Dirk Praetorius

Dirk Praetorius is a Professor of Numerics of Partial Differential Equations at the Vienna University of Technology (TU Wien), within the Institute for Analysis and Scientific Computing, part of the Faculty of Mathematics and Geoinformation. He leads research in numerical methods for PDEs, with a focus on Finite Element Methods (FEM), Boundary Element Methods (BEM), and computational micromagnetics. His work emphasizes adaptive algorithms, a-posteriori error estimation, and efficient numerical solvers. Praetorius has received awards such as the TU Best Teacher Award (2021) and TU Best Lecture Award (2019). He is also a Senior Editor of Computational Methods in Applied Mathematics and serves on the editorial board of Applied Numerical Mathematics.

His research interests span numerical analysis, including adaptive methods for PDEs, matrix compression techniques (e.g., hierarchical matrices), and software development for computational science. Notable contributions include the development of open-source software like MooAFEM (adaptive FEM in MATLAB), Commics (micromagnetic simulations), and HILBERT (BEM library). These tools address challenges in adaptive mesh refinement, iterative solvers, and large-scale scientific computing.

Praetorius has supervised numerous PhD students and postdocs, contributing to impactful publications in journals such as Numerische Mathematik, SIAM Journal on Numerical Analysis, and Computer Physics Communications. His work bridges theoretical analysis and practical applications, with a focus on achieving optimal computational efficiency and rigorous error control.

In addition to research, Praetorius has led initiatives like TUForMath to foster academic engagement and has been a key contributor to collaborative projects in computational electromagnetics and materials science.