Optogenetics Pioneer Receives Berthold Leibinger Zukunftspreis

For his groundbreaking work with lasers in the development and implementation of optogenetics, Karl Deisseroth will receive the Berthold Leibinger Zukunftspreis on September 21, 2018 in Ditzingen, Germany.

Deisseroth is a psychiatrist and an engineer at the Bioengineering Department at Stanford University.

Seeking to discover the neurological underpinnings of mental illness, Diesseroth developed optogenetic tools that enabled him and other researchers to investigate live mammalian brains in completely new ways.

Optogenetics uses a combination of techniques from optics and genetics to control and monitor the activities of individual cells, typically neurons, in living tissue. The key reagents used in optogenetics are light-sensitive proteins.

The international prize has been awarded biennially by the private foundation Berthold Leibinger Stiftung since 2006 to a single researcher for a groundbreaking contribution in or using laser technology.

Prize winners receive an award of €50,000.