日本学術振興会
Karthaus received a PhD from Johannes Gutenberg University of Mainz in Mainz, Germany, in 1992 under the supervision of Helmut Ringsdorf. From 1992 to 1993 he worked as a post-doctoral fellow of the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS) and the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation at Tohoku University. He then served as a research assistant from 1994 to 2000 at the Research Institute for Electronic Science at Hokkaido University in Sapporo.