Professor Ralf Steinmetz, Professor at the Department of Electrical Engineering and Information Technology (etit) at TU Darmstadt from 1996 to 2024, shaped research into an adaptable internet for the future at TU Darmstadt. He was the driving force behind the collaboration of leading scientists from various universities in the DFG Collaborative Research Centre ‘MAKI – Multi-Mechanism Adaptation for the Future Internet’. Under his leadership, the Collaborative Research Centre successfully laid the foundations for the future Internet during the maximum funding period of twelve years. Steinmetz was also co-initiator and Principal Investigator of the LOEWE centre emergenCITY, which has been conducting research into resilient infrastructures for digital cities that can withstand crises and disasters since 2020.

The vision of seamless communication has accompanied Steinmetz throughout his career. His scientific expertise and commitment have earned the busy etit professor with a secondary membership in the Department of Computer Science several awards, including an honorary doctorate from RWTH Aachen University, the appointment as a GI Fellow of the German Informatics Society and an ITG Fellow of the Information Technology Society of the Association of German Electrical Engineers (VDE), as well as being the first German scientist to be appointed both an IEEE Fellow and a Fellow of the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM).

In addition to his outstanding academic achievements, Steinmetz was also highly involved in university politics and teaching: He was a member of the university committees (Senate and University Assembly) and was also extremely committed to networking the etit and computer science departments: Large collaborative projects with colleagues from both departments were initiated by him and managed over many years. He was also a pioneer in the introduction of e-learning technologies and concepts at TU Darmstadt – long before their boom during the coronavirus pandemic.