ETH News

This past weekend, 67 teams from 24 countries competed in ETH Zurich’s Cybathlon – fighting not only for victory, but also for the advancement of assistance technologies that are more suitable for everyday use. The third edition of the competition for people with disabilities and experimental assistive technologies was a complete success.

He studies cancer cells and their cellular environment in order to new therapies. Now, ETH Zurich Professor Andrea Alimonti is being awarded the Cloëtta Prize.

The thirteenth edition of the Swiss HR Barometer focusses on the topic of ‘Sense and nonsense at work’. The majority of the 2032 respondents in Switzerland feel that their work is important and meaningful, with this becoming increasingly important from the age of 55. However, almost half feel alienated to some extent, and the perceived boredom has increased slightly compared to 10 years ago.

At its meeting of 18 and 19 September 2024 and upon application of Joël Mesot, President of ETH Zurich, the ETH Board appointed fifteen professors. The Board also awarded the title of "Professor of Practice" once.

On 14 September, ETH Zurich officially inaugurated the new 'Alps' supercomputer at the Swiss National Supercomputing Centre (CSCS) in Lugano. The celebrations in Lugano were attended by Federal Councillor Guy Parmelin and well-known personalities from the worlds of science and politics.

Four researchers from ETH Zurich have successfully applied for Consolidator Grants funded by the Swiss National Science Foundation.

The numerous spin-offs and patents generated at ETH Zurich are the driving force behind innovation in the Swiss economy. We present five of them.

At its meeting of 22 and 23 May 2024 and upon application of Joël Mesot, President of ETH Zurich, the ETH Board appointed twelve professors. The Board also awarded the title of "Professor" four times and the title of "Professor of Practice" three times.

In its annual report 2023 published today, ETH Zurich looks back on a successful year. For some years, however, the budget has not kept pace with the growth in student numbers. The growth rates projected by the Federal Council in the 2025-2028 ERI Dispatch are therefore forcing the university to consider drastic measures in research and teaching.

Natural forest regeneration is hailed as a cost-effective way to restore biodiversity and sequester carbon. However, the fragmentation of tropical forests has restricted the movement of large birds limiting their capacity to disperse seeds and restore healthy forests.

At its meeting of 6 and 7 March 2024 and upon application of Joël Mesot, President of ETH Zurich, the ETH Board appointed nine professors. The Board also awarded the title of "Professor" three times and the title of "Professor of Practice" once.

Heinrich Ursprung was President of ETH Zurich from 1973 to 1987. He led the bilateral negotiations between Switzerland and the EU in the field of research in his capacity as State Secretary in the 1990s. This influential figure in the Swiss higher education landscape passed away shortly before his 92nd birthday.

The European Space Agency’s most expensive and complex mission, the LISA space antenna, has reached a major milestone: it has passed the stage of intensive testing by experts in the Mission Adoption Review process - a significant step for the LISA consortium.

Climate neutrality and nuclear phase-out: Switzerland's ambitious green electricity targets are realistic if the electricity supply is profoundly and rapidly transformed, as a study by the SWEET EDGE consortium shows. The researchers developed three strategies for expanding renewable energies.

At its meeting of 6 and 7 December 2023 and upon application of Joël Mesot, President of ETH Zurich, the ETH Board appointed twelve professors and awarded the title "Professor of Practice" once.  

ETH Zurich will join the League of European Research Universities (LERU) on 1 January 2024. This will boost its networking with the European university landscape.

Forests renew themselves naturally. There has been very little research into how exactly this happens – until now. Researchers at ETH Zurich and WSL have set themselves the task of solving this puzzle.

The CRISPR-Cas gene scissors enable researchers to study the genetic and cellular causes of autism in the lab – directly on human tissue.

For the first time, researchers combined human and ecological factors to analyse the global scale of non-native tree species invasions. Human activity in hotspots of global trade, such as maritime ports, is linked to an increased likelihood of non-native tree species invasions. However, a high diversity of native tree species can help to curb the intensity of such invasions.

The 55th International Chemistry Olympiad ended with a closing ceremony on Monday afternoon, 24 July. Out of 348 participants, 217 were awarded gold, sil-ver, or bronze medals. The Swiss team took home an "honourable mention."

At its meeting of 12 and 13 July 2023 and upon application of Joël Mesot, President of ETH Zurich, the ETH Board appointed ten professors.

