Business Breakfast

Though it is a part of our everyday life, it is still a phenomenon. Sometimes it enrages us and is the reason for us coming late to appointments or forcing us to make a detour. Car drivers are always well advised to listen to traffic news. Otherwise one is immediately caught up in it – in the traffic jam. A frequently asked question about traffic jams is: How on earth did this jam arise here? It is especially difficult to understand this phenomenon when first you are caught up in it for hours and then, suddenly out of nowhere, the road is clear to drive again.

We kindly invite you to our event series „Business Breakfast“ at Hyatt Regency in Cologne. This time we welcome the physicist and „Master of traffic jams“ professor Michael Schreckenberg. His „Nagel-Schreckenberg-Modell“, which he developed during the 90s explains the famous phenomenon of „traffic jam out of nowhere“.

How does a traffic jam arise? Who is steering? Which mistakes do people make in traffic jams? These questions are part of Schreckenberg’s research on traffic. While first not being taken seriously, his findings quickly attracted interest. Schreckenberg had been hired by the state government of North Rhine Westphalia to register, display and forecast traffic jams. In a very amusing way he now explains his scientific results to his audience.

Professor Michael Schreckenberg studied physics and received his doctor’s degree at University of Cologne. In 1997 he held the world’s first professorship in physics of transport and traffic at University Duisburg-Essen. For more than 15 years he has been working on the modelling, simulation and optimization of transport systems in huge networks, especially in traffic, and its influence on human behaviour. His current activities include e.g. online traffic forecasts and the analysis of dynamic mechanisms in large crowds.

Invitation
PDF (499 KB)