In the Media - March 2024

A Big Boost to Europe’s Climate Change Goals

external page Indeed, while carbon pricing has been shown to reduce carbon emissions, its revenue-generating effects may prove to be one of its most important contributions, says ETH Zurich climate policy researcher Janna Hoppe, who coauthored an analysis of the effects of climate policies in the 2023 Annual Review of Environment and Resources. “Having some source of revenue that can be redistributed in order to make these policy instruments more just will always play a very critical role,” she says.

NTT Research PHI Lab Scientists Achieve Quantum Control of Excitons in 2D Semiconductors  

external page ETH Zurich Professor Puneet Murthy documented their success in trapping excitons in various geometries, including quantum dots, and controlling them to achieve independent energy tunability over scalable arrays.

The future of food: An inside look into NEOM CARE

external page Professor Sacha Menz from ETH Zurich, an architect and professor specialising in sustainable building technologies – who provides a structural perspective as a member of the Award Council for developing sustainable culinary practices.

It Is Possible to ‘Poison’ the Data to Compromise AI Chatbots With Little Effort

external page Florian Tramèr, an associate professor of computer science at ETH Zurich, highlighted the effectiveness of this approach in empowering chatbots. However, he also underscored the inherent risk associated with training AI tools on potentially inaccurate data.

Building with straw and hemp could seriously cut emissions

external page Researchers (from ETH Zurich) confirm that thermal insulation and heating replacement should be key elements of energy-efficient renovations. They developed a model that uses AI to calculate greenhouse gas emissions and costs and also takes into account uncertainties such as future climate and price developments. With bio-based building materials such as straw or hemp, significantly more greenhouse gas emissions can be saved in insulation compared to today.

First Data From Swiss Adult-Use Cannabis Pilot Indicates High Demand

external page According to Andreas Beerli, head of research from the KOF Swiss Economic Institute at ETH Zürich, which is leading the study, along with The University of Zürich, this research will focus on the social and economic effects of cannabis.

 

Said No to Tracking Cookies? Good Chance Your Data Are Still Being Collected

external page What is the level of compliance when it comes to the requirements of consent? That’s the question Amit Zac asked in his research with Ahmed Bouhoula, Karel Kubicek, Carlos Cotrini and David Basin from the computer science department at ETH Zurich. They created an automated process using machine learning methods, which allowed them to analyze 100 thousand websites in Europe. Their study shows that 65% of the websites that they were able to test ignore user rejection choices (for tracking cookies).

Global Cultured Meat Market Research Report 2023...

external page ETH Zurich research included in global market report for cultured meat.

When Algorithms Deliver: The AI Revolution in Logistics

external page Researchers from MIT and ETH Zurich used machine learning to speed things up (optimizing global logistics)...Max Paulus, a graduate student at ETH Zurich is a co-author on the paper. The research will be presented at the Conference on Neural Information Processing Systems.

Researchers publish dataset of over 6,000 agri-environmental policies from all over the world

external page Together with colleagues at ETH Zurich, Professor David Wuepper from the Institute for Food and Resource Economics at the University of Bonn has now put together an extensive, easy-to-use database containing 6,124 policies, from over 200 countries, that were adopted between 1960 and 2022.

Climate-friendly renovations using straw and hemp

external page Renovating buildings to improve their energy efficiency is a crucial step towards achieving climate targets. Researchers at ETH Zurich in Switzerland reveal the most effective renovation strategies for reducing greenhouse gas emissions. They include replacing fossil-fuel heating systems and harnessing the potential of bio-based building materials like straw and hemp. Researchers estimate that buildings could cut their greenhouse gas emissions by up to 87 percent with such renovation strategies.

Detecting heavy precipitation events directly with GPS data

external page A GPS station on the roof of the Institute of Geodesy and Photogrammetry (at ETH Zurich) is able to show that extreme weather events influence the quality of GPS signals and that these signals are therefore also suitable for detecting storms. It could one day even be possible to use them for the early detection and forecasting of thunderstorms.

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Organic farms seem to trigger more pesticide use on conventional farms

external page Robert Finger at ETH Zurich in Switzerland says the findings demonstrate the need for policy-makers to consider land-use policy at the “landscape scale” to maximise the environmental benefits of organic farming. “Fundamentally, just thinking about single fields or single farms is not enough,” he says.

