Professor, Director at the Max Planck Institute for Biophysical Chemistry

• 1987 Diploma in Physics, Univ.of Heidelberg (1.0)


• 1990 Doctorate in Physics, Univ. of Heidelberg (summa cum laude)


• 1991 – 1993 Postdoctoral Researcher, EMBL (European Molecular Biology Laboratory)


• 1993 – 1996 Principal Investigator, Laser Microscopy Group; Univ. of Turku, Finland


• 1996 Habilitation in Physics, Univ. Heidelberg; Physics teaching since 02/1996


• 1997 – 2002 Head, Max-Planck Junior Group High Resolution Optical Microscopy, at the Max-Planck-Institute for Biophysical Chemistry Göttingen, Germany


• since 10/2002 Director at the Max Planck Institute for Biophysical Chemistry, Head of Department of NanoBiophotonics


• since 12/2003 Apl. Prof., Faculty of Physics, Univ. of Heidelberg


• since 12/2003 Head of High Resolution Optical Microscopy Division, DKFZ Heidelberg


• since 01/2004 Hon. Prof., Faculty of Physics, Univ. of Göttingen

Major Research Interests

Optical microscopy beyond the diffraction barrier with far-field optics
Invention of STED and 4Pi microscopy and related techniques


Homepage Department/Research Group

http://www.mpibpc.mpg.de/groups/hell/



Selected Recent Publications

• Willig, K. I., Rizzoli, S. O., Westphal, V., Jahn, R., and Hell, S. W. (2006). STED-microscopy reveals that synaptotagmin remains clustered after synaptic vesicle exocytosis. Nature 440 (7086), 935 – 939


• Donnert, G., Keller, J., Medda, R., Andrei, M. A., Rizzoli, S. O., Lührmann, R., Jahn, R., Eggeling, C., and Hell, S. W. (2006) Macromolecular-scale resolution in biological fluorescence microscopy. Proc. Natl. Acad. Soc. USA 130 (31), 11440-11445


• Willig, K. I., Kellner, R. R., Medda, R., Hein, B., Jakobs, S., and Hell, S. W. (2006): Nanoscale resolution in GFP-based microscopy. Nature Methods 3 (9), 721 – 723


• Westphal, V., and Hell, S. W. (2005) Nanoscale Resolution in the Focal Plane of an Optical Microscope. Phys. Rev. Lett. 94, 143903


• Kastrup, L., Blom, H., Eggeling, C., and Hell, S. W. (2005) Fluorescence Fluctuation Spectroscopy in Subdiffraction Focal Volumes. Phys. Rev. Lett. 94, 178104


• Hofmann, M., Eggeling, C., Jakobs, S., and Hell, S. W. (2005). Breaking the diffraction barrier in fluorescence microscopy at low light intensities by using reversibly photoswitchable proteins. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 102 (49), 17565 – 17569


• Dyba, M., Jakobs, S., and Hell, S. W. (2003) Immunofluorescence stimulated emission depletion microscopy. Nature Biotechn. 21 (11), 1303-1304


• Hell, S. W. (2003) Toward fluorescence nanoscopy. Nature Biotechn. 21 (11), 1347-1355


• Dyba, M. and Hell, S. W. (2002) Focal Spots of Size /23 Open Up Far-Field Fluorescence Microscopy at 33 nm Axial Resolution. Phys. Rev. Lett. 88, 163901


• Klar, T. A., Jakobs, S., Dyba, M., Egner, A., and Hell, S. W. (2000) Fluorescence microscopy with diffraction resolution barrier broken by stimulated emission. Proc. Natl. Acad. Soc. USA 97, 8206-8210