Harald Lesch, born in 1960 in Giessen, studied physics at the Justus Liebig University in Giessen and at the Rheinische Friedrich Wilhelms University in Bonn, where he received his doctorate in 1987 with a dissertation on nonlinear plasma processes in active galactic nuclei prepared at the Max Planck Institute for Radio Astronomy (MPIfR). From 1988 to 1991 he was a research assistant at the Landessternwarte Heidelberg-Königstuhl and the following year a visiting professor at the University of Toronto. In 1994 he habilitated at the University of Bonn. Since 1995, Harald Lesch has been Professor of Theoretical Astrophysics at the Institute of Astronomy and Astrophysics at the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich. Since 2002, he has also taught natural philosophy at the Munich School of Philosophy.
In addition, Harald Lesch is an expert reviewer for astrophysics for the German Research Foundation (DFG) and a member of the Astronomical Society and author of numerous non-fiction books.
Harald Lesch is an exceptional figure: a researcher who really enjoys talking about his work - "in German and without technical terms," as he himself says. He shows how this works not only in numerous lectures, but also in various broadcast formats on ZDF. In the ZDF program "Leschs Kosmos," for example, he explains scientific phenomena in an extremely clear and understandable way. Since January 2010, he has also presented the weekly program "Frag den Lesch," the annual two-parter "Terra X - Faszination Universum," as well as special programs such as. "Ein Fall für Lesch & Steffens." In 2016, Harald Lesch conquered another medium: In his YouTube channel "Terra X Lesch & Co," he presents weekly exciting news from the world of science and takes a look at current discussions on scientific topics.