The European Network for Light Ion Hadron erapy (ENLIGHT) had its meeting at European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) in February 2002. inaugural About 70 specialists from dierent disciplines, including radiation biology, oncology, physics and engineering attended this rst gathering [1]. At that time, ‘multidisciplinarity’ was not yet a buzzword and the network was a real pioneer in the eld [2]. Clinicians, physicists, biologists and engineers with experience and interest in particle therapy were gathering for the rst time under the network’s umbrella. Started with the support of the EU Commission, ENLIGHT itself has run four other EU-funded projects –ULICE, PARTNER, ENVISION and ENTERVISION [3–6]. In fact, the network has worked as an open collaborative tool and served as a common multidisciplinary platform for all the communities involved. Since its foundation, ENLIGHT has relied on the variety of skills of its members to be able to identify and tackle the technical challenges, train young researchers, support innovation and lobby for funding. e idea of creating a multi-disciplinary and transnational platform for researchers and experts involved with radiation therapy, including hadron therapy, was born in 2001, when the Proton−Ion Medical Machine Study (PIMMS) had been presented at MedAustron and the whole idea of setting up specialised centres providing multiple radiation modalities was taking o in Europe [7]. at was the time when European Society for Radiotherapy & Oncology (ESTRO) was also starting to see the importance of considering other radiation options; at the same time, at CERN, Ugo Amaldi was pushing to get the organisation more heavily involved with hadron therapy and applications of accelerators advances in medical physics. e creation of ENLIGHT was, indeed, the result of the work of a few visionary people who could see the power of collaboration and knowledge sharing.