Science produces fascinating images. For two weeks, the most beautiful scientific images were exhibited in the foyer of the BESSY II X-ray source in Berlin-Adlershof. But it’s about much more than aesthetics: Helmholtz Imaging offers a great network that bundles expertise in imaging. Researchers benefit from this unbureaucratically and completely free of charge. Philipp Heuser from Helmholtz Imaging told me exactly what’s behind it during a roadshow at HZB.
I have just admired the fantastic pictures in the BESSY foyer. They are wonderful! Why do you need pictures in science?
Good pictures are needed everywhere! In research, of course, it’s not about beauty. In all areas of research, images are essential for gaining knowledge. Whether you work in medicine, analyse materials or analyse satellite images to study climate change: Images are extremely important, you can’t do it without them.
What are the current challenges in generating and processing images?
The challenges are very different, depending on which area you work in. The amount of data produced will grow immensely over the next few years. An example from the synchrotron research: If you use new detectors, even more data will be generated. This is important for obtaining better images. But you also should be able to handle such data volumes. For example, you need suitable software to analyse these images. Deep learning solutions are an important topic. This allows large amounts of information to be processed and analysed. This is also one of our main areas.
How can Helmholtz Imaging help?
We have many different areas of expertise in the Helmholtz Association. So, we want to bring these together in Helmholtz Imaging! We experience that a problem has already been solved in one field of research but not yet in another. Normally, you don’t find out about existing solutions from other fields because the scientific communities are not connected. This is our starting point: Bringing together experts from different fields, initiating collaborations and developing solutions. Our motto is: enabling science. First of all, we try to broker the existing expertise from the Association, but if necessary our support and research teams will dive deep into the challenges, to find a solution. That is a great benefit.
Specifically: How can I as a researcher benefit from Helmholtz Imaging?
Firstly, we provide everyone with concrete help for everyday problems. For example: What can I do if the beam has wobbled and my image is blurred? How do I get from my raw data to a complex 3D visualisation? We are here to answer all these questions: Simply send an email to our support hub. We offer short-term advice, free of charge and unbureaucratic! Moreover, we can also put you in touch with experts from our CONNECT database. By the way: you are welcome to contribute as an expert. This expands your own competences and perspectives, and gives you visibility.
Secondly, researchers can take part in our training programmes. We organise a summer school, hackathons, a large Helmholtz Imaging Conference and much more. Networking and learning are our main focus! Since we are talking about events: Our next Annual Conference will take place on 14-15 May in Heidelberg. The call for abstracts is open until 28 March 2024: https://events.hifis.net/event/1167/.
And thirdly, we publish an annual call for projects within Helmholtz Imaging. The next call is planned for spring 2024. Researchers can submit a project with relatively little effort – and receive funding and access to expertise to solve their problem.
As you can see, Helmholtz Imaging offers fantastic opportunities – from support to research and funding. Just take a look at our website right now.
Philipp Heuser works in the Engineering and Support Unit of Helmholtz Imaging at DESY.
Interview: Silvia Zerbe
Do you need help with your scientific images?
Contact Helmholtz Imaging at: helpdesk@helmholtz-imaging.de
Further information can be found on the Helmholtz Imaging website. You can receive updates on LinkedIn or in the newsletter (register here).
The members of Helmholtz Imaging are happy to help you!
