Francisco Balzarotti wins 2024 Frontiers of Science Award
IMP Group Leader Francisco Balzarotti was awarded a 2024 Frontiers of Science Award for his pioneering postdoctoral work on super-resolution microscopy at the Max Planck Institute for Biophysical Chemistry in Göttingen. The award ceremony took place on 14 July 2024 at the Great Hall of the People, Beijing.
The International Congress of Basic Science (ICBS) in China has honoured IMP Group Leader Francisco Balzarotti with one of the 2024 Frontiers of Science Awards for his groundbreaking contributions to super-resolution microscopy. His innovative postdoctoral research with Nobel Laureate Stefan W. Hell at the Max Planck Institute for Biophysical Chemistry in Göttingen, led to the development of the MINFLUX (MINimal emission FLUXes) technique.
An optical microscope can't distinguish objects closer than half the wavelength of light, but super-resolution methods have broken this “diffraction limit,” providing new insights into biological processes. The advent of fluorescence microscopy revolutionised biological research by allowing the study of live specimens through tagging cellular components with fluorescent molecules. However, such methods generally cap at about ten nanometers of resolution.
In 2016, Francisco Balzarotti and colleagues at Stefan Hell’s lab introduced MINFLUX, a powerful microscopy technique that uses structured illumination to localise fluorescent molecules with extremely high accuracy, far surpassing the capabilities of traditional microscopes. With this technique, precision down to a few nanometers–roughly the size of a single strand of DNA–was achieved, allowing for much clearer images and a hundredfold faster tracking of single molecules.
“I am honoured to receive the 2024 Frontiers of Science Award together with all co-authors, and grateful to our mentor Stefan Hell for his continued support” says Francisco Balzarotti. “This recognition shows the teamwork that went into this project and emphasises the impact of the MINFLUX technology on biological research.”
About the Frontiers of Science Award
The Frontiers of Science Award was inaugurated in 2023 with the support of the International Congress of Basic Sciences (ICBS)–a major scientific event held in China, designed to promote and facilitate discussions and collaborations among researchers in various fundamental scientific fields. The FSA award is sponsored by the City of Beijing and the Yanqi Lake Beijing Institute of Mathematical Sciences and Application (BIMSA), and is awarded annually to a recent paper, recognised for a major breakthrough in its field. Each year, researchers worldwide are invited to nominate candidates for the award. A panel of renowned experts is asked to review and select a shortlist of award candidates in each research area. A Global Committee empanelled by the ICBS selects the winners from the shortlisted candidates across various research fields.
About Francisco Balzarotti
Francisco Balzarotti studied Electrical Engineering at the University of Buenos Aires, where he then pursued a PhD in Optics and Plasmonics. As postdoctoral researcher, he worked in the field of Super Resolution Microscopy, developing innovative microscopy concepts at the Department of NanoBiophotonics at the Max Planck Institute for Biophysical Chemistry, led by Nobel Laureate Stefan W. Hell. Balzarotti joined the IMP as a Group Leader in 2020, pursuing research focused on the development of novel optical methods and instrumentation for the observation of biological phenomena with the highest fidelity. His innovations earned him a number of prestigious accolades, among them the “Top Ten Breakthrough of 2017” by Physics World, and an ERC Starting Grant.
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