Basic Research

Scientific research advances humanity, there's no question about that. Sure, we could have done without atomic bombs, and while the answer to the question of how the universe began is exciting, it's not really relevant to everyday life. The situation is quite different in biology: what keeps us alive at our core, what forces are at work and how they interact is of the utmost importance – whether it's transplanting a heart or investigating the causes of Alzheimer's disease or multiple sclerosis.

But basic research has a problem: by investigating the fundamentals, it does not look at the applications – and these are what determine the survival of individual patients in hospital. This makes basic research, as Prof. Petra Wahle puts it, a generational contract: tomorrow's applications stand on the shoulders of today's basics.

This applies, for example, to the causes of hidden hearing loss directly in the cochlea. Or the nourishment of axons by myelin – a finding that is significant for multiple sclerosis and whose role is currently even coming into focus in Alzheimer's research. In such cases, researchers have focused their curiosity on a question without even suspecting the extent of the answer. 

However, this raises another, much bigger problem: biology is so multi-layered and complex that every new answer gives rise to 10 more questions. This is also and especially true in the brain. It's not just the neurons, it's also the glial cells, it's also the extracellular matrix. One level deeper, it's about which cell produces which proteins, which in turn makes them unique. Basic research is therefore closely linked to the development of new methods. 

All in all, this just shows what Eric Kandel once told us in an interview: we still know so little about the brain. And we will need at least another 100 years to truly understand its mechanisms... Manuela Lenzen provides an initial insight with her text Understanding what holds the world together.