate is to “act as coordinator” for the German Coordination Group for the Einstein Telescope, facilitating the group to achieve its goals.