MaxPlanckResearch 2/2016: Language

216862

Research doesn't have

to be heavy.

Go paperless!

The Max Planck Society's magazine is

available as ePaper : www.mpg.de/mpr-mobile

Internet: www.mpg.de/mpresearch

App for

immediate & free download

LANGUAGE

THE HISTORY OF SCIENCE

ASTRONOMY

ENVIRONMENT

CHEMISTRY

siemens.com/pof-innovations

Dossier - Innovation at Siemens

How Innovations are generated - from

initial idea to market launch.

ON LOCATION

High above the Clouds?

Chancellor Pushes the Red Button

High-level visit to the control room of

the Wendelstein 7-X nuclear fusion re- actor: Chancellor Angela Merkel, a physicist herself, visited Greifswald in early February to switch on the first hydrogen plasma at the fusion reactor.

“Every step we have taken toward the

fusion power plant over the course of a century represents a success," under scored Merkel before a large audience from the realms of science and politics before getting down to action. For the all-important push of the button, em ployees from the Max Planck Institute of Plasma Physics had a glass cube structure with the silhouette of the fu sion reactor specially constructed and positioned on a steel column. Shortly after Angela Merkel spiritedly pressed the button, a bright light flickered on the monitors. These screens provided a glimpse inside the plasma vessel, where the brief fusion reaction the

Chancellor had set in motion via the

2-megawatt pulse of microwave heat

could be seen. Reaching a temperature of 80 million degrees and lasting a quarter of a second, the first hydrogen plasma in the system fully met the ex pectations of scientists and engineers at the Institute.

New Network for Alumni

“The end product is what matters"

Detlef Weigel:

Leibniz Prizes Awarded to Three Max Planck Researchers

The Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Prize,

awarded annually by the German Re- search Foundation, is one of the most prestigious scientific prizes in Germa- ny. The prize is endowed with up to

2.5 million euros, and once again,

three Max Planck Directors received the award in March 2016.

Marina Rodnina from the Max

Planck Institute for Biophysical Chem

istry was honored for her pioneering efforts on understanding the function of ribosomes. She succeeded in shed- ding light on the fundamental princi- ples of how ribosomes - the protein factories of living cells - function. Em- manuelle Charpentier, Director at the

Max Planck Institute for Infection Bi-

ology, was presented the award for de- veloping the CRISPR/Cas9 technique.

This mechanism, which stems from

bacteria, can be deployed as a high-pre- cision tool to investigate the function of genes and to manipulate genetic material. Benjamin List, Director at the Max-Planck-Institut für Kohlen forschung (Coal Research), received of the disease. In 2007, a team of researchers headed by Joa- chim Hauber from the Heinrich-Pette Institute in Hamburg and Frank Buchholz from the Max Planck Institute of Mo lecular Cell Biology and Genetics in Dresden succeeded for the first time in cutting out HIV genetic material from hu man cell cultures using an enzyme. Scientists have now tak- en an important step forward: they have developed the gene scissors to the point where over 90 percent of the HIV genotype can be removed from the human genome. The scientists have proven the effectiveness of their technique in cell cultures and animal research. The num ber of viruses fell below the detection limit in animals re ceiving this treatment. Frank Buchholz, now a professor at a medical milestone: “The creation of molecular scalpels will change medicine. It"s not just HIV patients who will benefit from this development, but also many others with genetic diseases."

HIV Scissors to Combat AIDS

To date, no cure has been found for infection with HIV. The drugs that infected patients must take for the rest of their life suppress the spread of the virus and thus the outbreak the prize for establishing an entirely new field of catalysis research. List dis- covered one of the foundations of or- ganocatalysis, which allows natural substances rather than metals to be used as catalysts for the first time.

On the Net

Exchange of Talent with Dutch University

hy does society need the history of science? And why does science, in particular, need the history of sci ence? In the fast-moving, pressur ized world of present-day research, scientists often wish for something that the history of science can"t deliver: they want to know where and when the next breakthrough is coming, and which research program will fulfill its promises and more besides. These things can"t be prophesied - for- tunately. Science that relies on its past to extrapolate its future would lack creativity.

