Our research encompasses diverse projects and collaborations at the University of Hamburg and beyond. Find below information about the PI and the current team.
PI | Post-Doctoral | PhD | Bachelor’s and Master’s | Alumni
Principal Investigator
Johannes Lederer
Johannes is Professor in the Department of Mathematics, Computer Science, and Natural Sciences at University of Hamburg. He is the chair of Mathematics for Data-Driven Methods. After receiving a MSc in Physics, he started his Doctor of Sciences under the supervision of Sara van de Geer and Peter Bühlmann at ETH Zürich in 2010 and obtained the degree in 2012. After that, he was a post-doctoral researcher hosted by Martin Wainwright at UC Berkeley, until he accepted the position as the Jacob Wolfowitz Visiting Assistant Professor in the Department of Statistical Science at Cornell University in 2013. In 2015, he joined the University of Washington as Tenure-Track Assistant Professor of Statistics and Adjunct Assistant Professor of Biostatistics. In 2018, Johannes became Professor at the Ruhr-University Bochum. He was then appointed to his current position in Hamburg in 2023. Johannes is also Affiliate Faculty at the University of Washington, and he was Visiting Professor at UC Louvain (2017), University of Hong Kong (2020), and University Gustave Eiffel (2023). Moreover, Johannes is an associate editor of the Electronic Journal of Statistics and the Canadian Journal of Statistics.
johannes.lederer@uni-hamburg.de
Post-Doctoral Researchers
Ayşe Çobankaya
Ayşe received her Master’s and PhD degree from the Mathematics department at Cukurova University, Turkey. Her thesis involved algebraic topology, topology, module theory, and homological algebra. She is now working with Johannes on mathematical theories for deep learning.
ayse.cobankaya@uni-hamburg.de
Mahsa Taheri
Mahsa received her Master’s degree in artificial intelligence from IUT, Iran, in 2017, and her PhD in mathematics from Ruhr-University Bochum in 2022. Mahsa and Johannes are working at the intersection of mathematics and computer science in high-dimensional statistics and deep learning.
mahsa.taheri@uni-hamburg.de
PhD Students
Yannick Düren
Yannick studied computational engineering science at RWTH Aachen University and received his Master’s degree in 2017. Yannick and Johannes are currently working on methods for high-dimensional statistics and biostatistics; in particular, they are interested in the application of probabilistic graphical models in the field of genetics.
yannick.dueren@rub.de
Pegah Golestaneh
Pegah received her Master’s degree in artificial intelligence from IUT, Iran, in 2016. Pegah and Johannes are developing statistical theories for deep learning.
pegah.golestaneh@uni-hamburg.de
Ayla Jungbluth
Ayla is a PhD student in mathematical statistics at Ruhr-University Bochum in cooperation with an engineering company. She received her Master’s degree in mathematics from Ruhr-University Bochum in 2022. Ayla and Johannes are currently working on time-series forecasting based on deep learning.
ayla.jungbluth@rub.de
Mike Laszkiewicz
Mike received his Master’s degree in mathematics from Ruhr-University Bochum in 2019. He did his Master’s thesis with Johannes on high-dimensional graphical modeling. He is currently working on the intersection of high-dimensional statistics and deep learning. Mike is co-advised by Asja Fischer (Ruhr-University Bochum).
mike.laszkiewicz@rub.de
Benedikt Lüdtke Schwienhorst
Benedikt obtained his Master’s degree in statistics from the Humboldt University of Berlin. He wrote his Master’s thesis on the use of dropout regularization in extended generalized linear models. Currently, he works on the comparison of frequentist and Bayesian methods for inference in particular with respect to robustness. Benedikt is co-advised by Nadja Klein (TU Dortmund).
benedikt.luetke.schwienhorst@uni-hamburg.de
Ali Mohaddes
Ali received his Master’s degree in applied mathematics from Sharif University of Technology. He did his Master’s thesis on rough paths and their applications in machine learning. Now, he is working on the mathematical theory of deep learning and on extreme-value theory.
ali.mohaddes@uni-hamburg.de
Bachelor’s and Master’s Students
We have a number of Bachelor’s and Master’s students; contact us if you are interested in joining.
Alumni
Former post-doctoral researchers and PhD students with subsequent jobs:
Yunqi Bu
Data Scientist at Amazon, Seattle
Somnath Chakraborty
Spiritual Leader
Shih-Ting Huang
Post-Doctoral Researcher at Washington University, St. Louis
Nehemy Lim
Visiting Assistant Professor at University of Connecticut, Storrs
Fang Xie
Assistant Professor BNU-HKBU United International College, Zhuhai
Rui Zhuang
Data Scientist at Microsoft, Bellevue
Johannes Lederer 