Spark Award 2021

Congratulations!

Load-​bearing, lightweight and now also recyclable: researchers led by Professor Paolo Ermanni were presented with the Spark Award in recognition of an innovative process for production of sustainable composite materials. ETH news article

winning team
The winners: Prof. Paolo Ermanni, Dr. Shelly Arreguin, Nicole Aegerter and Dr. Christoph Schneeberger. Congratulations also to Prof. Joanna Wong (not in the picture) in Calgary, Canada.

Videos of the top 5 inventions

Multi-​component fibrous moulding materials with deaeration features and manufacture thereof

group
Shelly Arreguin, Christoph Schneeberger, Joanna Wong, Paolo Ermanni, Nicole Aegerter
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Two-tier encapsulation of poorly soluble molecules in artificial protein cages

inventor group
Thomas Edwardson, Donald Hilvert
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A long non-coding RNA as a potent and specific cell death effector of cancer cells

inventor group
Yanrui Jiang, Makiko Seimiya, Renato Paro, Tosca Birbaumer, Tommy Schlumpf
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Tunable electro-optic modulator for boosting the efficiency of telecommunication systems

inventor group
David Pohl, Rachel Grange, Fabian Kaufmann, Marc Reig Escalé
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Programmable synthetic droplets and their uses

inventor group
Marie Kopp, Carolina Paganini, Umberto Capasso Palmiero, Paolo Arosio
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Photos of the award ceremony

Enlarged view: Vanessa Wood
Welcome by Prof. Vanessa Wood, ETH Vice President for Knowledge Transfer and Corporate Relations
Enlarged view: Big band Zürich
Big Band Zürich
Enlarged view: Tom Edwardson and Silke Meyns
Top 5 inventor Dr. Thomas Edwardson and Dr. Silke Meyns
Enlarged view: Marc Reig Escale and Silke Meyns
Top 5 inventor Dr. Marc Reig Escalé and Dr. Silke Meyns
Enlarged view: Umberto Caspasso Palmiero and Silke Meyns
Top 5 inventor Dr. Umberto Caspasso Palmiero and Dr. Silke Meyns
Enlarged view: Melanie Johnson and Silvio Bonaccio
Dr. Melanie Johnson, organizer of the Spark Award, and Dr. Silvio Bonaccio
Enlarged view: Mattias Ivarsson
Keynote speaker Dr. Mattias Ivarsson, CEO and founder of the ETH spin-off Inositec
Enlarged view: Silke Meyns
Dr. Silke Meyns, Head of IP group ETH transfer
Enlarged view: Tommy Schlumpf and Silvio Bonaccio
Top 5 inventor Dr. Tommy Schlumpf with Dr. Silvio Bonaccio Head of ETH transfer
Enlarged view: Christoph Schneeberger and Silvio Bonaccio
Top 5 inventor and soon to be announced winner Dr. Christoph Schneeberger and Dr. Silvio Bonaccio
Enlarged view: award ceremony
Award Ceremony
Enlarged view: top 20 inventors
our Top 20 inventor teams

The apéro in Polysnack

Top 20 inventions

D-BAUG

Smart-aggregate sensor for durability monitoring of reinforced concrete structures
Ueli Angst, Yurena Segui Femenias

D-BIOL

Engineering of deaminases to alter the activity window of base editors
Gerald Schwank, Lukas Villiger

D-BSSE

A long non-coding RNA as a potent and specific cell death effector of cancer cells
Renato Paro, Tosca Birbaumer, Yanrui Jiang, Tommy Schlumpf, Makiko Seimiya

PID Feedback control systems for robust control of molecular networks
Mustafa Khammash, Timothy Frei, Ching-Hsiang Chang, Maurice Filo

D-CHAB

Two-tier encapsulation of poorly soluble molecules in artificial protein cages
Donald Hilvert, Thomas Edwardson

Novel catalyst for the oxidation of ethanol in liquid-gas flow
Jeroen van Bokhoven, Sotiria Mostrou-Moser, Maximilian Moser

Programmable synthetic droplets and their uses
Paolo Arosio, Marie Kopp, Umberto Capasso Palmiero, Carolina Paganini

D-ITET

Ultra-wide band low power wake up radio
Michele Magno, Tommaso Polonelli, Thomas Burger, Vlad Niculescu

D-HEST

Scapula Orthosis to Support the Scapulohumeral Rhythm
Robert Riener, Yves Zimmermann, Anna-Maria Georgarakis

Device for rapid heating of liquids
Oliver Blattmann, Leandro Buchmann, Alexander Mathys

D-INFK

Robotically controlled cutting with a flexible rod-like tool
Roi Poranne, Stelian Coros, Simon Dünser, Bernhard Thomaszewski

D-ITET

Non-toxic electrochemical dissolution of gold nanoparticles for hand-held biosensing
Alexander Tanno, Yves Blickenstorfer, Raphael Tiefenauer, Janos Vörös

Non-invasive targeted small molecule delivery to brain via focused ultrasound
Mehmet Yanik, Mehmet Özdas, Aagam Shah, Paul Johnson

Ultrafast manufacturing of all solid state lithium ion batteries
Vanessa Wood, Paul Baade

D-MATL

Ultrahigh-pure magnesium alloys
Christian Wegmann, Jörg F. Löffler, Urs Gonzenbach, Leopold Berger, Philip Sturzenegger

D-MAVT

Multi-component fibrous moulding materials with deaeration features and manufacture thereof
Paolo Ermanni, Christoph Schneeberger, Nicole Aegerter, Joanna Wong, Shelly Arreguin

A new technology for imprinting free-form topography on the surface of biomedical devices for guiding biological responses
Aldo Ferrari, Edoardo Mazza, Raoul Hopf, Andreas Kourouklis, Xi Wu

D-PHYS

Method for localization of a scintillation event in a detector using hierarchical density based clustering
Max Ahnen, Jannis Fischer

Tunable electro-optic modulator for boosting the efficiency of telecommunication systems
Rachel Grange, David Pohl, Fabian Kaufmann, Marc Reig Escalé

Quantum cascade laser having stable frequency comb operation
Jérôme Faist, Ruijun Wang

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