The recent technological breakthrough in cryo electron tomography (cryoET) opens to imaging, at close to atomic resolution, of macromolecular complexes in their native cellular context. This technique is seminal for a new field in Life Sciences referred to as cellular structural biology which is starting to shed light on how fine conformational states of protein...
Biological processes at the interface of cell and developmental biology are highly dynamic and take place on several spatial and temporal scales. Methods allowing to visualise and quantify these processes across scales are becoming indispensable for modern biological and biomedical research and applications. Fluorescent microscopy has emerged as a powerful technique to acquire spatial and...
MERMAID (Multi-Emission Radioisotopes – Marine Animal Imaging Device) proposes a unique imaging approach that opens the door to unexplored research paths in various disciplines. MERMAID will be the first dedicated imaging device for radioisotope imaging of small aquatic animals, thus paving the way to innovations in sustainable aquaculture and expanding the use of zebrafish as...
The field of optogenetics is a relatively young discipline in the research field of biology investigating possibilities to remotely control genetically modified cells with visible light. This is achieved by the reversible control of isolated signalling components. Optogenetic proteins have the property to change their conformation and affinity upon illumination with light of a specific...
Although most people associate x-rays with medical applications or security scans, their use is widespread, with many industrial sectors and scientific disciplines dependent on them. For over a century, x-rays have been primarily used in a binary fashion, recording if they are absorbed by matter or not, termed attenuation contrast. However, x-rays are waves, exhibiting...
Glass and glass ceramics are attractive alternatives to the crystalline materials widely used in radiation detectors in basic research as well as for applications in medical diagnostics and homeland security detectors. The materials can be fabricated in moulds or by sol-gel techniques. Therefore, they can be prepared in various geometrical shapes such as blocks, plates,...
Any sensitive detection instrument seeks to isolate a usually very rare signal out of -an often overwhelming amount of- undesired, disturbing background events. Hence, breakthroughs in an instruments’ sensitivity are typically associated with more efficient detection of the former and/or more effective suppression of the latter. For sensitive optical devices this implies that the detection...
The enormous potential of silicon sensors in precise time measurement of ionizing particles is far from being exploited. At present, the best time resolutions in pixelated silicon is obtained by the proponents that have measured 100 and 130ps with low-noise ultra-fast SiGe HBT electronics in hybrid and monolithic implementations, respectively, without internal gain mechanism. Recently,...
Silicon-based photonic biosensors integrated into a semiconductor chip technology can lead to major advances in point-of-care applications, food diagnostics, and environmental monitoring through the rapid and precise analysis of various substances. In recent years, there has been an increasing interest in sensors based on photonic integrated circuits (PIC) because they give rise to cost effective,...
III-Nitride semiconductors (GaN, InN, AlN and their alloys) know an extremely rapid and extensive development in electronics and optoelectronics where lighting represents the first application. White LED lighting systems are based on indirect phosphor photoluminescence with nitride LED as an exciting source, although nitride materials offer theoretically the unique potential of a direct electroluminescence at...
This proposal aims at validating a novel readout concept for the front-end of 2D pixelated detectors that is under development by the ESRF and the University of Heidelberg under the name of digital integration. This new concept combines features of both photon-counting and charge-integrating techniques. It is particularly suitable for X-ray detectors that need to...
The idea of global, low earth orbit satellite constellations delivering high data rate free-space communication from and to any point in the world is reaching maturity. Projects by SpaceX, OneWeb, Facebook and Google are only a few examples of many initiatives which have recently been publicised. Key to the success of such deployments is the...
The era of Big Data has opened a new chapter in various fields of science, medicine, and business by allowing knowledge to be extracted from vast quantities of collected data, which has never been possible before. In High Energy Physics, the discovery of the Higgs boson would not have been possible without a carefully designed...
This project will investigate innovative ways to realise single photon visible light imagers for a number of applications in astronomy, quantum technologies, autonomous systems, and life sciences. The main objective is to create image sensor designs suitable for adaptive optics systems and low-light level spectroscopic and imaging applications, based on detailed semiconductor and technology device...
Life is more than the sum of its constituent molecules. It is dependent on the way these molecules interact and cooperate with each other, i.e., the way they are organised in self-sustaining chemical reaction networks. Understanding the general chemical organisation underlying living systems, and even more so the ability to have such systems emerge and evolve...
The socio-economic impact of Alzheimer’s Disease (AD) in Europe is around €175B annually. There is no cure today but pharmaceutical companies invest heavily in developing new drugs. However, each newly developed drug has to be assessed through a series of clinical trials. This demands major resources in the lifecycle of a new drug. Within the...
Nowadays, mammography screening is the most effective tool to fight breast cancer. Still, more than 30% of cancers are not detected, in particular in case of dense breast tissue. Today, X-ray detectors for mammography are optimised for resolution but still lack in sensitivity if compared to angiography systems. Reason is the different technology they rely on. Mammography is...
Glass is one of the oldest materials used by mankind. In terms of its optical properties as well as mechanical, chemical and physical resilience, glass remains unmatched and significantly outperforms polymers in most applications in academia and industry. However, glass is notoriously difficult to shape and thus is often disfavoured over polymers. For novel, innovative...
Cancer is among the main causes for death in the EU. According to Eurostat more than 350,000 cancer-related surgeries in Germany and France were carried out in 2016 only. All surgeries face the same challenge: Was all cancerous tissue removed from the patient? Answering this question reliably during the surgery itself is vital, but unfortunately not possible...
High-content screening (HCS) is a technology for high-throughput phenotypic analysis of cells which is integrated into all aspects of contemporary drug discovery and development and increasingly attracts attention in cell biology. HCS enables investigating a variety of cell phenotypes including those linked to the cell metabolism. However, despite the growing interest to understand metabolism – in particular as a...
