Nobel medicine prize honours three scientists for breakthrough in optogenetics

The brief

The 2026 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine has been awarded to American scientist Karl Deisseroth and German scientists Peter Hegemann and Georg Nagel for pioneering work in optogenetics, a technique that uses light to control nerve-cell activity and has transformed scientists' understanding of how the brain works. Hegemann and Nagel's research into light-sensitive proteins in algae helped lay the foundations for…