Kantonsspital Baden (KSB) and ETH Zurich have been working together since 2017, mainly in teaching initially, but increasingly in clinical research. Now three ETH professors are moving into new premises on the hospital’s healthcare campus. Together, they want to make findings from basic research available for the benefit of patients.

The ETH spin-off aiEndoscopic has developed a device that should make intubation easier and safer in the future. It combines artificial intelligence and robotics.

Researchers at ETH Zurich and Empa have developed a patch with a sensor function. It can be used to seal wounds in the abdomen after surgery. The polymer patch warns before the occurrence of dangerous leaks on sutures in the gastrointestinal tract.

ETH Zurich and EPFL want to work with partners from politics, science and industry to push innovative storage and transport solutions for renewable energy carriers. The overall goal is to create a climate-neutral and flexible energy system for Switzerland. Around 20 partners and industrial companies have already voiced their interest in a collaboration.

Timber construction is undergoing a renaissance in Switzerland. ETH researchers at the Hönggerberg campus are using a fire simulator to test timber components for the construction of buildings of all sizes. The custom-built oven permits simulations of realistic fire scenarios.

The Collegium Helveticum opens an exhibition this weekend that is all about data, patterns and artificial intelligence.

At its meeting of 24 and 25 May 2023 and upon application of Joël Mesot, President of ETH Zurich, the ETH Board appointed nine professors and awarded the title of professor twice. At the same time, the Board also bid farewell to nine professors and thanked them for their service.

Bachelor’s students at ETH Zurich were given a year to turn their original ideas into finished products. ETH News presents videos of two of these projects.

In the video series "Ask the Expert", experts from ETH Zurich answer questions from the community. In this edition, Stefan Wiemer provides information on the topic of earthquakes.

As of today, the ETH Zurich annual report for 2022 is available online. This is the first time it has been published in digital form. It provides an interactive tour through the different areas of the university, as well as describing how ETH functions and the contribution it makes to Swiss society.

In the video series "Ask the Expert", ETH Zurich experts answer questions from the community. In this edition, Maren Brehme provides information on the topic of geothermal energy.

At its meeting of 8 and 9 March and upon application of Joël Mesot, President of ETH Zurich, the ETH Board appointed 14 professors and awarded the title of professor five times. At the same time, the Board also bid farewell to three professors and thanked them for their service.

What is it like to study computer science at ETH? 33 female high school students attended a one-week taster course in February to find out.

What is the status of equality at ETH? What challenges do our female students face? Young women provide information on International Women's Day.

A special year is soon coming to an end. In 2022, much has been researched, developed and invented at ETH Zurich. ETH News looks back on an eventful past year.

The lander’s team has tried to contact the spacecraft twice without response, leading them to conclude it has run out of energy.

The LOOP Zurich research center combines expertise from ETH Zurich, the University of Zurich and the four university hospitals in Zurich with the aim of developing more personalized therapies. Two new projects supported by The LOOP Zurich target urinary tract infections and obesity respectively.

The creaking of the shimmering Morteratsch Glacier, the rumbling of ash-coloured dams and the steady sloshing of water in grey-blue Zurich reservoirs... In the “Serendipity” seminar series of Chair of Landscape Architecture Christophe Girot, researchers and students leave the seminar room to explore how places sound and how they can be explored by ear. They do this using no more than a microphone and an analogue camera.

High temperatures, fuelled by climate change, dried out soils across Europe and the Northern Hemisphere this summer, finds a team of climate scientists led by ETH Zurich in the name of the World Weather Attribution group.

Scientists often are either in the lab or at their desks researching, thinking, writing, reading, and analysing discoveries. What happens if their expertise aligns with current affairs in the media, such as the war in Ukraine and nuclear threats? How does their work change when they suddenly have to spend more time in talk shows than in the library?

ETH Zurich is stepping up research and teaching in the field of food technology and nutrition. It is supported in this by the companies Givaudan, Bühler and Nestlé with initial funding of 5 million Swiss francs over six years. This funding includes the creation of a new professorship.

It was only when Margherita Fontana left ETH Zurich that she realised she had been given a unique value proposition that she could take with her into the corporate world.

Words, sentences and entire books appeared all over ETH’s exhibition pavilion at this year’s World Economic Forum. In conjunction with the research exhibits on display, they framed the space for the discussion “RETHINKING LIVING”: a search for answers to the really big questions.

Before it reaches our plates, the food we eat usually has travelled a long way. In this episode of the ETH podcast, we talk about how far a breakfast travels and the resulting political and ecological significance.  

