Photon Lasers Med 2015; 4(1): 13–17

Magazine section Snapshots

DOI 10.1515/plm-2014-0051 connections arriving into a particular region deep in the brain, when stimulated, powerfully reduce symptoms. Detailed information about the keynote and the con- Congress gleanings gress can be found at:

http://www.ecnp-congress.eu/~/media/Files/ 27th ECNP Congress congress/Berlin%202014/ECNP%202014%20 Monday%20-%20Low%20res%20final.pdf New addiction treatment targets, structural brain changes and in schizophrenia, findings on the effects of seasonal http://www.ecnp-congress.eu/ changes on the brain, and epigenetics as a possible target (24.11.2014) for intervention are some of the topics which were pre- sented and discussed during the 27th European College of Neuropsychopharmacology (ECNP) Congress which was Falling Walls Conference 2014 held for the first time in Berlin from 18 to 21 October 2014. The congress was opened by Karl Deisseroth, winner More than 20 top international researchers, 100 outstand- of several prestigious awards (2013 Brain Prize, 2014 Keio ing young scientists from around the world and 30 of the Medical Science Prize) and currently D.H. Chen Professor best science-based start-ups presented their impending of Bioengineering, Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at breakthroughs on 8 and 9 November 2014 in Berlin at the Stanford University, USA, with a keynote lecture entitled Falling Walls Conference. The Falling Walls Conference “Circuit dynamics of motivated behavior”. is an annual global gathering of forward thinking indi- Deisseroth developed two technologies which inte- viduals organized by the Falling Walls Foundation. It was grate basic methods in order to study normal and per- first held in 2009 to mark the 20th anniversary of the fall turbed brain structure and function in living organisms of the Berlin Wall and has since developed into a highly as well as post-mortem tissue: (1) CLARITY – a technology acclaimed annual platform for top international research. that can be used to transform intact biological tissue into a hybrid form in which tissue components are removed and replaced with exogenous elements for increased accessibility and functionality, and (2) optogenetics – a technique that uses light to control the activity of the brain. The advantages of both methods are to control and monitor individual neurons and measure changes in real time (optogenetics), and to produce highly detailed three- dimensional images of brain volumes (CLARITY). Nowadays, numerous labs worldwide are using optogenetics to understand and develop treatments for diseases of the brain and mental health conditions and to better understand the complex wiring of our brains. Berlin Wall (© David Lally @ PublicDomainPictures.net). One example of how optogenetics could point to better therapies came from work in Parkinson’s disease. In 2014, at the 25th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Deisseroth and his team used optogenetics to stimulate Wall, for the first time a Nobel Laureate who received different components of the brain’s wiring in animals his award only this year gave a presentation: the Göttin- with a version of Parkinson’s disease, and found that gen researcher Stefan Hell, who was awarded the Nobel 14 Magazine section

