Georg Nagel
Georg Nagel is a German biophysicist and former professor of molecular plant physiology at the University of Würzburg. While working at the Max Planck Institute of Biophysics in Frankfurt, he, Peter HegemannPeter HegemannPeter Hegemann is a German biophysicist and the Hertie Senior Research Professor of Neuroscience at Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin. Starting from the question of how the single-celled green alga Chlamydomonas senses light and swims toward it, he and Georg Nagel and others discovered the light-gated ion channels known as channelrhodopsins, laying the molecular foundation for optogenetics, for which he shared the 2026 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine with Karl Deisseroth and Georg Nagel.Open the full entry, and others confirmed that the channelrhodopsins of green algae are ion channels opened directly by light, laying the foundation for optogenetics, for which he shared the 2026 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine with Karl DeisserothKarl DeisserothKarl Deisseroth is an American neuroscientist and psychiatrist, professor of bioengineering and of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at Stanford University, and an investigator of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI). By introducing channelrhodopsin-2, a light-sensitive channel protein from green algae, into nerve cells, he pioneered optogenetics, the use of light to control the activity of specific neurons, for which he shared the 2026 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine with Peter Hegemann and Georg Nagel.Open the full entry and Peter Hegemann.
Contents16 sections
Key facts
August 24, 1953Born in Weingarten; Early Education
1984–1988Doctoral Studies in Frankfurt
1988–1993Postdoctoral Research in the United States
After receiving his doctorate, he spent five years doing postdoctoral research in the United States at Yale University and at Rockefeller University in New York.[3]
1993Returning to the Max Planck Institute of Biophysics
In 1993, he returned to his former institution, the Max Planck Institute of Biophysics in Frankfurt, as a research group leader (Max Planck Society information gives 1992 as the start), and worked there until 2004. From 1995 to 2000, he also worked as a research assistant at Goethe University’s Institute of Biophysics, where he completed his habilitation in biophysical chemistry; as part of his habilitation research, he spent time at the University of Naples as a Marie Curie Fellow in 1999.[3][2][3][3]
2002–2003Confirming That Channelrhodopsins Are Light-Gated Ion Channels
Nagel was then using frog eggs to study proteins. Peter Hegemann’s group contacted him after finding two genes in Chlamydomonas gene sequences that appeared to encode light-sensitive proteins; he injected each of the two genes into frog eggs so that the proteins were produced in large quantities, and quickly found that the two proteins were ion channels opened by light, confirming the hypothesis Hegemann had formulated a decade earlier. They were named channelrhodopsin-1 and channelrhodopsin-2.[5][5][5][5][5][5]
His characterization of channelrhodopsin-2 showed that, after a pulse of light, a channel opened in the frog egg cell membrane within 0.2 milliseconds, and positively charged ions then flowed through the channel, producing an electrical signal. The two also introduced the gene into human embryonic kidney cells and hamster kidney cells, which likewise produced electrical signals when illuminated. In 2003, Hegemann and Nagel published these results, proposing that channelrhodopsin-2 could be used as a tool to generate electrical impulses in cells using light. The prize-awarded discoveries were made at the Max Planck Institute of Biophysics in Frankfurt.[5][5][5][5][5][5][4][2]
2004Professor at the University of Würzburg
In 2004, he accepted an appointment at the University of Würzburg (Julius-Maximilians-Universität Würzburg), where he was Professor of Molecular Plant Physiology at the Chair of Botany I of the Julius von Sachs Institute of the Biocentre until 2021. His colleague Dirk Becker worked with him for more than 20 years.[3][3][3]
2005Co-Authoring the Founding Paper of Optogenetics
After learning of the discovery of channelrhodopsin-2, Karl Deisseroth of Stanford University wrote to Nagel asking for the DNA encoding the protein. In 2005, Deisseroth’s group published a paper in Nature Neuroscience on using light to control neural activity with millisecond precision, with Nagel as one of the co-authors.[5][6]
2010Wiley Prize and Karl Heinz Beckurts Prize
In 2010, he shared the Wiley Prize in Biomedical Sciences and the Karl Heinz Beckurts Prize with Hegemann and Ernst Bamberg.[3]
2012–2015Zülch Prize, Brain Prize, and EMBO
In 2012, he received the International Prize for Translational Neuroscience and shared the Zülch Prize with Deisseroth, Hegemann, and Bamberg; in 2013 he received the Louis-Jeantet Prize and the Brain Prize; and in 2015 he was elected a member of the European Molecular Biology Organization (EMBO).[3][6]
2019Receiving the Rumford Prize
In 2019, he received the Rumford Prize.[3]
May 2020Receiving the Shaw Prize
2021Becoming a Senior Professor
From 2021 until the end of June 2026, he continued his research and teaching as a senior professor at the University of Würzburg’s Institute of Physiology.[3]
2024Receiving the University of Würzburg’s Röntgen Medal
In 2024, the University of Würzburg awarded him the Röntgen Medal for his outstanding scientific achievements.[3]
October 5, 2026Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine
On October 5, 2026, the Nobel Assembly at Karolinska Institutet announced that the 2026 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine would be awarded jointly to Nagel, Peter Hegemann of Humboldt University of Berlin, and Karl Deisseroth of Stanford University “for their discoveries concerning light-gated ion channels and optogenetics”. The prize amount is 12 million Swedish kronor (about $1.2 million), shared equally among the three. Nagel, then 73, learned of the award in Italy.[4][4][4][4][9][9][10][3]
He is the University of Würzburg’s 15th Nobel laureate. University President Paul Pauli congratulated him on behalf of the university; Bavarian Minister-President Markus Söder also issued a statement of congratulations, calling it a source of pride for Bavaria. Hesse’s science minister Timon Gremmels said that Nagel is closely connected with Frankfurt as a research location and laid important foundations there for the prize-winning research.[3][3][3][3][3][2]
Related Organizations, Websites, and Public Accounts
Julius-Maximilians-Universität Würzburg: Official website: https://www.uni-wuerzburg.de/ (opens in a new window).[3]
Max Planck Institute of Biophysics: Official website: https://www.biophys.mpg.de/ (opens in a new window).[3]
Sources
- Georg Nagel – Facts – 2026 (opens in a new window)
- Georg Nagel erhält Medizin-Nobelpreis - seine Entdeckung machte er in Frankfurt (opens in a new window)
- Nobel Prize for Würzburg Professor Georg Nagel (opens in a new window)
- Press release: Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 2026 (opens in a new window)
- Popular science background: A light-sensitive algal protein energised neuroscience (opens in a new window)
- Karl Alexander Deisseroth, M.D., Ph.D. (opens in a new window)
- Hong Kong Laureate Forum - Laureate - PETER HEGEMANN (opens in a new window)
- Peter Hegemann receives 2020 Shaw Prize (opens in a new window)
- Nobel medicine prize goes to 3 scientists for research into brain activity (opens in a new window)
- Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 2026 (opens in a new window)