The VIEshunt student team aims to benefit patients by developing an intelligent shunt able to regulate the intracranial pressure.

Slovak President Zuzana Čaputová and President of the Swiss Confederation Ignazio Cassis visited ETH Zurich today. The Slovak President is currently on a two-day state visit to Switzerland and made a stop at the university.

Philippe Kahn, a technology innovator and entrepreneur who studied mathematics at ETH Zurich, is credited with creating the first camera phone solution.

ETH News has been videoing three student teams working on focus projects. One of these is the Sowa team.

The robotic explorer GLIMPSE, created at ETH Zurich and the University of Zurich, has made it into the final round of a competition for prospecting resources in space. The long-term goal is for the robot to explore the south polar region of the moon.

Switzerland's former ambassador to the US Martin Dahinden made many exciting encounters during his diplomatic career, and ETH Zurich played a key role throughout.

In this episode of the podcast, ETH researchers and the former Director-General of Research and Innovation at the European Commission talk about Switzerland's exclusion from Horizon Europe.

ETH spin-off Climeworks is specialised in technology that filters CO₂ directly from the air. The company secured CHF 600 million in investment in its latest equity round, allowing it to invest in new large-​scale air capture facilities.

Researchers at PSI and ETH Zurich have observed for the first time how tiny magnets in a special layout align themselves solely as a result of temperature changes. This view into processes that take place within so-called artificial spin ice could play an important role in the development of novel high-performance computers.

The past year has brought challenges on three fronts: coronavirus, climate change and links with Europe. While new variants of Sars-CoV-2 were the main concern during the second year of the pandemic, governments meeting at COP21 sought commitments for more coordinated efforts in combatting climate change. For Swiss universities, 2021 also marked a turning point, as they were shut out of the EU research programme Horizon Europe.

At its meeting of 9 and 10 March 2022 and upon application of Joël Mesot, President of ETH Zurich, the ETH Board appointed ten professors and awarded the title of professor twice.  

The Swiss Polar Institute has launched a four-year study led by EPFL in which researchers from several other Swiss institutions are investigating the impact of climate change on Greenland’s fjord ecosystems. Research groups from ETH Zurich are also involved.  

On International Women’s Day, the ETH podcast has a close look at facts and figures regarding gender equality at ETH Zurich.

Biologists from ETH Zurich have discovered speargun-like molecular injection systems in two types of bacteria and have described their structure for the first time. The special nanomachines are used by the microbes for the interaction between cells and could one day be useful as tools in biomedicine.

In the video series "Ask the Expert", experts from ETH Zurich answer questions from the community. In this episode Gabriela Hug talks about energy supply.

Usually, failure is something shameful, or at least it used to be. Nowadays, people rather talk about how crucial failure is for success.

Researchers at ETH Zurich and the Frankfurt School have developed an artificial neural network that can solve challenging control problems. The self-learning system can be used for the optimization of supply chains and production processes as well as for smart grids or traffic control systems.

All living organisms that respire have to get rid of electrons. In oxygen-free environments, microorganisms deploy special molecules which act as extracellular electron shuttles to transfer the electrons from cells to minerals. A group of researchers has now discovered what determines the electron transfer efficiency of these "cabs".

ETH’s Student Project House is a dream come true for young inventors. It's a space where flashes of inspiration can materialise - or not and a place where students can implement their ideas without the pressure of succeeding.

A turbulent year is soon coming to an end. Despite the coronavirus, much has been researched, developed and invented at ETH Zurich. ETH News looks back at 2021.

At its meeting of 8 and 9 December 2021 and upon application of Joël Mesot, President of ETH Zurich, the ETH Board appointed ten professors and awarded the title of professor twice.

Switzerland’s two federal institutes of technology have teamed up to offer a new joint doctoral programme in the learning sciences. It aims to train experts to draw on their technological and scientific knowledge in the interests of advancing the research, teaching and learning.

Chronic stress can decrease the quality of our lives, and have long-term negative effects on our health that may be irreversible. The new Hochschulmedizin Zürich flagship project STRESS aims to explore the causes of stress and highlight possible treatments.

Two scientists in Switzerland solved the mysterious incident. They tell us in the ETH podcast why they got interested in the incident and what happened after they published their findings.

By cleverly combining different technologies, manufacturers can produce plastic that is climate neutral over its entire life cycle. A new study by an international team of researchers has shown that this combination requires less energy than alternatives and costs the same – or even less.

