President
Prof. Dr. Birgit Kleinschmit

Thünen-Institut
Bundesallee 5038116 Braunschweig
- Telephone
- +49 531 596 1002
- Fax
- +49 531 596 1099
- praesidentin@thuenen.de
About the person
Professor Birgit Kleinschmit from Braunschweig took over as President of the Thünen Institute on 1 February 2025. Prior to this, the forestry scientist, who holds a doctorate, worked for 22 years as Professor of Geoinformation in Environmental Planning at the Technical University (TU) of Berlin.
Birgit Kleinschmit was born in Münster/Westphalia in 1973. In 1993, she began her studies in forest science at the Georg-August University of Göttingen. She then completed her doctorate on the subject of ‘Natural forest monitoring with remote sensing methods’ and subsequently worked as a software developer. In 2003, at the age of 29, she was one of the youngest scientists to be appointed to a junior professorship and in 2011 to a university professorship in the Department of Geoinformation at TU Berlin.
As an expert, she has been advising the Federal Ministry of Food and Agriculture (BMEL) on the Scientific Advisory Board for Forest Policy since 2019 and has been its deputy chairwoman since 2023. She has been the spokesperson for several interdisciplinary research networks, is a reviewer for the German Research Foundation and the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation, among others, and a reviewer for various scientific journals. At TU Berlin, she was also deputy managing director of the institute and a member of the university's transfer advisory board. She was one of the 100 most important minds in science in Berlin in 2024 and was a keynote speaker at COP27 in Cairo in 2022. She also supports young female scientists as a personal mentor.
Birgit Kleinschmit is based in Braunschweig since 2006, where she lives with her husband and two children.
Professor Kleinschmit succeeds the deceased agricultural economist Prof Dr Folkhard Isermeyer.
- Xu, Chunyan; Förster, Michael; Beckschäfer, Philip; Talkner, Ulrike; Klinck, Caroline; Kleinschmit, Birgit; Modeling European beech defoliation at a regional scale gradient in Germany from northern lowlands to central uplands using geo-ecological parameters, Sentinel-2 and National Forest Condition Survey dataForest Ecology and Management, 576; Januar 2025; Herausgeber: Elsevier; DOI:10.1016/j.foreco.2024.122383
- Rocha, Alby Duarte; Vulova, Stenka; Förster, Michael; Gioli, Beniamino; Matthews, Bradley; Helfter, Carole; Meier, Fred; Steeneveld, Gert–Jan; Barlow, Janet; Järvi, Leena; Chrysoulakis, Nektarios; Nicolini, Giacomo; Kleinschmit, Brigit; Unprivileged groups are less served by green cooling services in major European urban areas, Nature Cities,6 :19; Mai 2024; Herausgeber: Springer Nature Limited; ISSN: 1476-4687 (online), 0028-0836 (print); DOI:10.14279/depositonce-22480
- Sachverständigenrat für Umweltfragen (SRU); Wissenschaftlicher Beirat für Biodiversität und Genetische Ressourcen (WBBGR); Wissenschaftlicher Beirat für Waldpolitik (WBW), inkl. Kleinschmit, Birgit; Renaturierung: Biodiversität stärken, Flächen zukunftsfähig bewirtschaften; Geschäftsstelle des Sachverständigenrates für Umweltfragen (SRU); Herausgeber: Geschäftsstelle des Sachverständigenrates für Umweltfragen (SRU) Luisenstraße 46, 10117 Berlin Tel.: +49 30 263696-0 info@umweltrat.de; www.umweltrat.de; Stellungnahme; April 2024; ISBN 978-3-947370-29-0
- Blickensdörfer, Lukas; Oehmichen, Katja; Pflugmacher, Dirk; Kleinschmit, Birgit; Hostert, Patrick; National tree species mapping using Sentinel-1/2 time series and German National Forest Inventory data; Remote Sensing of Environment, 304; April 2024; DOI:10.1016/j.rse.2024.114069
- Li, Hanyu; Vulova, Stenka; Rocha, Alby Duarte; Kleinschmit, Birgit; Spatio-temporal feature attribution of European summer wildfires with Explainable Artificial Intelligence (XAI); Science of The Total Environment, 916 :170330; März 2024; Herausgeber: Elsevier; ISSN: 0048-9697; DOI:10.1016/j.scitotenv.2024.170330
- Xu, Chunyan; Förster, Michael; Gränzig, Tobias; May, Johannes; Kleinschmit, Birgit; Relating soil moisture and Sentinel-2 vegetation index patterns to spruce bark beetle infestations prior to outbreak; Forestry: An International Journal of Forest Research, 2024; Februar 2024; Herausgeber: Oxford University Press; DOI:10.1093/forestry/cpae007
- Schulz, Christian; Förster, Michael; Vulova, Stenka; Rocha, Alby Duarte; Kleinschmit, Birgit; Spectral-temporal traits in Sentinel-1 C-band SAR and Sentinel-2 multispectral remote sensing time series for 61 tree species in Central Europe; Remote Sensing of Environment (RSE); 2024; DOI:10.1016/j.rse.2024.114162
- Holtgrave, Ann-Kathrin; Lobert, Felix; Erasmi, Stefan; Röder, Norbert; Kleinschmit, B; Grassland mowing event detection using combined optical, SAR, and weather time series; Remote Sensing of Environment, Volume 295, 1 September 2023, 113680; September 2023; Herausgeber: Elsevier; DOI:10.1016/j.rse.2023.113680
- Schraml, U.; Möhring, B.; Bauhus, J.; Lang ; Seeling, U.; Farwig, N.; Hafner, A.; Kätzel, R.; Kleinschmit, B; Lindner, M.; M., Niekisch; Mehr als „Gute fachliche Praxis“ – Vorschlag für eine anpassungsfähige Governance zum Erhalt resilienter Wälder und ihrer Ökosystemleistungen in Zeiten des globalen Wandels. Stellungnahme des Wissenschaftlichen Beirats für Waldpolitik.; Berichte über Landwirtschaft-Zeitschrift für Agrarpolitik und Landwirtschaft, 235; 2023; Herausgeber: BMEL; ISSN: 2196-5099; DOI:10.12767/buel.vi235.463
- Bauhus, Jürgen; Seeling, Ute; Dieter, Matthias; Farwig, Nina; Hafner, Annette; Kätzel, Ralf; Kleinschmit, Birgit; Lang, Friederike; Lindner, Marcus; Möhring, Bernhard; Die Anpassung von Wäldern und Waldwirtschaft an den Klimawandel; Berichte über Landwirtschaft-Zeitschrift für Agrarpolitik und Landwirtschaft; 2021; ISSN:2196-5099; DOI:10.12767/buel.vi233.386
Further publications can be found on the website of the Technischen Universität Berlin or on ORCHID.