Prize for Chemistry for his role in developing stimulated Isamu Akasaki (Meijo University, Nagoya, Japan and emission depletion (STED) microscopy. Nagoya University, Japan), Hiroshi Amano (Nagoya Uni- As part of the conference, the Falling Walls Lab for versity, Japan) and Shuji Nakamura (University of Califor- young researchers and innovators and Falling Walls nia, Santa Barbara, CA, USA) “for the invention of efficient Venture, the competition for science-based start-ups, took blue light-emitting diodes which has enabled bright and place on the eve of the Conference, on 8 November 2014. energy-saving white light sources”. One of the young presenters of the Falling Wall Lab This year’s Nobel Laureates are rewarded for having Final 2014 and second prize winner of the Falling Walls invented a new energy-efficient and environment-friendly Young Innovators 2014 prize is the Egyptian Nermeen light source – the blue light-emitting diode (LED). In the Youssef from the University of Alberta in Canada. In spirit of Alfred Nobel the Prize rewards an invention of her presentation, entitled “Breaking the wall of type-1 greatest benefit to mankind; using blue LEDs, white light diabetes”, Youssef pitched her idea of using blue light can be created in a new way. With the advent of LED lamps to stimulate engineered fat cells to secrete insulin – we now have more long-lasting and more efficient alterna- an idea that could lead to needle-free management of tives to older light sources. type-1 diabetes. When Isamu Akasaki, Hiroshi Amano and Shuji Naka- The first prize of the Falling Walls Venture competi- mura produced bright blue light beams from their semi- tion was awarded to EyeTechCare for its innovative treat- conductors in the early 1990s, they triggered a fundamental ment of glaucoma, a degenerative disease of the optic transformation of lighting technology. Red and green diodes nerve that affects about 4% of the world population and had been around for a long time but without blue light, can lead to blindness. EyeTechCare has developed the white lamps could not have been created. Despite con- first ophthalmic device that operates with high intensity siderable efforts, both in the scientific community and in focused ultrasound (HIFU). It has been used to treat over industry, the blue LED had remained a challenge for three 1000 patients so far and is clinically tested and approved decades. for sale in Europe. So far, the French-based company has They succeeded where everyone else had failed. managed to collect 16 million euros in investments, which Akasaki worked together with Amano at the University allowed it to develop the product and to begin commer- of Nagoya, while Nakamura was employed at Nichia cialization (source: Falling Walls Foundation gGmbH). Chemicals, a small company in Tokushima. Their inven- For more information please also visit: tions were revolutionary. Incandescent light bulbs lit up the 20th century; the 21st century will be lit up by LED http://www.falling-walls.com/press/ lamps. press-releases White LED lamps emit a bright white light, are or long-lasting and energy-efficient. They are constantly http://uofa.ualberta.ca/news-and-events/ improved, getting more efficient with higher luminous newsarticles/2014/november/ualberta-grad- flux (measured in lumen) per unit electrical input power student-takes-second-in-falling-walls- (measured in watt). The most recent record is just over finale 300 lm/W, which can be compared to 16 lm/W for regular or light bulbs and close to 70 lm/W for fluorescent lamps. http://www.eyetechcare.com/uk/news/­ As about one quarter of world electricity consumption is science-start-up-the-year-2014,131.html used for lighting purposes, the LEDs contribute to saving (24.11.2014) the Earth’s resources. Materials consumption is also diminished as LEDs last up to 100,000 h, compared to 1000 for incandescent bulbs and 10,000 h for fluorescent lights. Awards The LED lamp holds great promise for increasing the quality of life for over 1.5 billion people around the world Nobel Prize in Physics 2014 who lack access to electricity grids: due to low power requirements it can be powered by cheap local solar power. October 7, 2014. The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences The invention of the efficient blue LED is just 20 years has decided to award the 2014 Nobel Prize in Physics to old, but it has already contributed to create white light in Magazine section 15 an entirely new manner to the benefit of us all (source: Scanning over the sample, nanometer for nanometer, “The 2014 Nobel Prize in Physics – Press Release”, Nobel- yields an image with a resolution better than Abbe’s stipu- prize.org). lated limit. See also: Eric Betzig and William Moerner, working separately, laid the foundation for the second method, single-mole- http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/ cule microscopy. The method relies upon the possibility physics/laureates/2014/press.html of turning the fluorescence of individual molecules on (24.11.2014) and off. Scientists image the same area