What the history of science can provide is an ex

planation of why present-day research is devoted to certain issues (and not to others); why certain meth-

ods (and not others) have become indispensable; why some discoveries are hailed immediately while others languish in obscurity for decades, or even cen turies; why one discipline flourishes while another is neglected; why a scientific career follows certain stages (and not others); and ultimately why scientif- ic careers exist - something that, from a historical perspective, is anything but self-evident.

Above all, the history of science provides an ex-

planation of the varying time scales of science, each with a tempo of its own - and each with transforma- tive potential.

There are three clocks that measure the pace of

science. Empirical discoveries move at the fastest pace - the research results that appear in the next is- sue of

S, N and other journals. This clock

is calibrated in weeks and months; it ticks allegro

The tempo of the climate for empirical research,

on the other hand, is andante . By climate, I mean the synthetic theories - the different questions em- bodied within a theory - but also the material con-

VIEWPOINT

ditions for science: the invention of new instru- ments, the level of social support and appreciation of research, the ability to attract the finest minds to this career rather than any other. This clock ticks slower, in units of years and decades.

The third clock is

legato , advancing in units of centuries or even millennia. It measures the pace of the fundamental epistemic virtues of science, the particular characteristics that define the science of a specific era as science (as opposed to knowledge, opinion or belief): certainty, truth, precision, ob jectivity. It is this third clock, the history of the seemingly self-evident in science, that I focus on in my research.

Given that these categories develop so slowly

and are anchored so deeply in the identity of sci- ence, they appear to have no history. But let us take an example - certainty: For almost 2,000 years, from antiquity until the end of the 17th century, this was the sine qua non of science.

Episteme

in ancient Greek, scientia in Latin, the concept was defined as certain knowledge that not only accorded with the facts, but could be proven by axiomata , in the same way as a syllogism in logic or a mathematical proof.

Even Isaac Newton still clung to this vision: he

described his laws of motion as axiomata sive leges motus

Research doesn't have

to be heavy.

Go paperless!

The Max Planck Society's magazine is

available as ePaper : www.mpg.de/mpr-mobile

Internet: www.mpg.de/mpresearch

App for

immediate & free download

LANGUAGE

THE HISTORY OF SCIENCE

ASTRONOMY

ENVIRONMENT

CHEMISTRY

siemens.com/pof-innovations

Dossier - Innovation at Siemens

How Innovations are generated - from

initial idea to market launch.

ON LOCATION

High above the Clouds?

Chancellor Pushes the Red Button

High-level visit to the control room of

the Wendelstein 7-X nuclear fusion re- actor: Chancellor Angela Merkel, a physicist herself, visited Greifswald in early February to switch on the first hydrogen plasma at the fusion reactor.

“Every step we have taken toward the

fusion power plant over the course of a century represents a success," under scored Merkel before a large audience from the realms of science and politics before getting down to action. For the all-important push of the button, em ployees from the Max Planck Institute of Plasma Physics had a glass cube structure with the silhouette of the fu sion reactor specially constructed and positioned on a steel column. Shortly after Angela Merkel spiritedly pressed the button, a bright light flickered on the monitors. These screens provided a glimpse inside the plasma vessel, where the brief fusion reaction the

Chancellor had set in motion via the

2-megawatt pulse of microwave heat

could be seen. Reaching a temperature of 80 million degrees and lasting a quarter of a second, the first hydrogen plasma in the system fully met the ex pectations of scientists and engineers at the Institute.

New Network for Alumni

“The end product is what matters"

Detlef Weigel:

Leibniz Prizes Awarded to Three Max Planck Researchers

The Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Prize,

awarded annually by the German Re- search Foundation, is one of the most prestigious scientific prizes in Germa- ny. The prize is endowed with up to

2.5 million euros, and once again,

three Max Planck Directors received the award in March 2016.