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external page PHYS.org

A model that could broaden the manipulation skills of four-legged robots

external page A team of researchers at ETH Zurich recently introduced a new reinforcement learning–based model that could allow four-legged robots to interact with their surroundings in innovative ways, without requiring additional arms or manipulators.

Should I stop eating meat? The next big climate deadline is for meat and dairy

external page “As we have seen by the recent protests in Europe, it’s really becoming a left/right, or a liberal/conservative dividing line,” said Lukas Fesenfeld, a researcher at ETH Zurich and lecturer at the University of Bern who studies environmental and food policy. Fesenfeld did not participate in the survey.  

Doubts Grow About the Biosignature Approach to Alien-Hunting

external page “It’s a bit of this elephant in the room,” said the astronomer Daniel Angerhausen of the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich, who is a project scientist on the LIFE mission, a proposed space telescope that would search for biosignature gases on Earth-like exoplanets.

Canada Council for the Arts reveals 2025 Venice Biennale of Architecture Shortlist

external page Living Room Collective: Andrea Ling, architect, biodesigner at ETH Zurich leads "The Living Room Collective." "The project is an ambitious, large-scale living pavilion that utilizes materials embedded with biologically active, living cells in an architectural context. Using innovative fabrication techniques, functionalities such as structural reinforcement and carbon sequestration will be integrated into living structures that are then tended to throughout their life cycle,” reads the Canada Council for the Arts’ website.

ABB Robotics unveils new AMR with Visual SLAM navigation

external page ABB Robotics, the Zürich, Switzerland-based company’s AMR Studio software enables first-time robot users to program and operate entire fleets of robots. This latest announcement follows the company’s acquisition of (ETH Zurich spinoff) Sevensense in January. At the time, ABB said it was interested in offering more autonomy and cognitive intelligence in its AMRs...Sevensense, which spun out of ETH Zurich in 2018, specializes in Visual SLAM technology. ABB had invested in Sevensense in 2021.

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As well as numerous regional publications in the US.

Creating Fluid, Double-Curved Shapes Through Non-planar 3D Printing

external page ...The team from the Chair of Digital Construction Technologies at ETH Zurich—integrating computational design, digital manufacturing, and new materials—has been exploring an innovative non-planar robotic additive manufacturing system. This method facilitates the printing of thin structures with double curvature, significantly expanding the possibilities of their application in architecture on a larger scale.

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external page Azure Magazine

Heat stress could cost Singapore $2.2b a year in lost productivity by 2035: Study

external page Natalia Borzino Leonor, postdoctoral researcher at the Singapore-ETH Centre speaks about heat stress and loss of productivity.

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NVIDIA Unveils 6G Research Cloud Platform to Advance Wireless Communications With AI

external page NVIDIA today announced a 6G research platform that empowers researchers with a novel approach to develop the next phase of wireless technology...ETH Zurich spinoff, animatico AG was aquired by NVIDIA Switzerland AG.

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Numerous publications throughout Europe and North America.

The Secret Behind NASA's Recent Success with Dr. Thomas Zurbuchen

external page What drives NASA's most successful projects like James Webb, Perseverance, Parker Solar Probe, etc? What's going on with international cooperation? How will future missions be planned and executed? Finding out with Dr. Thomas Zurbuchen, former Associate Administrator of NASA Science Mission Directorate.

Climeworks establishes US headquarters in Austin

external page ETH Zurich Spinoff, Climeworks has elected to establish its US headquarters in Austin, the capital of the US State of Texas. The pioneering carbon capture firm has drawn up plans to triple its workforce stateside by the end of the year. The background to this development is that the US Department of Energy is providing huge financial backing to three Climeworks projects.

‘Parkour’ robot dog can leap, jump, and crawl its way through complex obstacle courses

external page A video of newly trained ANYmal in action shared by ETH Zurich shows the beefy red robot clambering up a small wooden staircase before leading over a small gap to land on another platform.

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A new ion trap for larger quantum computers

external page Researchers at ETH have managed to trap ions using static electric and magnetic fields and to perform quantum operations on them. In the future, such traps could be used to realize quantum computers with far more quantum bits than have been possible up to now.

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AI Offers Faster, More Efficient Diagnosis of Critical Newborn Condition

external page Researchers from ETH Zurich and KUNO Klinik St. Hedwig in Regensburg have created an algorithm that offers a reliable and automatic method for identifying a specific kind of heart defect in newborn babies.

