By means of own experience in academia interrupted by 5 years in 2 different companies in Germany and the US I would like to derive some messages in comparison:

1. Keep broad interests: Many things You learn are unimportant, but You do not know which.                                                                                                              

2.   Success criteria between industry and academia differ, but both can be intellectually challenging.                                                                                                    

3.  In all cases top priority is communication across disciplines and cultures.
    

For this I will describe briefly work on 3 interdisciplinary projects: 1. Development of a camera for the Hubble telescope, 2.Early cancer recognition by Secondary Ion Mass Spectroscopy, 3. Future ways of Solar Energy Conversion.                                          Although these were topics of last century, they are still very actual, and some general conclusions are still valid. I will try to demonstrate this again relating to modern developments in medicine and technology.