Dear participants of the Lindau Nobel Laureate Meeting. Please do not run away if one of these Seven holds a camera on you asking for an interview. They are young researchers and attendees who want to capture their experiences during this week in Lindau with the camera. We try to put online some „raw material“ they gathered on a daily basis. The final cut of their Lindau video diaries will follow at the end of the week. (More)

After the opening speeches by many people associated with the Lindau meetings there was a small panel discussion on the meetings. The panel consisted of a Lindau alumnus of the 1959 meeting, Horst Grimme; a Lindau alumnus of 2008, Bilge Demirkoz; Winner of Physics Nobel 1973, Ivar Giaver and Winner of Chemistry Nobel 2004, Aaron Ciechanover. (More)

For 60 years now the Bernadotte family holds their protecting hands over the Lindau Meeting of Nobel Laureates - unpretentious, with a very personal approach. In 1987 Count Lennart assigned the presidency of the Council board of trustees to his wife Sonja in a humorous speech. And he handed her over (More)

Welcome to Lindau. Apparently, you're one of the non-German readers of this blog and in that case maybe even one of the lucky scientists who will travel to this picturesque town next week. If it is your first visit to Germany you should definetely try to see a little more than Lindau – especially because you're now on a border triangle between Germany, Austria and Switzerland. (More)

John Turton Randall was trying hard, real hard. For some time now, the University of Birmingham physicist was focusing on trying to improve the features of a machine which transmitted and received electromagnetic waves. A few years back this would have been just another intriguing academic problem for a physicist to crack, but this time it was a matter of life and death for thousands. Literally. It was 1939, and an ominous menace loomed large over Europe in the person of Adolf Hitler. The machine Randall was working on was designed to thwart Hitler's attempts to invade the British mainland. It sent out electromagnetic waves of meter wavelength and tried to deduce the position of an object based on its reflection of these waves. The operating principle of this humble machine later turned into a household name- Radar. (More)

My son has the Panini fever (1). Inevitable. It’s World Cup time. And I may predict which fever will catch many of the young researchers at Lindau soon--Autograph fever. It’s the Lindau Nobel Laureates Meeting. Some collect stickers, others signatures and some both. However, I’m pretty sure my son’s Panini book will sooner or later disappear in the garbage, whereas the signatures of the laureates will be kept in a shrine.  Just like the paintings by Laureates that I have gathered – look at the small Quiz at the end of this post.  (More)

Cities, just like human beings, have character. The character is frequently defined by little things as well as big. For instance New York is The Big Apple, Paris the city of fashion, Sydney the city with the Opera House and Rio de Janeiro the carnival city. Small cities are also known for their own accomplishments. For instance, last year I visited the the little German city of Magdeburg which is known for Otto von Guericke, the man who established the physics of vacuums through a famous experiment involving horses. (More)