4-year Institute Colloquium: Johann Georg Danzl

Decoding biological systems with high resolution imaging

Biomolecular organization determines the functional repertoire of living systems; it requires exquisite orchestration spanning the scales of molecules and their assembly into cellular machineries, to cells, tissues, organs, and organisms. 

My research group focuses on developing novel technologies to decode the architecture and dynamics of biological systems and to reveal previously inaccessible information about them.

Here I will discuss our ongoing projects including development of technologies to map synapses and other subcellular structures within their tissue context. We have furthermore developed an integrated super-resolution imaging and data analysis workflow to reconstruct living brain tissue in silico. I will give an outlook on how we seek to chart proteins with cryo-microscopy of near-natively preserved cells at single-digit nanometer 3D-precision.