Prof. Dr Joachim Peinke, university lecturer in physics and spokesperson for ForWind, the centre for wind energy research at the universities of Oldenburg, Hanover and Bremen, was appointed Vice President of the European Academy of Wind Energy (EAWE) in Trondheim (Norway) at the end of September. EAWE is an association supported by research centres and universities that conduct research into wind energy. The aim is to network, coordinate and promote research, teaching and development across Europe. A total of 29 institutions from seven European Union countries are members of the EAWE. Over 80 per cent of Europe's cutting-edge research in the field of wind energy is coordinated there. "Wind energy is becoming increasingly important for the energy supply of the future. This is both an opportunity and a major challenge for science and research. It is therefore essential that a European, interdisciplinary network is established that responds to the latest developments and from which all participants can benefit," explains Peinke. "As Vice President of the EAWE, I would like to drive this networking forward even more and expand the research that is already taking place at a high level." Peinke, who was appointed to the University of Oldenburg in 1998, studied physics in Tübingen, where he completed his doctorate and habilitation. He then worked at the Institute for Low Temperature Physics (C.N.R.S.) in Grenoble, France, with a research grant from the German Research Foundation (DFG). Peinke was a Heisenberg scholarship holder of the DFG and conducted research as a research assistant at the Institute of Physics at the University of Bayreuth. The physicist has been spokesman for ForWind since January 2008.