Honors and Awards (Selection) 2024 Recipient of the ICMI Community Service Award, ACM 2023 Induction into the “Hall of Fame of German Research“ 2023 Fellowship of the hessian.AI – The Hessian Center for Artificial Intelligence, Darmstadt 2023 Named Distinguished Fellow of the International Computer Science Institute (ICSI), Berkeley, USA 2022 Fifth Honorary Doctorate from Carl von Ossietzky University of Oldenburg 2021 Elected Foreign Member of the Engineering Academy of the Czech Republic (EACR) 2020 Fourth Honorary Doctorate from Czech Technical University (CTU) in Prague, Czech Republic 2019 Great Cross of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany, Berlin 2019 Honorary Medal of CIIRC Czech Technical University (CTU), Prague 2019 Named one of the 10 most influential figures in the history of AI in Germany by the National Society for Informatics (GI) 2019 Named one of 21 natural scientists among the “500 most important intellectuals” in Germany by the Cicero Magazine 2018 Honorary Citizenship of the City of Saarbruecken, Saarland, Germany 2017 Recipient of the Saarland Order of Merit 2017 Recipient of an Endowed Honorary Professorship by the Johannes Gutenberg Foundation, Mainz, Germany 2017 Entry in the Golden Books of the City of Mainz and the University of Mainz 2016 Recipient of the ICMI Sustained Accomplishment Award of the ACM 2015 Third Honorary Doctorate from Maastricht University, The Netherlands 2014 Induction to the Hall of Fame of “the Leading German Personalities in IT” of the Computer Weekly Magazine 2013 Recipient of the Donald E. Walker Distinguished Service Award of the International Joint Conferences on Artificial Intelligence for his substantial contributions, as well as his extensive service to the field of Artificial Intelligence throughout his career 2012 Eagle of Saint Venceslao Award, the highest recognition given by the Autonomous Province of Trento, Italy for his research on intelligent user interfaces and more than 15 years of scientific consulting services to the IRST research institute in Trento, Italy 2010 Elected Honorary Member of the GFFT for Outstanding Achievements in Research and Technology Transfer, Darmstadt, Germany 2008 Elected Full Member of the Berlin-Brandenburg Leibniz Academy of Sciences and Humanities (BBAW), Berlin 2007 Elected Honorary Member of the Institute for Information Technology OFFIS, Oldenburg 2006 Recipient of the Federal Cross of Merit, First Class, the Officer’s Cross of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany by the President of Germany 2005 Appointed as Spokesman of the Saarland Ambassadors 2004 GI Fellow (German Informatics Association) elected for “outstanding interdisciplinary contributions to computer science, linguistics, and psychology” 2004 Induction to the “Wall of Fame for Pioneers of Computer Technology” at HNF, the world’s largest computer museum, one of the four AI scientists featured on the electronic wall 2004 Elected Full Member of Acatech, the Council for Engineering Sciences at the Union of the German Academies of Science and Humanities 2004 Elected Full Member of the German National Academy of Sciences Leopoldina, the world’s oldest academy established 1652 by emperor Leopold I 2004 Appointed Saarland Ambassador by Prime Minister Peter Müller 2003 First German computer scientist elected Foreign Member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, Stockholm 2002 Second German Computer Scientist elected Full Member of the German Academy of Sciences and Literature, Mainz 2001 2001 German Future Prize – Germany’s highest scientific prize, presented by the Federal President of Germany for outstanding innovations in language technology and intelligent user interfaces 2001 Second Honorary Doctorate from Darmstadt University of Technology in Germany 2000 Karl Heinz Beckurts Award for pioneering and sustained scientific contributions to language technology and intelligent user interfaces and for the transfer of these results into industrial applications” 1999 EurAI (formerly ECCAI) Fellow, elected for significant and sustained contributions to the field of artificial intelligence (AI) in Europe 1998 Degree of Doctor Honoris Causa from the Institute of Technology at Linkoeping University, Sweden 1995 Information Technology European Award for “WIP a plan-based generation system for adaptive multimedia presentations” 1993 AAAI Fellow, elected for pioneering work in the development of dialog systems, and outstanding service to the artificial intelligence community 1991 Fritz Winter Award for seminal technical contributions to natural language dialog systems 1972 – 1977 Scholarship of the German National Merit Foundation, that is granted to 0.25% of the German student population
