First doctoral student at RWU

Weingarten - Doing a doctorate and obtaining a doctorate - this has recently become possible at the Universities of Applied Sciences (HAW) in Baden-Württemberg. The HAW BW doctoral association was founded in 2022 for this purpose. 24 universities are involved - RWU is one of them.

Doing a doctorate in the association

"Obtaining the right to award doctorates is a great success for the universities of applied sciences in the state and at the same time an important milestone for their further development and profiling. With the option to also do a doctorate in the HAW association, we are expanding our educational offer and promoting young academics," says Henning Rudewig, Chancellor of RWU and board member of the doctoral association.

Previously, the right to award doctorates was reserved for universities and universities of teacher education (PH): As a doctoral candidate, you therefore needed at least one partner university or PH at which the initial supervision was also located. "As the UAS are distributed decentrally throughout the country, we are improving access to doctorates in general with the doctoral association and also making an important contribution to equal opportunities," adds Professor Dr. Michael Pfeffer, Vice-Rector for Research, International Affairs and Transfer at RWU.

Fascination with AI

Two years after its foundation, the first doctoral student is now starting his doctorate at RWU: Nishanth Nandakumar is part of a research group that deals with artificial intelligence (AI) and computer vision. In his research project, he is specifically concerned with the application of AI in the industrial sector; his thesis is entitled "Data Generative Approaches for Industrial AI Applications".

Professor Dr. Jörg Eberhardt, who is part of the doctoral association, is the first supervisor at RWU. He teaches and researches in the fields of machine vision, optics and 3D technologies and heads the bachelor's degree program in Industrial Engineering. "Together, we have already published our first scientific paper , which provides an overview of the methods available for collecting artificial data in industry," says Nishanth Nandakumar.

From India to Weingarten for a doctorate

Nishanth Nandakumar came to Weingarten in 2019 for his master's degree in Mechatronics. Prior to this, he completed his bachelor's degree in Mechanical Engineering in India. He was already so fascinated by AI during his master's that he attended all the modules on the subject without exception. Parallel to his studies, he worked as an assistant in the RoboLab at RWU.

Since completing his master's degree, Nishanth Nandakumar has been a research assistant at RWU: He is part of the "AI-based digital twin" research project, which is funded by the Carl Zeiss Foundation. "We are investigating the question of how digital twins can use AI to independently adapt to a particular production system and keep it up to date," explains the doctoral student. Together with Jörg Eberhardt, he came up with the perfect idea for a doctorate that is linked to the research project.

Nishanth Nandakumar would like to complete his doctorate at the end of 2026. And after that? "I like research and I enjoy learning new things. That's why a postdoc position would be interesting for me, for example," says Nishanth Nandakumar.

Text: Lisann Gauss