Prof. Dr. rer. nat. Claudia Pacholski is Professor of Inorganic and Analytical Chemistry at the Berliner Hochschule für Technik. She studied Food Chemistry at the University of Hamburg and earned her doctorate with a dissertation entitled Self-Assembly of Zinc Oxide Nanoparticles and Investigation of Charge Carrier Dynamics. Following her PhD, she completed two postdoctoral research appointments abroad, at the University of California San Diego (USA), and the University of Fribourg (Switzerland). Before joining the Berliner Hochschule für Technik, she held a Heisenberg Fellowship and a substitute professorship at the University of Potsdam, worked as a research group leader at the Max Planck Institute for Intelligent Systems in Stuttgart, and served as a project manager at the Center for Applied Nanotechnology (CAN GmbH) in Hamburg.
At the University of Potsdam, Prof. Pacholski taught a wide range of undergraduate and graduate courses and supervised numerous postdoctoral researchers, doctoral candidates, master's students, and bachelor's students. In addition to her teaching activities, she has participated in professional development programs and developed innovative teaching concepts incorporating digital learning methods and active learning approaches.
Prof. Pacholski has served as a reviewer for funding organizations including the German Research Foundation (DFG), the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation, and the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF). Her research focuses on the design and synthesis of tailor-made nanomaterials for a variety of applications, particularly biosensors, as well as heterogeneous catalysis.
Throughout her career, Prof. Pacholski has successfully secured more than €4.5 million in competitive third-party funding from organizations including the DFG, the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF/EFRE), the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF), and the Volkswagen Foundation. These grants have supported projects on fiber-optic sensors, infrared spectroscopic analysis of the degradation of biodegradable mulch films, optical cell diagnostics and manipulation, and the development of tailor-made optical biosensors.
Prof. Pacholski has received numerous awards and honors, including the FöWiTec Award (2020), the DFG Heisenberg Fellowship (2016), the Günter Petzow Prize (2012), and the DFG Return Fellowship for Postdoctoral Researchers (2006). In 2008, she became a member of the WIN Collegium of the Heidelberg Academy of Sciences and Humanities.
