Marion Merklein is Professor of Manufacturing Technology in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at Friedrich-Alexander University Erlangen-Nuremberg. After gaining her doctorate in 2001, she completed her habilitation in 2006. She has received several prizes and awards, e.g. the Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Prize of the DFG in 2013, the Bavarian Order of Merit in 2018 and will be awarded the SME Frederick W. Taylor Research Medal in 2024. She was Dean of the Faculty of Engineering from 2011 to 2015. Marion Merklein is currently a Senator of the German Research Foundation (DFG) and a member of various national academies, e.g. the German Academy of Science and Engineering (acatech), the Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences and Humanities (BBAW) and the German Academy of Sciences Leopoldina. Her research interests focus on forming technology, mechanical joining, material characterization and modelling as well as digitalization.