Chris Boos has a mission: empowering human potential, freeing up time for creativity and innovative thinking through artificial intelligence (AI). To that end, Chris founded arago in Germany in 1995, pushing existing boundaries in AI technology to build a general AI. Since then, Chris has led arago to become a key partner and driver for the established economy, positioning arago’s AI HIRO™ as a platform for companies to reinvent their business models in the digital age. 

Structural biology and molecular cell biology is currently undergoing a revolution, brought about by technical developments in electron cryo-microscopy (cryoEM). The "resolution revolution" in cryoEM is primarily due to a new generation of direct electron detectors and image processing programs. With these developments it is now possible to determine the detailed structures and molecular mechanisms of large and dynamic protein assemblies, in particular membrane proteins, that have been intractable for decades. Single-particle cryoEM of membrane protein complexes now routinely achieves 2-3 Å resolution, where all sidechains, cofactors and (in the case of membrane proteins) lipids, bound ions and even water molecules in a protein complex are visible. As an added bonus, cryoEM simultaneously records images of co-existing conformational states of a protein complex; the different conformations can be separated by image processing and put into a functional sequence. Using the same instruments, electron cryo-tomography (cryoET) can image macromolecular assemblies in their cellular or organellar environment at increasingly high resolution. 

 We combine both approaches to investigate the structure and molecular mechanisms of energy-converting membrane protein complexes. CryoET of Mgm1 on lipid membranes indicates how this mechano-chemical GTPase may shape the mitochondrial cristae. CryoET of mitochondrial mem-branes indicates that the respiratory chain supercomplex is essentially conserved from plants to mammals. Single-particle cryoEM of complex I from Yarrowia lipolytica reveals bound substrates and lipids at 3.2 Å resolution. While the chloroplast ATP synthase is monomeric, all mitochondrial ATP synthases form dimers that assemble into long rows that induce local membrane curvature. Single-particle cryoEM of the chloroplast ATP synthase shows how the complex is turned off at night to prevent unproductive ATP hydrolysis. The 2.7 Å map of a mitochondrial ATP synthase dimer resolves 13 different rotary substates, providing unexpected new insights into the universal mechanism of ATP synthesis by rotary catalysis that drives most cellular processes. 

Born on December 7, 1951 in Bayreuth. Study of chemistry, biochemistry and biophysics in Berlin and London, PhD Univ. of Cambridge (1981), research posts ETH Zurich (1981-1984) and Imperial College London (1984-1987), Heisenberg Fellowship (1986-1991), head of a research group at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) Heidelberg (1988-1996), Director and Scientific Member at the Max Planck Institute of Biophysics (since 1997), Associate Professor at the Johann Wolfgang Goethe University Frankfurt am Main.

Theoretical modeling in cell biology has to strike a balance between finding parsimonious, manageable models with not too many parameters or assumptions that are not directly accessible to experimentation on one hand and, on the other hand, not suggesting models that are regarded as too simplistic and biologically unrealistic. During the search for such balance, it is frequently overlooked that concise models implicitly make many assumptions without actually exposing them to scrutiny. In my talk, I will illustrate this issue using computational models of simple signaling pathways and show how detailed mechanistic models of intracellular reaction networks can be explored efficiently.

Dr. Meier-Schellersheim obtained a master’s degree in physics in 1997 and a Ph.D. in 2001 from the University of Hamburg, Germany. His research focuses on building a bridge between experimental and computational cell biology through the development and application of modeling tools that combine accessible graphical interfaces with the capability to perform spatially and temporally highly resolved simulations, even for models of complex cellular signaling processes.

For a person to think, act, or feel, the neurons in a person’s brain must communicate continuously, rapidly, and repeatedly. This communication occurs at synapses, specialized junctions between neurons that transfer and compute information on a millisecond timescale. By forming synapses with each other, neurons are organized into vast overlapping neural circuits.

As intercellular junctions, synapses are asymmetric with a presynaptic terminal that emits a transmitter signal and a postsynaptic cell that receives this signal. Synapses differ in properties and exhibit distinct types of plasticity, enabling fast information processing as well as learning and memory. Synapses are the most vulnerable component of the brain whose dysfunction initiates multifarious brain disorders. Despite their importance, however, synapses are poorly understood beyond basic principles.

Thomas Südhof’s laboratory studies how synapses form in the brain and how their properties are specified, which together organize neural circuits. Moreover, the Südhof laboratory examines how synapses become dysfunctional in neurodegenerative and neuropsychiatric disorders to pave the way for better therapies.

Thomas Christian Südhof was born in Göttingen, Germany in 1955 and obtained his M.D. and doctoral degrees from the University of Göttingen in 1982. He performed his doctoral thesis work at the Max-Planck-Institut für biophysikalische Chemie in Göttingen with Prof. Victor P. Whittaker on the biophysical structure of secretory granules. From 1983-1986, Südhof trained as a postdoctoral fellow with Drs. Mike Brown and Joe Goldstein at UT Southwestern in Dallas, TX, and elucidated the structure, expression and cholesterol-dependent regulation of the LDL receptor gene. Südhof began his independent career in 1986 at UT Southwestern, where he stayed until 2008 and, among others, was the founding chair of the Department of Neuroscience. In 2008, Südhof moved to Stanford, and became the Avram Goldstein Professor in the School of Medicine at Stanford University. In addition, Südhof has been an Investigator of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute since 1986.