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external page ScienceDaily

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As European dynamism gathers momentum, Elaia and partners double down with new deep tech fund

external page European venture capital firm, Elaia to visit ETH Zurich's Robotics Lab and AI Center.

Concerns raised over health effects of chemicals leaching from food packaging

external page ‘We know very little about the composition of plastic products or how they interact with biological systems – whether they are hazardous or toxic,’ says Helene Wiesinger, a chemist at ETH Zurich in Switzerland. ‘It would help to have more transparency. We could do more targeted testing and choose the safest alternatives for sensitive products like food packaging or medical items.’

Persia From Above, A Century Ago

external page Swiss aviator Walter Mittelholzer, who had received an invitation from the Persian government to deliver a new Junkers aircraft to the country, which would be renamed Iran in 1935.

Also reported in numerous international publications around the world.

Odne announces closing of USD 5.5 million USD Series A1 Financing Round to fund the US market launch

external page ETH Zuricih spinoff, Odne (Onde Ltd and Odne Inc) is pleased to announce the closing of its Series A1 Financing Round raising USD 5.5 million (CHF 4.8 million) to fund the upcoming US market launch.

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As well as numerous regional television broadcasts and publications across the U.S.

Footprints left by the first vertebrate

external page In 1992 off the coast of Ireland, a Swiss geology student accidentally discovered the longest set of footprints made by the first four-legged animals to walk on earth. They pointed to a new date for the key milestone in evolution when the first amphibians left the water 385 million years ago. The salamander-type animal which was the size of a basset hound lived when County Kerry was semi-arid, long before dinosaurs, as Iwan Stössel explains to Josephine McDermott.

Where we might find aliens in the next decade

external page Future telescopes, like the Habitable Worlds Observatory and a European proposal called Life, will then try to perform this same analysis for true Earth-analogue planets around stars like our Sun. "The driving planetary class will be rocky planets in the habitable zone," says Sascha Quanz, an astrophysicist at ETH Zürich in Switzerland who leads the Life program.

Fluid Forms created using non-planar robotic 3D printing

external page Fluid Forms is a 2.0-meter tall lightweight shell created using non-planar robotic 3D printing. This project showcases an innovative robotic additive manufacturing method that enables the more efficient printing of doubly curved thin shells.

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external page Archinect News

How a natural compound from sea squirts combats cancer

external page A promising drug derived from the sea squirt Ecteinascidia turbinata, has shown potential in combating cancers resistant to conventional treatments. However, its precise mechanism of action has remained elusive—until now. A collaborative effort led by Dr. SON Kook and Professor Orlando D. SCHÄRER from the Center for Genomic Integrity within the Institute for Basic Science in South Korea, along with Dr. Vakil TAKHAVEEV and Professor Shana STURLA from ETH Zurich, Switzerland, has illuminated the inner workings of this mysterious compound.

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external page PHYS.org

external page Oncology News Australia

Sustainable tourism: 25 students at ETH Zurich and University of Seychelles present new research

external page The study was done by three partners, ETH Zurich (University of Zurich), the tourism department and the University of Seychelles. Twenty-five students doing their master's degree at the Swiss university made a case study on the impacts, challenges and diversification of tourism in the island nation.  

Rainforests replanted with seedlings after logging don't recover well

external page Daisy Dent of ETH Zürich, Switzerland and the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute, Panama, commented on how the interaction between animals and seedlings in these environments plays a crucial role...“Rainforests are complex systems and there are many possible explanations for our results. For example, animals that eat seeds — like bearded pigs — may be drawn into restored forest patches to eat the more abundant seeds and seedlings, rather than moving into adjacent poor-quality logged forest. In natural forests, animals potentially move more freely and so do not exhaust seed supplies in the same way,” Dent explained.

Indonesian gold mine expanding in ‘wrong direction’ into orangutan habitat

external page Advocacy group Mighty Earth says the expansion will impact an area recently established to help protect the orangutan and other threatened species...an assessment concluded that the long-term impact of the planned exploration and development work was minimal...Mighty Earth, however, said this conclusion only applied to the proposed exploration work in the...area, and not the impact on high carbon stock (HCS) forests in most of the KBA areas adjacent to the mine, according to a large-scale indicative HCS forest map of Indonesia published in 2021 by Swiss research institute ETH Zurich’s EcoVision Lab.

