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 Prof.Dr. Stefan Hell from the Max-Planck Institute of Biophysical Chemistry (copyright Deutscher Zukunftspreis, photo: Ansgar Pudenz, source: Max-Planck-Institute of Biophysical Chemistry)
Stefan Hell was unwilling to accept that the resolution of a lens-based light microscope was limited by physical laws. With new and unconventional ideas developed over many years, he has turned accepted textbook knowledge on its head and revolutionized the possibilities of fluorescence microscopy. With STED microscopy developed by Dr. Hell, details within cells can be seen which remain hidden by even the best-resolving conventional microscopes.
The jury has selected this innovative and successful project, highlighting a new method which promises novel insights and technological applications in different fields. “Leica Microsystems, based in Mannheim, Germany, has announced that they will bring the STED microscope to the market in 2007,” says Hell. Because it will be the first commercial microscope in many years with substantially higher resolution, he adds: “It shouldn’t be difficult to sell.” The value of the instrument is not measured by the sales price, however. The substantially clearer images of details in cell interiors will likely lead to new discoveries in medical research, enabling related spin-offs: new forms of therapy, new medicines, and the associated value of these further discoveries. “This market doesn’t only have another order of magnitude, but a human dimension,” remarks Hell.
Born in 1962, Stefan Hell studied Physics in Heidelberg. He had “fantastic” teachers, from whom he acquired the enthusiasm to become a physicist, engage in research and strive to understand of the workings of nature. After attaining his doctoral degree in Heidelberg in 1990, he initially pursued his ideas as a “freelance inventor.” After a time as a postdoc at the EMBL (European Molecular Biology Laboratory) in Heidelberg, he traveled to the university in Turku, Finland, in 1993, where he worked as a group leader. There he developed the principles of STED microscopy. In 1996 Hell began as the principle investigator of a junior research group at the Max Planck Institute of Biophysical Chemistry in Göttingen, where he has lead the Department of NanoBiophotonics since 2002. Hell is a scientific member of the Max Planck Society, and since 2004, an honorary professor for experimental physics at the Georg-August University in Göttingen . He has received numerous awards: the Prize of the International Commission for Optics (ICO), among others. A look at the inside of cells becomes sharper: Both figures above show the filaments in a human nerve cell; left with a common confocal microscope, right with a STED microscope plus mathematical deconvolution. The resolution of the STED microscope is better by more than an order of magnitude.
Source: MPI Biophysical Chemistry
To the picture at the start page: A look at the inside of cells becomes sharper: Both figures show the filaments in a human nerve cell; left with a common confocal microscope, right with a STED microscope plus mathematical deconvolution. The resolution of the STED microscope is better by more than an order of magnitude.
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