The Lowy International School Supports Successful Goethe University–Tel Aviv University Winter School

16 February 2025

Prof. Tom Schonberg, co-organizer of the Winter School, and Prof. Roy Mukamel, from TAU’s School of Psychological Sciences, speak to the audience

Goethe University Frankfurt (GU) and Tel Aviv University (TAU) recently held a Winter School that brought together leading early career researchers (ECRs) from Germany and Israel for an engaging academic exchange on Adaptive Cognition in Noisy Environments. Hosted in the Brain Imaging Center building at GU, the event featured dynamic lectures, interactive group activities and ample networking opportunities.

A Platform for Collaboration, Learning, and Scientific Exchange

“The school brought people together to discuss and meet face-to-face; this creates a real human connection that can lead to scientific collaborations,” reflects Prof. Tom Schonberg—a neuroscientist from TAU—who co-organized the event with his colleague Prof. Christian Fiebach, from GU’s Department of Psychology.

“It really was a heartwarming success.”—Prof. Christian Fiebach, GU’s Department of Psychology.

The success of this Winter School was made possible through the generous support of multiple institutions, including TAU’s The Lowy International School, as well as the German-Israeli Foundation, the German U15, and TAU’s Minerva Center for Human Intelligence in immersive, augmented and mixed realities.

The Winter School included 12 Israeli early career researchers and 13 German early career researchers, as well as more advanced academics who gave talks on their work.

The event attracted 12 ECRs from Israel and 13 ECRs from Germany, alongside distinguished faculty members who gave talks on areas of expertise like attention, language, and motor control methods utilizing cutting-edge research methods like virtual reality and mobile EEG. With thought-provoking discussions, hands-on sessions, and even research on primates and rodents, the program offered an expansive and immersive educational experience.

“Participation in the Winter School was a truly valuable and very inspiring opportunity. It enabled me to interact with experts in the field, create potential collaborations with researchers from diverse backgrounds, and acquire new insights into my own research.”—Tamar Ben David, a PhD student at TAU’s Sagol School of Neuroscience

Cultivating Community in and Beyond the Classroom

Beyond academia, the Winter School featured an engaging social program, including a cooking class and local market tour, creating a relaxed environment for participants to connect beyond the classroom. The initiative also emphasized collaborative learning, with attendees divided into research teams and delivering a group presentation on the final day.

Winter School participants not only collaborated on academic matters, but in the kitchen, too.

Lea Alexandra Müller Karoza, a PhD student who attended from GU’s Scene Grammar Lab, said the whole experience was transformative. “I have honestly profited from it so much more than I ever thought possible,” Müller Karoza says.

“It was a unique experience, the atmosphere was open and collaborative and to meet people from all over Israel and Germany was so insightful.”—Müller Karoza, a PhD student at GU’s Scene Grammar Lab