Vera Demberg

Vera Demberg is a Professor of Computer Science and Computational Linguistics at Saarland University since 2016 and a Max Planck Fellow at the MPI for Informatics since 2024. She leads the Multimodal Language Processing research group at the Saarland Informatics Campus (Campus E1 4, Saarbrücken), focusing on interdisciplinary work bridging computer science and linguistics.

Educational Background:

• PhD in Informatics from the University of Edinburgh (2010)
• Independent Research Group Leader at Saarland University's Cluster of Excellence for Multimodal Computing and Interaction

Research Interests:
Her work integrates experimental and computational approaches to discourse processing, pragmatic modeling, and adaptive neural language generation. She investigates how language interacts with visual information and body language in multimodal contexts, developing reliable systems for human-computer interaction. Key emphases include individualized discourse modeling, cognitive aspects of language processing, and robust natural language generation architectures.

Scientific Awards:

• ERC Starting Grant "Individualized Interaction in Discourse" (2020)

Grants and Leadership:
As principal investigator of the ERC-funded project, she directs a research team exploring individualized discourse interactions. Her leadership spans both Saarland University and the Max Planck Institute, where she established the Multimodal Language Processing group to advance interdisciplinary research in language technology.

Labs and Teams:
She heads the Multimodal Language Processing research group at the Saarland Informatics Campus, which combines expertise in computational linguistics, computer vision, and behavioral analysis to study language-vision-body language integration in real-world communication scenarios.