World Championship Title for Manja Marz

Manja Marz (right) with Go professional Michael Redmond. Photo: Alexander Kiel
Manja Marz (right) with Go professional Michael Redmond. Photo: Alexander Kiel

PI in the Cluster of Excellence “Balance of the Microverse” wins Women’s Amateur World Championship in the strategy game Go

Prof. Dr. Manja Marz, Professor of RNA Bioinformatics and High-Throughput Methods at Friedrich Schiller University Jena and Principal Investigator (PI) in the Cluster of Excellence “Balance of the Microverse”, has been crowned the new Women’s Amateur World Champion in the strategy game Go. The 44-year-old secured the title last weekend at the “Senko Cup World Amateur Women’s Go Championship” in Tokyo. Marz has previously won the German Go Championship multiple times.

Competing against a strong international field of players from Asia, Europe, and the Americas, Manja Marz demonstrated exceptional strategic skill. The ancient board game Go is widely regarded as one of the most complex strategy games in the world. Originating in China more than 4,000 years ago, it later spread to Japan and beyond. Despite its cultural significance in East Asia, Go remains relatively niche in Europe—making the international success of a German player all the more remarkable.

Marz plans to invest the prize money of 300,000 yen (approx. €1,640) in specialized Go boards for visually impaired players and aims to collaborate with relevant associations. She has long been committed to promoting Go in Europe and founded the only offline Go school on the continent.