Prior to becoming a neuroscientist, Südhof was trained in the biophysics of subcellular organelles at the Max-Planck-Institute of Biophysical Chemistry and in cholesterol metabolism at UT Southwestern. When Südhof started his laboratory, he decided to switch to neuroscience to study synapses because of their central, as yet incompletely understood role in brain function. Südhof’s work initially focused on the mechanism of neurotransmitter release, which is the first step in synaptic transmission that accounts for the speed and precision of information transfer in the brain. It was for this work that Südhof was awarded in 2013 the Albert Lasker Basic Medical Research Award (with Richard Scheller) and the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (with James Rothman and Randy Schekman). In the last decade, Südhof’s research emphasis has switched to focus on a different unsolved problem in neuroscience that regards synapses, namely how synapses are established specifically between defined pre- and postsynaptic neurons, and how such connections are endowed with specific properties by these neurons. Addressing this fundamental question is essential for understanding how circuits are wired and how they process information, but the basic rules that govern synapse formation and specification are only now beginning to emerge. Elucidating these rules is the goal of Südhof’s present work.

After a general introduction on how to define normativity, we survey different accounts on the relationship between normative and non-normative properties and the use of our language. In the second part of our talk, we focus on the concept of biodiversity as a case study involving conservation biology techniques and social sciences.

Hanieh Saeedi is interested in understanding the driving factors (ecological and evolutionary process) which shape the biodiversity patterns and biogeography in marine species (shallow and deep sea) using big data and in addition in predicting how these biodiversity patterns and species distribution ranges will shift under future climate change. She is also the OBIS (Ocean Biogeographic Information System) deep-sea node data manager in UNESCO, specialised in managing big datasets, biodiversity data standards, and quality control tasks. To carry out her research, she uses different skillsets and apply different methods and techniques such as taxonomy (morphology and molecular), phylogeny, biogeography, big-data management, biodiversity informatics, macroecology, and species distribution modeling and ecological modeling.

At the moment, she leads projects in digitisation of museum collections, biogeography, biodiversity informatics using big-data at the regional (e.g. NW Pacific) and global scales. She also works for science-policy intergovernmental bodies such as IPBES (Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services) to provide fundamental information for biodiversity assessment reports in a response to policy makers to better understand the global status of biodiversity in the World Oceans and consequently to establish more efficient strategic management plans to maintain the Ocean Biodiversity.

Andreas Widl is CEO of the SAMSON AG. SAMSON operates wherever there is controlled flow of oils, gases, vapors or chemical substances. Valves are our core business. With our valves, we are active in a market that has enormous potential for future innovations. We are further expanding the valves' decentralized intelligence. By developing new, smart systems, we are transforming process automation to the benefit of our customers and to achieve greater flexibility, safety and reliability in industrial processes.

Structured pathological findings, digital histological and radiology images, and molecular data are the basis for personalized medicine, where individual predictions can be made for each individual patient. The Dr. Senckenberg Institute of Pathology is an important and central component for the implementation of the concept of precision medicine. 

After finishing medical school at the University of Regensburg in 2001, he started his residency in pathology (University Hospital Regensburg, Hamburg-Eppendorf and Zürich). From 2001 until 2005 he did a postgraduate training in medical biometrics at the University of Heidelberg. In May 2008, he received my German Board Certification in Pathology from the Hamburg Medical Association and in May 2010 the Swiss Board Certification in Pathology (FMH). Following two-year postdoctoral studies with Prof. Wilhelm Krek at the Institute of Cell Biology, ETH Zurich, he worked from 2010 until 2012 as staff physician at the Institute of Surgical Pathology and Molecular Pathology, University Hospital Zurich. In September 2012, he was appointed Assistant Professor (tenure track) for Systems Pathology and became attending physician at the Institute of Surgical Pathology and Molecular Pathology, University Hospital Zurich. As principal investigator and director of the High-Throughput Genomics and Proteomics Laboratory at the University Hospital Zurich, he was responsible for integrating next generation sequencing and mass spectrometry techniques into clinical practice. In 2016, he became Full-Professor for Systems Pathology at the University of Zurich. He has successfully attracted third-party funding (e.g. Horizon 2020) and received the Rudolf-Virchow-Prize of the German Society of Pathology in 2013. This has enabled him to establish a dynamic research laboratory in the field of systems pathology. Besides, he was an active reviewer for the European Research Council (ERC) and a number of high ranked peer-reviewed journals including Nature Medicine and Nature Communications on ad hoc basis.

The goal of the Helmstaedter Department is to decipher how the cerebral cortex stores sensory experience and uses it to detect objects in the current environment. To this end, they develop and apply methods for measuring communication maps of neuronal circuits, connectomes. They strive to push the frontiers of connectomics to make the mapping of neuronal circuits a high-throughput technique.  Born 1978 in Berlin, Germany. 1998 onwards studies of medicine and physics at Ruprecht-Karls-University Heidelberg, Germany (Medical license and Diploma in physics). Brief interlude as strategy consultant with McKinsey. Doctoral thesis with Bert Sakmann and Post-Doc with Winfried Denk at the Max Planck Institute for Medical Research in Heidelberg. 2011-2014 Research Group leader and Principal Investigator at the Max Planck Institute of Neurobiology, Munich. For his research activities, Moritz Helmstaedter was honored with the Otto Hahn Medal and the Bernard Katz Lecture. Since August 2014 Director and Scientific Member at the Max Planck Institute for Brain Research. Since 2016 Professor (Chair, extraordinary professor) for Neuronal Networks at Radboud University, Nijmegen, Netherlands.