Fraunhofer Institute for Applied Information Technology FITThe Life Science Informatics department develops new approaches to produce highly specific information on diseases and individual patients.
After the sequencing of the human genome had been successfully completed, automatic instruments and computerized data analysis moved into the focus of biotechnology and medicine. On all levels, from molecular interaction to cellular function, tissue or organ structure, and the course of a disease in an individual patient, new instruments can produce information about the processes involved in a disease and can help to improve diagnosis and therapy.
This potential motivates our R&D in the field of information-intensive instruments using optical and electronic detection methods. We develop novel components, like fluidic microsystems to study cells and molecules, smart scanning microscopes and software for image analysis and object detection. We test and validate complete applications in cooperation with their users. We use our components to build application-specific systems that provide seamless integration in state-of-the-art network infrastructures and mobile access.
Computer scientists, engineers and natural scientists in two close collaborating groups work in our projects.