12 Quotes by Stefan Hell

Calling on each molecule one by one? No way. I just told all of them to be quiet - except for a selected few.

According to the belief, molecules closer together than 200 nanometers could not be told apart with focused light. This is because, in a packed molecular crowd, the molecules shout out their fluorescence simultaneously, causing their signal, their voices, to be confused.

It's childish, but it still gives me great pleasure to see high-res pictures everyone told me would be impossible.

I got bored with the topic; I felt this was 19th century physics. I was wondering if there was still something profound that could be made with light microscopy. So I saw that the diffraction barrier was the only important problem that had been left over.

I love to be a scientist. I've always enjoyed being curious.

I've always enjoyed doing challenging things and also challenging common wisdom.

Nothing is more powerful than an idea whose time has come - even if it came in a - living room - or to someone - with a humble living.

There is still refinement needed - we are working on being able to do the same things at lower light levels and with a larger field of view.

Eventually I realised there must be a way by playing with the molecules; trying to turn the molecules on and off allows you to see adjacent things you couldn't see before.