Gunnar Hornig obtained his PhD in 1997 from the Ruhr-Universität Bochum (RUB), Germany. He led a junior research group funded by the Volkswagen Stiftung for six years at RUB before he came for a one-year visiting position to the University of St Andrews. In 2005 he took up a position at the University of Dundee to build up a new group on Magnetohydrodynamics.