Erich Grädel is Professor for Mathematical Foundations of Computer Science at RWTH Aachen University, Germany. He got his doctoral degree in mathematics at the University of Basel (Switzerland) in 1987. He held research and teaching positions in Pisa, Berkeley, Zürich and Basel, before becoming a Professor in Aachen in 1993. He has held short-term positions as a visiting professor in Vienna, Paris, Bordeaux, and Cachan. His main field of research is logic in computer science, with particular emphasis on algorithmic model theory, logic and algorithms, and the theory of infinite games as a methodological basis for the synthesis and validation of large discrete systems. From 2002 to 2013, Grädel directed the European Network on Games for Design and Verification (GAMES). He has been an invited speaker at many of the major conferences in logic and theoretical computer science, including LICS, CSL, STACS, HIGHLIGHTS, Logic Colloquium, CADE, ICDT, FSTTCS, and MFCS, and has been an invited tutorial speaker at numerous conferences and schools. He has been an Editor of the Journal of Symbolic Logic, Logical Methods in Computer Science, the Journal of Logic and Computation, and Mathematical Logic Quarterly.