Biophysical Society Bulletin | July/August 2021

Publications

Know the Editor Shi-Wei Chu

National Taiwan University Editor Biophysical Reports

Open for Submissions

Shi-Wei Chu

What are you currently working on that excites you? We are currently working on developing high-speed volumet- ric imaging for probing small-animal brain functions. To un- derstand how a brain functions is one of the grand challenges in modern scientific communities. From our perspective, a functional brain is similar to a computer in that it is composed of hardware and software. The former includes matters of neurons, synapses, molecules, etc., and the latter is the rules and operating information used by the brain that might emerge from pan-neuron/synapse functional connections. We feel that the major bottleneck lies in the difficulty directly unraveling the brain “software.” Our strategy is to achieve functional mapping of individual neurons/sectors in a living Drosophila brain, and more efforts are waiting ahead to bridge functional imaging and brain “software.” What have you read lately that you found really interesting or stimulating? Proof of Heaven: A Neurosurgeon’s Journey into the Afterlife and The Map of Heaven: How Science, Religion, and Ordinary Peo- ple Are Proving the Afterlife by Eben Alexander , a professional neurosurgeon in the United States. He had a near-death experience a decade ago and experienced a journey beyond this world, which he reported in detail in these books. These books stimulated me to consider the boundary of science. In particular, I am working on optical imaging and believe in the motto “seeing is believing.” However, knowing that there may be a vast amount of information that cannot be probed with contemporary imaging instruments poses not only superb research challenges, but also many emerging opportunities.

Biophysical Reports , the fully Gold Open Access journal from the Biophysical Society, provides a new publishing option for Society members and other biophysics researchers. Editor-in-Chief Jörg Enderlein invites submissions from all disciplines encompassed by biophysics, with a particular emphasis on methods and techniques. The new- est addition to the Society’s family of journals is committed to rapid publication of articles that are written for specialists as well as those writ- ten for the broader biophysics community. The journal will feature short contributions (Letters and Reports) with rapid turnarounds as well as Research Articles and Reviews. Publication fees will be waived for the first 10 new submissions accepted by the journal!

biophysreports.org

Numbers By the

The median annual wage for biochemists and biophysicists in the United States was $94,270 in May 2020. Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics, U.S. Department of Labor, Occupational Outlook Handbook, Biochemists and Biophysicists, at https:/www.bls.gov/ooh/life-physi- cal-and-social-science/biochemists-and-biophysicists.htm (visited June 10, 2021).

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