Outreach
Science Communication
An important part of conducting excellent research is to communicate its processes, findings, conditions, and challenges.
Our approach to science communication is to utilize multifaceted ways and channels of communication to show the variety and diversity of research projects at ZiF. There are established forms of public relations like press releases or newspaper articles, lectures and panel discussions, or newer media channels and formats like YouTube, LinkedIn, BlueSky, Instagram, the podcast "InterSpaces", and the blog "Interdisciplinarity".
On these pages you can browse through our latest videos, podcast episodes and news posts. You can also subscribe to our monthly newsletter for regular updates on all ZiF activities.
Video: Auf der Suche nach Frieden im Übergang vom Mittelalter zur Frühen Neuzeit
In seinem öffentlichen Vortrag im Juni 2025 im ZiF betrachtete Masaki Taguchi zwei historische Phänomene vergleichend: einerseits die Fehdeführung im deutschen Spätmittelalter und ihr Verbot durch den Ewigen Landfrieden (1495) und andererseits die landesweiten Unruhen in Japan sowie ihre Befriedung unter Toyotomi Hideyoshi am Ende des 16. Jahrhunderts. Es moderierte der Historiker Andreas Rüther (Bielefeld).
Podcast: Using New Methods to Support Interdisciplinary Collaboration
One subject we always think about at ZiF is how to support our fellows and their work in the best ways possible since they have to combine all their different disciplinary backgrounds, methods and research cultures in a few months of working together. To come to terms with these differences often takes up quite some of the joint research time. How is it possible to avoid more of the frictional losses and the possible dissatisfaction with interdisciplinary work? What kind of maybe more unusual – meaning within the scientific community – methods could be integrated into the framework of the research group to help them make their work as efficient as possible? You can listen to this episode here.
News Post: Hacking for Ecology
Can artificial intelligence help to make scientific literature for ecology more accessible, make better use of data and promote communication between researchers and practitioners? To answer this question, the ZiF research group "Mapping Evidence to Theory in Ecology" hosted a hackathon, a programming competition, from 20 to 22 January. There was a great deal of interest: 'We had numerous applications from all over the world', reports Jennifer D'Souza from the TIB (Leibniz Information Centre for Science and Technology and University Library) Hannover, the organiser of the hackathon. A total of 40 people in 12 teams ultimately took part, some of them at ZiF, others online. 'The biggest challenge was dealing with the time zones', says D'Souza. Read More
Publications: Research on Interdisciplinarity
"Inducing Interdisciplinarity: Irresistible Infliction? The Example of a Research Group at the Center for Interdisciplinary Research (ZiF), Bielefeld, Germany" by Sabine Maasen from the book "Practising Interdisciplinarity". Read More