Strengthening ties
The 14th annual meeting of our IMPRS Physics of Light (IMPRS-PL) simultaneously became the 1st annual meeting of our IMPRS Physics of Medicine (IMPRS-PM). The conference for both graduate programs took place on October 18th and was designed to deepen collaborations not only between IMPRS-PL and IMPRS-PM but also between all the partner institutions involved, namely the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Light (MPL), the Friedrich-Alexander University Erlangen-Nürnberg (FAU), the University Hospital Erlangen (UKER) and the Max-Planck-Zentrum für Physik und Medizin (MPZPM).
To welcome our recently admitted IMPRS students, the event started with introductory talks and socializing games. New student representatives were elected, having Maximilian Nägele (MPL) and Johannes Wesseler (FAU) substituting Anchit Srivastava and Santiago López Huidobro in IMPRS-PL and Daria Belous (FAU & MPZPM) and Klara Metzner (UKER) taking over the positions from Maximilian Eiche and Benedikt Hartmann in IMPRS-PM.
The afternoon slots were dedicated to reports from both IMPRS steering committees and introductory talks by Principal Investigators that had been included in the graduate schools only recently. Birgit Stiller (IMPRS-PL PI) told us about her research in quantum optoacoustics, whereas Frederik Graw and Tomohisa Toda (both IMPRS-PM PIs) spoke of diverse immune processes and neural epigenomics.
The evening was spent in the foyer of the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Light for a joint poster session. Food and drinks supported the enthusiastic and elaborate scientific exchange that accumulated in the award of two best poster prizes. IMPRS-PL chair Florian Marquardt and IMPRS-PM chair Vahid Sandoghdar handed them out to the winners Julia Kolb and Maximilian Eiche. Congratulations!
