Thomas Wiemann

Thomas Wiemann is a temporary Professor for Autonomous Robotics at Osnabrück University and a researcher at the German Research Center for Artificial Intelligence (DFKI), group Kooperative und Autonome Systeme. He has been active since 2007, focusing on 3D mapping, SLAM, and semantic interpretation of sensor data for robotics. He received his Dr. rer. nat. in 2013 and his habilitation in 2020. His work is widely recognized, with awards such as the Karman Innovation Award (2007) and the Intevation Free Software Award (2014).

Education:

• Habilitation in Computer Science, Osnabrück University (2020)
• Doctorate (Dr. rer. nat.) in Computer Science, Osnabrück University (2013)
• M.Sc. in Physics and Computer Science, Osnabrück University (2007)
• B.Sc. in Physics and Computer Science, Osnabrück University (2005)

Research Focus:
Thomas Wiemann's research is centered on autonomous robotics, particularly in 3D mapping, SLAM, and semantic environment understanding. His work includes the automatic generation of polygonal maps from point cloud data, large-scale 3D reconstruction, hyperspectral data integration, and hardware-accelerated SLAM systems using FPGAs and GPUs. He has developed open-source tools like the Las Vegas Reconstruction Toolkit (LVR) and contributed to ROS packages for 3D mapping and navigation.

Scientific Awards:

• Karman Innovation Award (2007) for his master’s thesis
• Intevation Free Software Award (2014) for his contributions to open-source software

Advising & Grants:
He has supervised over 60 bachelor’s and master’s theses, primarily in the areas of 3D mapping, SLAM, and robotics systems. His projects include SOILAssist (2019–2021), focusing on sustainable agriculture using robotics, and 3DinOS (2016–2017) for 3D documentation of historical buildings. He has also worked on DFG-funded projects like RoboRithmics.

Labs & Teams:
He is part of the Knowledge Based Systems Group at Osnabrück University and collaborates with the DFKI Robotics Innovation Center. His lab focuses on advanced 3D perception, semantic mapping, and energy-efficient robotic systems.