leads the Ocean Governance Research Group at RIFS since September 2022. Trained as a geographer, she has specialized human-environment interactions, sustainable development and (environmental) governance of coastal and marine areas. Her research interest is in understanding how governance processes can be designed and supported in such a way that they foster sustainable approaches and provide responses to the challenges ahead. She employs transdisciplinary and transformative research approaches and focuses particularly on the interface of science, policy/administration, and civil society. Barbara was a research associate at the Chair of Physical Geography and Environmental Research at Saarland University, Germany, from 1997 to 2010 and received her PhD in 2002. From 2010 to 2017, she was a member of the Cluster of Excellence “The Future Ocean” in Kiel and employed as a research associate in the working group Coastal Risks and Sea Level Rise at the Institute of Geography at Kiel University. Here she researched and taught on climate change, sea-level rise impacts, and sustainability and governance of coastal areas. She joined the RIFS (formerly the Institute for Advanced Sustainability Studies, IASS) in 2017.

is the Head of the German Arctic Office at the Alfred Wegener Institute, Helmholtz Centre for Polar and Marine Research (AWI). The office serves as a vital platform for information exchange and cooperation among German stakeholders in science, politics, and industry, addressing Arctic-related challenges and opportunities.

Prior to his current role, Dr. Rachold served as Executive Secretary of the International Arctic Science Committee (IASC) from 2006 to 2017, first in Stockholm and later in Potsdam.

A geochemist by training, Dr. Rachold earned his Ph.D. from Göttingen University in 1994, where he also completed his undergraduate studies. Since then, he worked with the AWI. His research focused on land-ocean interactions in the Siberian Arctic and he led several land- and ship-based Russian-German expeditions.