PeopleofSuperintelligence

Researcher

Michael Kohlhase

Michael Kohlhase is a computer scientist whose work connects formal mathematics, symbolic AI, and language processing. He was born in Erlangen in 1964, earned a mathematics degree at Bonn in 1989, and completed a computer science doctorate and habilitation at Saarland in 1994 and 1999, with extended research visits to Carnegie Mellon, Amsterdam, Edinburgh, and SRI International. He developed OMDoc from 1998 to 2000 as a content-based format for mathematical knowledge that people can read and computers can process. His career includes research and teaching at Carnegie Mellon, a computer science professorship at Jacobs University, and a vice-director role at DFKI before he took a professorship at FAU in 2016. He is a professor of Knowledge Representation and Processing at FAU, where his work spans STEM knowledge representation, inference-based natural language processing, and computer-supported education; he contributed to OpenDreamKit and an OpenMath task force, and he teaches AI courses, including symbolic AI, in 2025 and 2026.

Born
1964
Works
455
Citations
3,491
h-index
29
Badges

Years link to their sources. Publication numbers from OpenAlex, as of 22 October 2026.

Timeline

  1. 1964–1999

    Education and research visits

    Born in Erlangen in 1964, he earns a mathematics degree from the University of Bonn in 1989, a computer science doctorate at Saarland University in 1994, and a habilitation there in 1999. His doctoral and postdoctoral research includes extended visits to Carnegie Mellon University, the University of Amsterdam, the University of Edinburgh, and SRI International.

  2. 1998–2000

    Developing the OMDoc format

    Alan Bundy's email prompts him to develop OMDoc in 1998 as a content-based format for mathematical knowledge. Version 1.0 appears in 2000 for mathematical documents designed to be machine-readable and human-readable.

  3. 2000–2003

    Research and teaching at CMU

    From 2000 to 2003, he conducts research and teaches at Carnegie Mellon's School of Computer Science, where he is appointed adjunct associate professor.

  4. 2003–2008

    Jacobs University and DFKI

    He becomes Professor of Computer Science at Jacobs University Bremen in September 2003. From 2006 to 2008, he serves as vice director of the Department of Safe and Secure Cognitive Systems at DFKI's Bremen lab.

  5. 2015–2019

    OpenDreamKit mathematics toolkit

    The EU-funded OpenDreamKit project runs from 2015 to 2019 and creates an open-source toolkit for virtual research environments in mathematics; Kohlhase is one of 70 researchers from 19 European universities involved. In a 2016 OpenDreamKit article, he explains how OpenMath and the Math-in-the-Middle ontology help mathematical software systems communicate.

  6. Since 2016

    Professor at FAU

    In September 2016, he takes the Professorship for Knowledge Representation and Processing at FAU. His research includes knowledge representation for STEM, inference-based natural language processing, and computer-supported education.

  7. 2018

    OpenMath task force

    The OpenMath Society mandates a task force for OpenMath CD changes in August 2018, and Kohlhase is among its initial members.

  8. October 2026

    Professor teaching symbolic AI

    He teaches Artificial Intelligence II at FAU in summer 2025 and Artificial Intelligence I in October 2026. The latter course covers the foundations of symbolic AI. As of October 2026, he is a professor of Knowledge Representation and Processing in FAU's Department of Computer Science.

Career

  1. Since 2017Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-NürnbergProfessor of Knowledge Representation and Processing
  2. 2006–2008DFKIVice director
  3. 2004–2016Constructor University
  4. From 2003Jacobs University BremenProfessor of computer science
  5. 2000–2003Carnegie Mellon UniversityResearcher, Adjunct associate professor
  6. University of AmsterdamResearcher
  7. University of EdinburghResearcher
  8. SRI InternationalResearcher

Education

  1. 1999Saarland UniversityHabilitation
  2. 1994Saarland UniversityDoctorate
  3. 1989University of BonnMathematics degree

From the biography and OpenAlex affiliations (the years of papers that list the organization), so some years are approximate.

Most-cited works

  1. OMDoc – An Open Markup Format for Mathematical Documents [version 1.2]2006 · Lecture notes in computer science · 238 citations
  2. A Search Engine for Mathematical Formulae2006 · Lecture notes in computer science · 128 citations
  3. Ωmega: Towards a mathematical assistant1997 · Lecture notes in computer science · 118 citations
  4. Higher-order semantics and extensionality2004 · Journal of Symbolic Logic · 108 citations
  5. A scalable module system2013 · Information and Computation · 104 citations

From OpenAlex, as of 21 October 2026.

  1. More people shaping AI studied at Massachusetts Institute of Technology than at any other institutionIncludes Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg. We estimate where the people shaping AI studied and where their careers led. Massachusetts Institute of Technology leads with 467 former students, including 291 recorded doctorates.
  2. The company share of AI researchers’ top papers was 31% in 2020–2024 and 8% in 1970–1974Includes Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg. We estimate where the people shaping AI worked when their most-cited papers appeared: the company share was 31% in 2020–2024 and 8% in 1970–1974, and Google led all organizations in 2020–2024.
  3. 11% of AI doctorate holders from 2010 to 2016 founded or led a company or lab by 10 years after graduationIncludes Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg. We estimate how often AI doctorate holders founded or led a company or lab by 10 years after graduation, how waiting times compare between founders and top jobs, and which universities trained the most.
  4. Google has the highest combined h-index among AI organizationsIncludes Carnegie Mellon University. We estimate that Google holds the highest combined h-index at 8,016, while universities account for 73% of the deduplicated total across AI organizations.

Colleagues

People named in this biography, and people with dated positions at the same organization in the same years.

Sources and credits

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  1. Michael Kohlhase - Wikipedia en.wikipedia.org. Checked 21 October 2026.
  2. OMDoc history · OMDoc omdoc.org. Checked 21 October 2026.
  3. Werkzeuge für die Wissensgemeinschaft | FAU fau.de. Checked 21 October 2026.
  4. OpenMath in OpenDreamKit · OpenDreamKit opendreamkit.org. Checked 21 October 2026.
  5. Prof. Dr. Michael Kohlhase · KWARC kwarc.info. Checked 21 October 2026.
  6. OMCD Task Force mandated · OpenMath openmath.org. Checked 21 October 2026.
  7. Michael Kohlhase - Artificial Intelligence (B.Sc./M.Sc.) | FAU ai.study.fau.eu. Checked 21 October 2026.
  8. Artificial Intelligence II [SerienID : 4225] | FAU.tv fau.tv. Checked 21 October 2026.
  9. Artificial Intelligence I (WS26/27) [SerienID : 4743] | FAU.tv fau.tv. Checked 21 October 2026.