As scientist around the world

Dr. Stefan Takacs researches as part of the Erwin-Schrödinger-Fellowship for a year at the Professorship of Numerical Mathematics (Partial Differential Equations)

Whether Linz, Oxford or Chemnitz - Dr. Stefan Takacs, post-doc at the Professorship of Numerical Mathematics (Partial Differential Equations) at Technische Universität Chemnitz, has already visited many locations on behalf of science. The 29-year-old studied from 2003 to 2008 Mathematics and Industrial Mathematics at the University of Linz (Austria). Afterwards he conducted research as a doctoral candidate on fast solvers for optimal control problems. "In the classical simulation calculation it is for example possible to calculate the temperature distribution in a blast furnace if the heat sources are given. In an optimal control problem the question now is reversed: How should the heat sources be chosen in order to bring the temperature distribution as close as possible to an optimal distribution," Dr. Takacs says.

Since 2012 Dr. Takacs is Erwin-Schrödinger-Fellowship holder and has already spent one year as post-doc at the University of Oxford, where he was able to further enhance his research. After the year at Oxford he added one more at TU Chemnitz. Since November 2013 he completely dedicates himself to research on optimal control problems with pointwise inequality constraints. "Pointwise inequality constraints for example could be maximum and minimum temperatures, which may not be exceeded or fallen below at any point in the blast furnace. Including such conditions into the question, makes the whole of course more intricate," Takacs says. The native-born Austrian regularly presents his research results at meetings and conferences. Last year he gave lectures at the `Siam Annual Meeting´ in San Diego and at the `Preconditioning Conference´ in Oxford. "In addition to do research at the university it is always exciting to get in contact with scientists from abroad and to exchange ideas. You always learn something new and get a different perspective on things," Takacs says. At the Professorship of Numerical Mathematics (Partial Differential Equations) he works in the research group led by Prof. Dr. Roland Herzog. "I work with a very nice and international team. The working atmosphere is pleasant and Prof. Herzog as a contact person has always a sympathetic ear and supports us wherever he can."

In November 2014 Dr. Takacs will leave TU Chemnitz and return at first to Linz. For his career advancement he can imagine a job in Austria as well as abroad.

(Author: Damaris Diener, Translation: Jakob Landwehr)

Katharina Thehos
12.03.2014

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