Neuromag July 2016 | Page 27

by Diljit Singh Kajal

NeNa 2015 Neurowissenschaftliche Nachwuchskonferenz

A report by Renée Hartig

At 10 am , a bus filled with 50 people pulled away from the main train station of the small Swäbisch town , Tübingen . The bus was headed for the outskirts of the Black Forest , or the Schwarzwald , if you care for German translations . It ’ s also interesting to note that on the weekend just before the conference , there had been snow in Tübingen , however , this snow didn ’ t last long in the small town .

Only the road that carried those 50 graduate students to another little town called Schramberg parted the white trees and grass . Perhaps it felt a little cold outside , but inside the bus , there was a hustle and bustle to finish handing out homemade -but professionally done – abstract books for the event . The whole conference was outlined in the program for everyone to review and get excited over .

Day 1 . The first day continued after the bus arrived at Schramberg and the hungry students had their fill of the grub . Attendees were paired into groups of five or six to share temporary homes on the outskirts of the Schramberg conference center . Not too much later , all came together for the commencement of talks and poster sessions . The norm of a scientific conference , yet much more laid-back – the way we would oftentimes prefer . This year , the conference organizers , such as the author herself , evaluated talks and posters ; however it must be noted that everyone there presented quality work – data or no data . And that ’ s when I realized a thank you is in order to everyone who came out there with us . It does not stop there either . We had Axel Lindner ( Uni Tübingen ) and Markus Fendt ( Uni Madgeburg ) team up for a back-to-back discussion on the potential trajectories for the career of a young neuroscientist . This could be summed parsimoniously as ‘ academia or industry , which would you prefer ?’

Day 2 . The second day doesn ’ t start

July 2016 | NEUROMAG | 27