“We hypothesize that changes in role identity can be induced in clinical settings as well. The mechanisms of action of the observed results remain uncertain, but new treatments for pain conditions, which modulate self-perceived role identity in emotionally meaningful settings, may contribute to a beneficial influence on pain management.”(1)
Where is the link to medicinal chemistry?
Very likely, the subjects who changed their role identity during the experiment and were able to bear considerable more pain, produced more endogenous opioids and more of its receptors to interfere with the pain signal. While there is no doubt about a ligand – receptor interaction at the end of the chain, the detailed processes underlying the observation remain unclear, especially for the role of perception and emotion. Hence, this simple experiment raises a number of questions in and adjacent to medicinal chemistry which we try to answer in a rather unusual setting of a “laboratory for interdisciplinarity”, the Collegium Helveticum in Zurich.
History
Being a forum of dialogue between the sciences, Collegium Helveticum was founded by the ETH Zurich in 1997, with the objective of promoting a more in-depth discourse of natural and technical sciences with humanities and social sciences.
Interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary dialogue, and exchange of ideas between natural and technical sciences with humanities, art and medical science are still core and vision of the Collegium.
Mission
The Collegium Helveticum perceives transdisciplinarity as an indispensable element of its research projects. These projects are carried out with cooperation of the University of Zurich and the ETH Zurich as well as other academies, research institutes and industry partners, under the direction of Collegium Helveticum.
Within the interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary research Collegium pursues a pragmatic approach based on cooperation, communication and coordination. Disciplinary competence has thereby always been a pre-requisite.
Collegium Helveticum as a research institute is committed to a bottom-up-approach. Together with interested scientists (fellows) and invited institutions that are endowed with complex questions that are in need of interdisciplinary approaches, one or several joint research projects are designed combining several fields.
Collegium Helveticum is not an introversive institution. It initiates and organizes symposiums, lectures, workshops and other events which are all interdisciplinary and public. In this manner, Collegium tries to bring together diverse subgroups in order to promote the interchange of ideas between students, scientists and representatives from arts, economics, literature and the public, and it acts as a catalyst in relevant questions of the present and the future.
Structure
“Fellows” are professors of the ETH Zurich and University of Zurich and are elected by a curatorium (the rectors of the two institutions and the president of the Swiss Academy of Sciences) for a 5 years period in which they serve for 20% share of their time at the Collegium and are equivalently reimbursed by their home institutions. “Affiliated Fellows” are researchers from either universities or public institutions or the industry, who spent a certain amount of the time at the Collegium according to their interest or that of their home institutions.
The director of the Collegium is elected by the curatorium for a period of 5 year and is a professor at ETH Zurich or University of Zurich. For the period until 2009 Prof. Dr. Gerd Folkers has taken the responsibility to head the Collegium Helveticum.
Research
The Fellows, the affiliated Fellows and the director are expected to take part in the academic life of both home institutions in research and teaching. Usually the Conference of the Fellows chooses one research topic to focus on for the whole period, resulting in a multidisciplinary and hopefully transdisciplinary research project. At the moment, a group of experts from the fields of Chemistry, History, Environmental Sciences, Medical Science, Neurosciences, Economics, Pharmacy and Religious Philosophy deals with the current research topic entitled «The role of an emotion: its contribution to human acts and in establishing social and behavioral norms».
Actually the Collegium hosts 6 Fellows, 3 affiliated Fellows, 15 senior researchers or post docs and 17 PhD students from various disciplines.
Teaching
Biweekly public lectures and student lectures given by the Fellows and invited experts parallel the research project, thus providing a wide spectrum of views on the topic of research for both the public and the students. Regular inhouse research colloquia for all members of the Collegium deepen the understanding and foster interdisciplinary discussion and dissemination of the ideas. In the monthly fellows meeting, reports are discussed to develop further research strategies.
Achievements
After having collaborated for half of the period now, all the members of the Collegium have acquired and improved abilities in exchanging their disciplinary views and concepts with other disciplines. Re-formulation and re-evaluation of hypotheses have led to common interdisciplinary research proposals to the National Science Foundation and foreign science agencies. Open-minded dialogue between disciplines, listening and learning and flat hierarchies have been established as essentials of research culture at the Collegium Helveticum.
Information and contact
Read more about people, projects and publications on our webpage
http://www.collegium.ethz.ch/index.en.html
or contact
e-mail: gerd.folkers@collegium.ethz.ch
By Gerd Folkers
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(1) Changes in Self-Perceived Role Identity Modulate Pain Perception, Elvan Kut, Nils Schaffner, Amrei Wittwer, Victor Candia, Meike Brockmann, Claudio Storck & Gerd Folkers, DOI: 10.1016/j.pain.2007.04.012