Marina Rodnina from the Max

Planck Institute for Biophysical Chem

istry was honored for her pioneering efforts on understanding the function of ribosomes. She succeeded in shed- ding light on the fundamental princi- ples of how ribosomes - the protein factories of living cells - function. Em- manuelle Charpentier, Director at the

Max Planck Institute for Infection Bi-

ology, was presented the award for de- veloping the CRISPR/Cas9 technique.

This mechanism, which stems from

bacteria, can be deployed as a high-pre- cision tool to investigate the function of genes and to manipulate genetic material. Benjamin List, Director at the Max-Planck-Institut für Kohlen forschung (Coal Research), received of the disease. In 2007, a team of researchers headed by Joa- chim Hauber from the Heinrich-Pette Institute in Hamburg and Frank Buchholz from the Max Planck Institute of Mo lecular Cell Biology and Genetics in Dresden succeeded for the first time in cutting out HIV genetic material from hu man cell cultures using an enzyme. Scientists have now tak- en an important step forward: they have developed the gene scissors to the point where over 90 percent of the HIV genotype can be removed from the human genome. The scientists have proven the effectiveness of their technique in cell cultures and animal research. The num ber of viruses fell below the detection limit in animals re ceiving this treatment. Frank Buchholz, now a professor at a medical milestone: “The creation of molecular scalpels will change medicine. It"s not just HIV patients who will benefit from this development, but also many others with genetic diseases."

HIV Scissors to Combat AIDS

To date, no cure has been found for infection with HIV. The drugs that infected patients must take for the rest of their life suppress the spread of the virus and thus the outbreak the prize for establishing an entirely new field of catalysis research. List dis- covered one of the foundations of or- ganocatalysis, which allows natural substances rather than metals to be used as catalysts for the first time.

On the Net

Exchange of Talent with Dutch University

hy does society need the history of science? And why does science, in particular, need the history of sci ence? In the fast-moving, pressur ized world of present-day research, scientists often wish for something that the history of science can"t deliver: they want to know where and when the next breakthrough is coming, and which research program will fulfill its promises and more besides. These things can"t be prophesied - for- tunately. Science that relies on its past to extrapolate its future would lack creativity.

What the history of science can provide is an ex

planation of why present-day research is devoted to certain issues (and not to others); why certain meth-

ods (and not others) have become indispensable; why some discoveries are hailed immediately while others languish in obscurity for decades, or even cen turies; why one discipline flourishes while another is neglected; why a scientific career follows certain stages (and not others); and ultimately why scientif- ic careers exist - something that, from a historical perspective, is anything but self-evident.

Above all, the history of science provides an ex-

planation of the varying time scales of science, each with a tempo of its own - and each with transforma- tive potential.

There are three clocks that measure the pace of

science. Empirical discoveries move at the fastest pace - the research results that appear in the next is- sue of

S, N and other journals. This clock

is calibrated in weeks and months; it ticks allegro

The tempo of the climate for empirical research,

on the other hand, is andante . By climate, I mean the synthetic theories - the different questions em- bodied within a theory - but also the material con-

VIEWPOINT

ditions for science: the invention of new instru- ments, the level of social support and appreciation of research, the ability to attract the finest minds to this career rather than any other. This clock ticks slower, in units of years and decades.

The third clock is

legato , advancing in units of centuries or even millennia. It measures the pace of the fundamental epistemic virtues of science, the particular characteristics that define the science of a specific era as science (as opposed to knowledge, opinion or belief): certainty, truth, precision, ob jectivity. It is this third clock, the history of the seemingly self-evident in science, that I focus on in my research.

Given that these categories develop so slowly

and are anchored so deeply in the identity of sci- ence, they appear to have no history. But let us take an example - certainty: For almost 2,000 years, from antiquity until the end of the 17th century, this was the sine qua non of science.

Episteme

in ancient Greek, scientia in Latin, the concept was defined as certain knowledge that not only accorded with the facts, but could be proven by axiomata , in the same way as a syllogism in logic or a mathematical proof.

Even Isaac Newton still clung to this vision: he

described his laws of motion as axiomata sive leges motus