"Schlau gemacht bis Mitternacht” (engl. “clever until midnight") was the motto of the 20th Long Night of Sciences, which took place on June 30 at various Dresden research institutes. This time, the people of Dresden were particularly hungry for new knowledge: After cancellations, digital and smaller variants during the Corona pandemic, the 20th Long Night of the Sciences took place again in its old size on June 30 - and attracted 48,000 visitors. That was almost 10,000 more than usual.

This year, the Paul Langerhans Institute Dresden (PLID) of the German Center for Diabetes Research (DZD) again participated in this great series of events with a variety of activities. Between 5 p.m. and midnight, almost 3,000 science enthusiasts of all ages visited the Center for Regenerative Therapies Dresden (CRTD) where the PLID information booth was located. The visitors took the opportunity to learn about the current research activities of the scientists in type 1 and type 2 diabetes. In addition, the scientists at the information booth offered various hands-on activities such as taste experiments or a "sugar quiz". In self-produced videos, visitors could have the intracellular processes in a beta cell explained to them after it had been exposed to a glucose stimulus or practice pipetting colored sugar solutions.

The visitors were allowed to experiment themselves. © Frank Möller / PLID