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EXC 171:  Microscopy at the Nanometer Range (within DFG Research Centre CMPB)

Subject Area Neurosciences
Basic Research in Biology and Medicine
Medicine
Term from 2006 to 2018
Project identifier Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 32501626
 
Final Report Year 2020

Final Report Abstract

One of the most important challenges in neuroscience is to unravel the basic mechanisms of neurodegenerative and psychiatric diseases. The Center for Nanoscale Microscopy and Molecular Physiology of the Brain (CNMPB) therefore aimed on utilizing the revolutionary developments in advanced microscopy for the discovery of the complex molecular processes that underlie brain development and dysfunction. On this basis, new diagnostic tools and therapeutic strategies have been identified and developed for prevention and treatment of relevant disorders. Basis of the highly successful research alliance was the DFG Research Center Molecular Physiology of the Brain (CMPB), which has been established in 2002 and expanded by the Cluster of Excellence Microscopy at the Nanometer Range in 2006. In the final prolongation phase the two were fused as CNMPB. The CMPB/EXC/CNMPB has profoundly changed the academic landscape in Göttingen, and succeeded in creating an integrated and interdisciplinary neuroscience campus, including groups from the University, the University Medical Center, two Max Planck Institutes, the German Primate Center, and the Laser Laboratory Göttingen e.V. on an equal footing. This development has been supported by creation of key professorships, now tenured, in bridging areas that were not covered before. CNMPB scientists have contributed to international visibility by publishing 1075 peer-reviewed papers in relevant scientific journals since 2006. The most prominent highlight is the Nobel Prize in Chemistry that CNMPB speaker Stefan Hell received in 2014 for the development of stimulated emission depletion (STED) microscopy, and its successfully application to live neuronal tissues. The CNMPB has been catalyst for the creation of interdisciplinary graduate schools, especially in biophysics and neuroscience. In total, 108 doctoral theses were completed, 9 Junior Research Groups were established, and various young CNMPB scientists obtained attractive offers for professor positions subsequent to their CNMPB engagement. CNMPB scientists were involved in establishment of numerous local research consortia (CRCs, FORs, and start-ups). In 2014, the construction of the Center for Biostructural Imaging in Neurodegeneration (BIN) was completed as a straightforward extension of the CNMPB’s goals. Finally, 16 years of cutting-edge CNMPB research provided the basis for the successful proposal of a new life science cluster within the Excellence Strategy of the Federal Government and the Länder. In 2019, the Cluster of Excellence ‘Multiscale Bioimaging: From Molecular Machines to Networks of Excitable Cells’ and successor of the CNMPB commenced its operations.

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