Why recycling plastic is not a quick fix

external page "...The wide variety of different chemicals in plastics and the lack of transparency about them causes problems for the circular economy and potentially puts people and the environment at risk," writes Helene Wiesinger, ETH Zurich.

The 50 most powerful women in architecture and design

external page Mariam Issoufou (formerly Mariam Kamara) is the founder of Niger-based studio Atelier Masōmī, a rapidly growing architecture practice focused on creating empowering spatial solutions for communities in the developing world. She is also an appointed professor of architecture heritage and sustainability at ETH Zurich in 2022. 

On International Women’s Day: 6 Women Architects to Learn

external page ETH Zurich alumna, Jeanne Gang is an American architect...she studied urban design in an interdisciplinary program combining landscape architecture, urban planning, architecture, and engineering as a Rotary Foundation Ambassadorial scholar at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zürich (ETH Zurich).

Switzerland wants to end the relationship crisis with Brussels

external page The plan to conclude an electricity agreement with the EU for the first time is very well received by business. This will improve network stability and strengthen security of supply. According to a study from ETH Zurich commissioned by Economiesuisse, Switzerland could save more than 50 billion francs by 2050 with an electricity agreement because Switzerland would not have to set up many systems twice if it were integrated into Europe.

JWST Found Baby Quasars. They Could Help Solve An Astronomical Mystery

external page In new research using the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), published in The Astrophysical Journal, a large team of scientists (including R. Mackenzie and S. Lilly at ETH Zurich) showed that they were able to isolate and scrutinize a bunch of tiny red dots we used to think were normal galaxies. That might not sound like much on the surface, but it turns out that those galaxies could actually be home to very young quasars—the term for black holes that suck up surrounding astronomical bodies until they become some of the brightest objects in the entire universe.

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external page Science Magazine

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Construction commences on world's "tallest 3D-printed structure" Tor Alva

external page Architects Michael Hansmeyer and Benjamin Dillenburger are creating a 30-metre-tall tower in the Swiss Alps, which is being 3D-printed with concrete by technology university ETH Zurich. Named Tor Alva, or White Tower, the building will become the world's "tallest 3D-printed structure" once complete in Mulegns later this year, according to Hansmeyer and Dillenburger.

D-Wave-led Research Team Reports on Quantum Advantage in Quantum Simulation Task

external page A team of researchers, (including researchers from the Institute for Theoretical Physics at ETH Zurich) led by scientists from Canadian quantum computer pioneer D-Wave, have made significant strides in simulating phenomena that classical computers struggle to solve.

Bridging quantum and classical physics with nanoparticle entanglement

external page A team of researchers led by Dr. Jayadev Vijayan from The University of Manchester, in collaboration with scientists from ETH Zurich and theorists from the University of Innsbruck, has made a significant breakthrough in "Observable quantum: Scaling up the invisible". Their experiment, conducted at ETH Zurich and detailed in Nature Physics, introduces a novel method to preserve quantum features amidst environmental noise.“The strength of these optical interactions, mediated by the cavity, remains constant regardless of the distance, enabling us to couple micron-scale particles over several millimeters,” adds Johannes Piotrowski from ETH Zurich.

Researchers expose security, privacy and safety issues in femtech

external page Academics are calling for regulatory action after unveiling security, privacy and safety issues in femtech. Researchers at Royal Holloway, University of London, Newcastle University, University of London and ETH Zurich, have identified “significant” security, privacy and safety issues surrounding women’s health technologies, such as period tracking apps and fertility smart devices.

Also reported in...

external page TechXplore

external page Cyber Daily - Australia

Deadly earthquakes trigger hunt for speedier alerts

external page Researchers in Europe have identified an underground signal that may be a precursor to strong quakes. This was the focus of another EU-funded project. Called RISE, it ran from September 2019 through May 2023...‘Our starting point was to make Europe more resilient to earthquakes,’ said Professor Stefan Wiemer, director of the Swiss Seismological Service at ETH Zurich...Wiemer led a group of engineers and experts in seismology, information technology, geology and social sciences from two dozen organisations in 13 countries ranging from Japan and Italy to Israel and Mexico...‘We can estimate within only 30 minutes after an event an approximate number of victims, injured people and various levels of damage and costs,’ said Wiemer, who is also chair of seismology at the Department of Earth Science at ETH Zurich.