multiple times, letting just a few interspersed molecules glow each time. Superimposing these images yields a dense super-image Nobel Prize in Chemistry 2014 resolved at the nanolevel. In 2006, Eric Betzig utilized this method for the first time. October 8, 2014. The 2014 Nobel Prize in Chemistry was Today, nanoscopy is used worldwide and new know­ awarded jointly to Eric Betzig (Janelia Research Campus, ledge of greatest benefit to mankind is produced on a daily Howard Hughes Medical Institute, Ashburn, VA, USA), basis (source: “The Nobel Prize in Chemistry 2014 – Press Stefan W. Hell (Max Planck Institute for Biophysical Chem- Release”, Nobelprize.org). istry, Göttingen, and German Cancer Research Center, Please also visit: Heidelberg, Germany) and William E. Moerner (Stanford University, Stanford, CA, USA) “for the development of http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/ super-resolved fluorescence microscopy”. chemistry/laureates/2014/press.html For a long time optical microscopy was held back by (24.11.2014) a presumed limitation: that it would never obtain a better resolution than half the wavelength of light. Helped by fluorescent molecules, the Nobel Laureates in Chemis- try 2014 ingeniously circumvented this limitation. Their Personnel issue ground-breaking work has brought optical microscopy into the nanodimension. CERN Council selects next director-general In what has become known as nanoscopy, scien- tists visualize the pathways of individual molecules Geneva, 4 November 2014. At its 173rd Closed Session, inside living cells. They can see how molecules create CERN Council selected the Italian physicist, Dr. Fabiola synapses between nerve cells in the brain; they can Gianotti, as the Organization’s next Director-General. The track proteins involved in Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s and appointment will be formalized at the December session Huntington’s diseases as they aggregate; they follow of Council, and Dr. Gianotti’s mandate will begin on individual proteins in fertilized eggs as these divide January 1, 2016 and run for a period of 5 years. into embryos. Council rapidly converged in favor of Dr. Gianotti. It was all but not obvious that scientists should ever “We were extremely impressed with all three candidates be able to study living cells in the tiniest molecular detail. put forward by the search committee,” said President of In 1873, the microscopist Ernst Abbe stipulated a physi- Council Agnieszka Zalewska. “It was Dr. Gianotti’s vision cal limit for the maximum resolution of traditional optical for CERN’s future as a world leading accelerator labora- microscopy: it could never become better than 0.2 μm. Eric tory, coupled with her in-depth knowledge of both CERN Betzig, Stefan W. Hell and William E. Moerner are awarded and the field of experimental particle physics that led us the Nobel Prize in Chemistry 2014 for having by-passed to this outcome. I would like to thank all the candidates this limit. Due to their achievements the optical micro- for giving the Council such a hard decision to make, and scope can now peer into the nanoworld. the search committee for all its hard work over recent Two separate principles are rewarded. One enables months”. the method of STED microscopy, developed by Stefan “Fabiola Gianotti is an excellent choice to be my Hell in 2000. Two laser beams are utilized; one stimulates successor”, said CERN Director-General Rolf Heuer. “It fluorescent molecules to glow, another cancels out all has been a pleasure to work with her for many years. I fluorescence except for that in a nanometer-sized volume. look forward to continuing to work with her through the 16 Magazine section transition year of 2015, and I am confident that CERN will Hungary, Israel, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, be in very good hands”. Portugal, Slovakia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the “It is a great honor and responsibility for me to be United Kingdom. Romania is a Candidate for Accession. selected as the next CERN Director-General following 15 Serbia is an Associate Member in the pre-stage to Mem- outstanding predecessors”, said Dr. Gianotti. “CERN is a bership. India, Japan, the Russian Federation, the United center of scientific excellence, and a source of pride and States of America, Turkey, the European Commission and inspiration for physicists from all over the world. CERN UNESCO have Observer Status (source: CERN press office). is also a cradle for technology and innovation, a fount Please also visit: of knowledge and education, and a shining, concrete example of worldwide scientific cooperation and peace. It http://press.web.cern.ch/press- is the combination of these four assets that renders CERN releases/2014/11/cern-council-selects- so unique, a place that makes better scientists and better next-director-general people. I will fully engage myself to maintain CERN’s (24.11.2014) excellence in all its attributes, with the help of everybody, including CERN Council, staff and users from all over the world”. Controversy

