Leon Alpen wins first prize for his work Conception, construction and evaluation of a scale-down BioTech air filter – MicroBreeze. The idea came about as part of his bachelor’s thesis in his course Environmental engineering and managementsupervised by Prof. Dr.-Ing. Claas Heymann (TH Lübeck), at Green City Solutions. The company offers air filtration systems that use natural filters such as moss and are already used in cities such as Lisbon, Berlin and London as CityTrees. Leon Alpen’s MicroBreeze prototype is based on the company’s philosophy, uses living mosses as a filter and is designed for private spaces and offices – a unique concept to date.
Leon Alpen impressed the jury with the diversity of disciplines that are combined in his work: biology, process engineering, mechatronics, pollution control, industrial engineering and manufacturing technology. All of these areas are part of the courses in the Environmental Engineering and Management course and provided the basis for his successful bachelor’s thesis. From the concept to the construction, the 3D printing of the prototype, to testing and evaluating the results, he developed everything independently. Alpen is hopeful that his prototype will also be used in the future. What worries him: The social focus has shifted away from climate protection. I hope that more will be invested by the government.
Smart, robust, future-proof
The Possehl Prize is endowed with €5,000. A second prize of €3,000 and a third prize of €2,000 were also awarded. In addition to the written work, a five-minute short presentation is also included in the evaluation of the nine nominees. No matter how different the works are, one thing unites them: the confident willingness to tackle topics that others would avoid with good reason, me for example – but you turn them into something clever, robust and sustainable
says Prof. Dr. Wolfgang Sandberger, Chairman of the Possehl Foundation about the nominated students and the award winners. They build bridges. Bridges between idea and implementation. Between theory and application. Between the ‘You should…’ and the ‘I did it’
Sandberger continued.
Explore how toddlers hear without being able to talk to them
Wilhelm Frommholz received second prize for his bachelor’s thesis Investigating light-based imaging (fNIRS) in young children during speech perception: assessing the effectiveness of novel features in the course of study Hearing acoustics excellent. That’s what it’s about: The language acquisition phase in small children is very important for their development. Especially children with severe hearing problems who have to wear hearing systems cannot yet properly determine whether the devices are correctly adjusted for them. Until they have developed sufficient language comprehension, there is a loss of time, which has an impact on the children’s developmental prognosis.
In his research work, Wilhelm Frommholz uses the novel method functional near infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS), which measures neuronal activity and examines the child’s ability to distinguish between speech signals without the child’s involvement. For this he traveled to Australia Bionics Ear Institute in Melbourneto see Dr. Demi Gao to research. In his work, he supervised hearing experiments with children, evaluated the data sets and found that the maximum amplitude feature is the most promising candidate for clinical application of the system. At the TH Lübeck, Frommholz was taught by Prof. Dr. rer. supervised by Tim Jürgens.
Picasso’s Guernica brought to life
Nina Gierke secured third prize for her bachelor’s thesis Guernica Digital – Picasso’s masterpiece reimagined as an interactive application using Unreal Engine 5which she did in her bachelor’s degree Information technology and design written by Fabio Anthony. Using the Unreal Engine 5 program, Gierke developed an interactive, digital work of art that brings painter Pablo Picasso’s masterpiece to life. Users can wander through the painting and learn facts about the attack on Gernika in 1937. Gierke created her own characters and, with her design, makes the painting accessible to younger people. The jury was enthusiastic about how the graduate combines art, current politics and technology.
Dr. Muriel Helbig, President of TH Lübeck sums up the evening: The awarding of the Possehl Engineering Prize is always an incredibly exciting and beautiful moment for all of us. We have never had so many nominations in the history of the prize, which shows how committed our graduates are.
Also nominated for the Possehl Engineering Prize 2025
Clara Blume: Building research in a medieval bakery (Bachelor of Architecture)
Marc Vincent Fritzemeier: Into the Blue (Master of Urban Planning)
Jan Haack: Additively manufactured porous structure of 316L stainless steel (Master Mechanical Engineering)
Kyra Salewski: Conception and evaluation of a web-based application to optimize the BITV self-test process taking into account the human-centered design process (Master Media Informatics Online)
Katja Steinhagen: Proposal for a Viable Regulatory Framework for In Vitro Diagnostic Medical Devices in the Event of an Arboviral Outbreak in Europe (Master Regulatory Affairs)
Tobias Trottnow: Construction of the mechanics of a pneumatic and sensor interface of an anesthesia machine (Bachelor of Mechanical Engineering)
Background: About the Possehl Engineering Prize
Since 1983, the Possehl Engineering Prize has honored outstanding work by graduates of the Lübeck University of Technology once a year. Since the first awards ceremony, over 120 prizes have been awarded. The Possehl Engineering Prize illustrates the full diversity of teaching at the Lübeck University of Applied Sciences and its departments Applied Natural Sciences, Construction, Electrical engineering and computer scienceas well as Mechanical engineering and economics.