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Charge fractionalisation observed spectroscopically

external page A research team led by the Paul Scherrer Institute has spectroscopically observed fractionalisation of electronic charge in an iron-based metallic ferromagnet...“Achieving and observing states in which charge is fractionalised is exciting not only from the perspective of fundamental research,” says Gabriel Aeppli, head of the photon science division at PSI and professor at EPFL and ETH Zurich, who proposed the study. “We observe this in an alloy of common metals at low, but still relatively accessible temperatures. This makes it worthwhile considering whether there are electronic devices that might exploit fractionalisation.”

3D Printing of Mineral Foams from Recycled Industrial Waste for the Building Industry

external page Among the challenges facing the construction sector are the reduction in the use of construction materials and the industrial waste generated during and after each project. Additionally, new architectural trends involving complex geometries are wasteful and difficult to manufacture using conventional methods. As a result, a doctoral student at ETH Zurich, in collaboration with FenX AG, developed a method for 3D printing lightweight insulation building components from cement-free mineral foams derived from recycled industrial waste. The project is called Airelements.

Scientists find way to make gold from electronic waste

external page “The fact I love the most is that we’re using a food industry byproduct to obtain gold from electronic waste...You can’t get much more sustainable than that,” study coauthor and ETH Zurich professor Raffaele Mezzenga said in a statement.

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100x the power of JWST? Diffractive lenses could alter astronomy forever

external page To date, NASA has discovered roughly 5,000 exoplanets – the term used to describe planets outside our solar system. By studying these planets in greater detail, the scientific community can learn a great deal about the evolution of the cosmos. They may even be able to detect signs of extraterrestrial life in a distant solar system – which is also one of the goals of the James Webb team as well as that of other projects, including ETH Zurich’s LIFE space mission.

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A Sustainable Fuel and Chemical From the Robotic Lab

external page Artificial intelligence and automated laboratory infrastructure are massively accelerating the development of new chemical catalysts. With these tools, researchers at ETH Zurich are developing catalysts for efficient and cost-effective synthesis of the energy source methanol from CO2.

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external page TrendRadars

Cost of carbon capture by 2050 ‘twice as high as previously estimated’

external page The cost of removing one tonne of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere by 2050 will be twice as high as previously estimated, new research has found. Using one of three carbon capture techniques will cost $230-540 per tonne, according to the work at ETH Zurich in Switzerland. Researchers compared technologies used by ETH spin-off Climeworks, carbon capture using aqueous solutions, and carbon capture using calcium oxide, all of which are already in use.

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external page Environmental News Network

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ETH students accelerate private sector innovation

external page How can companies accelerate their development and innovation processes while also minimising the risks involved? This question is at the heart of the research conducted by Mirko Meboldt, Professor of Product Development and Construction at ETH Zurich. Meboldt runs the university's Feasibility Lab, which supports companies in testing their ideas for innovation.

Bio-Inspired Neuroprosthetics: Sending Signals The Brain Can Understand

external page ETH researchers have developed a prosthetic leg communicating with the brain via natural signals. Prostheses that connect to the nervous system have been available for several years. Now, researchers at ETH Zurich have found evidence that neuroprosthetics work better when they use signals that are inspired by nature.

Earth’s Fountain of Life Is Vanishing Beneath Our Feet

external page In the study, scientists from University College London, University of California at Santa Barbara, and ETH Zürich curated groundwater measurements gathered from 170,000 wells in 1,700 aquifer systems. According to the researchers, this is the first global view into groundwater levels from ground-based data, providing a level of detail that’s impossible to achieve with just satellite or computer-generated models. While their findings are mostly bad news, there is a dash of good news mixed in as well.

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Was Cosmic Dust Responsible for Life on Earth?

external page What is cosmic dust? What is it made of and what can it tell us about the Universe? Could cosmic dust be responsible for life starting on Earth? Figuring it all out with Dr Craig Walton from Cambridge University, and a Nomis Fellow for ETH Zurich’s Centre for Origins and Prevalence of Life.

Rapyuta Robotics to Demo Pick Assist Robots Live at Modex 2024

external page Rapyuta Robotics, an ETH Zurich spinoff, a leading provider of cloud robotics warehouse solutions, is pleased to announce its participation in Modex 2024, a premier trade show for the supply chain, manufacturing, and distribution industries, taking place from March 11-14 at the Georgia World Congress Center in Atlanta, Georgia.

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Among other publications