Airline crews may be more likely to get skin cancer

Pilots and flight attendants may be at an increased risk of developing melanoma the most deadly form of skin cancer, suggests a new literature review which was recently published (Sanlorenzo M, Wehner MR, Linos E, Kornak J, Kainz W, Posch C, Vujic I, Johnston K, Gho D, Monico G, McGrath JT, Osella-Abate S, Quaglino P, Cleaver JE, Ortiz-Urda S. The risk of melanoma in airline pilots and cabin crew: A meta-analysis. JAMA Dermatol 2014. doi:

Portrait of Fabiola Gianotti, spokesperson for the ATLAS Experiment 10.1001/jamadermatol.2014.1077). and new CERN’s Director-General for 2016 (© CERN, Photo: Claudia While the study cannot pinpoint why flight crews are Marcelloni). at higher risk, the authors led by Dr. Martina Sanlorenzo from the Mount Zion Cancer Research Center, Department Dr. Gianotti was leader of the ATLAS experiment col- of Dermatology, University of California, San Francisco, laboration from March 2009 to February 2013, covering USA suspect it could be the result of greater exposure to the period in which the large hadron collider experiments ultraviolet (UV) radiation, which causes damage to the ATLAS and CMS announced the long-awaited discovery of DNA in skin cells, at high altitudes. the so-called Higgs boson, recognized by the award of the Skin cancer is the most common form of cancer in the Nobel Prize to François Englert and Peter Higgs in 2013. USA. Over 3.5 million Americans will be diagnosed with She is a member of many international committees, and skin cancers in 2014, according to the American Cancer has received many prestigious awards. She will be the first Society. About 76,000 people will be diagnosed with mela- woman to hold the position of CERN Director-General. noma, which is the type of skin cancer that is most likely CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear to lead to death. Research, is the world’s leading laboratory for particle Past studies have suggested that airline pilots and physics. It has its headquarters in Geneva. At present, its other flight crew members are prone to getting more skin Member States are Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, the Czech cancers, but the association was poorly understood, the Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, researchers write. Magazine section 17

UV radiation pilots and cabin crews are exposed to inside commercial planes, versus, for example, aircraft with special radiation-blocking windows (source: Andrew M. Seaman, Reuters Health). The full contribution can be found at:

http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/09/03/ us-airplane-cancer-idUSKBN0GY2HO20140903 (24.11.2014)

Patients’ rights

Jet airplane (© Peter Griffin @ PublicDomainPictures.net). From January 2015: Skin cancer is officially an occupational disease For the new analysis, Sanlorenzo et al. combined data from 19 previous studies published between 1990 and Skin cancer will be recognized in Germany from January 2013. In total, they had data on more than 266,431 people. 2015 as an occupational disease. According to the Profes- The researchers used a measure known as stand- sional Association of German Dermatologists (Berufsver- ardized incidence ratio, which helps gauge whether the band der Deutschen Dermatologen, BVDD), people who cancer cases observed among specific groups of people are regularly exposed to the sun as part of their job and are more or less than what would be expected in the suffer from a form of non-melanoma skin cancer will for general population. the first time be able to make claims for benefits from the According to the National Cancer Institute, the statutory accident insurance. The benefits will include average American has about a 2% risk of developing mela- treatment and rehabilitation, as well as pensions and noma during his/her lifetime. compensation. Among participants in the 19 studies, the researchers Outdoor jobs are, for example, construction found that melanoma was about twice as common among workers, roofers, farmers and sailors, but also postmen, pilots and flight crew members than would be expected in lifeguards and ski instructors fall into this group. the general population. Even before the introduction of this new occupational The researchers caution that they cannot say why disease payments of 100,000 euros were paid as an cabin crews may be more likely to develop melanoma. “invalidity pension” for individual cases. The accident It could be due to greater exposure to solar radiation as insurance predicts that there will be additional costs of altitude increases and the protective barrier of the atmo­ around 20.5 million euros per year for cases of white sphere thins. There may, however, be other unknown skin cancer. factors among cabin crews, apart from UV exposure, that Its inclusion on the list of occupational diseases is based affect their melanoma risk, the study team writes. on scientific and medical evidence but the decision has also The researchers don’t have any data on airplane pas- been met with broad political approval (source: n24). sengers, but Sanlorenzo notes that “frequent flyers that fly For more information please visit: as often as cabin crew should get regular skin checks and protect themselves from UV radiation”. http://www.uptoderm.de/jsp_public/cms2/ She suggested that the U.S. Federal Aviation Admin- index.jsp?did=6298 istration should take more measurements of how much (24.11.2014)