At its meeting of 22 and 23 September and upon application of Joël Mesot, President of ETH Zurich, the ETH Board appointed six professors. At the same time, the Board also bid farewell to six professors and thanked them for their service.

The shape of rocks is a key factor in assessing rockfall hazard. This is the conclusion of a new study from the Institute for Snow and Avalanche Research and ETH Zurich.

The Italian scientist Nicola Aceto will receive the Swiss Science Prize Latsis 2021 worth CHF 100,000. Aceto is an associate professor at ETH Zurich and is being honoured for his groundbreaking discoveries in the field of cancer research.

In the video series "Ask the Expert", experts from ETH Zurich answer questions from the community. In this episode Bruno Studer talks about molecular plant breeding.

In this episode of the ETH podcast Didier Queloz talks about the quandaries of being a young Nobel Laureate. He also talks about his plans at ETH and tells us what he would ask a Martian if he met one.

At its meeting of 14 July 2021 and upon application of Joël Mesot, President of ETH Zurich, the ETH Board appointed ten professors. Six of them are affiliated with the Department of Architecture.

While Domenico Giardini, Professor of Seismology and Geodynamics, already has his hands on Mars, Adrian Glauser, Senior Researcher at the Institute for Particle Physics and Astrophysics, has to be patient. Among many others, Adrian worked on the James-Webb-Telescope that shall finally launch this fall, with a delay of many years.

In the video series "Ask the Expert", experts from ETH Zurich answer questions from the community. In this episode Klaus Eyer talks about vaccinations.

The 1991 Nobel Prize winner in Chemistry, ETH Professor Emeritus Richard Ernst, has died at the age of 87. ETH Zurich mourns the loss of a man with an extremely broad range of interests and commitments.

This episode of the podcast is all about astrophysics. The first Swiss astronaut Claude Nicollier talks about his flights into space and astrophysicist Judit Szulágyi about her experiences at NASA.

In the latest episode or our podcast we talk to Claude Nicollier about what planet earth looks like from space, and we ask Judit Szulágyi about her experiences working at NASA.

Fewer typing errors when touching a smartphone keyboard: ETH Computer scientists have developed a new AI solution that enables touchscreens to sense with eight times higher resolution than current devices. Thanks to AI, their solution can infer much more precisely where fingers touch the screen.

The 5G wireless standard is a less polarising issue among the Swiss population than thought. According to a survey conducted by ETH researchers, the majority of people are in favour of 5G. However, a substantial portion of the population in the French-speaking region had concerns about electromagnetic radiation.

In the last episode of the Uncertainty-Series, we talk to Helga Nowotny and Eric Burns about why uncertainty in research is eminent but at the same time increases pressure on researchers regarding their position.

Novel nanoparticles developed by researchers at ETH Zurich and Empa detect multi-resistant bacteria hiding in body cells and kill them. The scientists' goal is to develop an antibacterial agent that is effective where conventional antibiotics remain ineffective.

The new “LOOP Zurich - Medical Research Center” promotes patient-focused therapies – for example in oncology and neuro-rehabilitation. To achieve its goals, the center brings together specialist knowledge in the fields of biomedicine, clinical research and bioinformatics from the University of Zurich, ETH Zurich as well as Zurich’s four university hospitals.

Gudela Grote and Nadine Bienefeld talk about the impact of the uncertainty factor on people's potential in the new podcast episode.

Researchers at ETH Zurich and Empa have chemically modified wood and made it more compressible, turning it into a mini-generator. When compressed, it generates an electrical voltage. Such wood could serve as a biosensor or as a building material that harvests energy.

Electricity providers have a simple way of encouraging households and companies to procure power from sustainable sources. This can help lower CO₂ emissions.

At its meeting of 3 and 4 March 2021 and upon application of Joël Mesot, President of ETH Zurich, the ETH Board appointed 7 professors. In addition, two scientists were awarded the title of professor.

ESA BIC Switzerland aims to support space start-ups in Switzerland. Representatives decided today to extend the program by five years.

In the third part of the ETH-podcast series on the topic of uncertainty senior lecturer Myriam Dunn Cavelty and student Karin Holzhauser talk about cybersecurity and its role in computer science. 

The second episode of the uncertainty series of the ETH podcast is dedicated to the topic of uncertainty in climate change.

The ETH researchers behind LatticeFlow are aiming to facilitate a new generation of trustworthy artificial intelligence (AI).

Oxygen levels in the ancient oceans were surprisingly resilient to climate change, new research suggests.

An extraordinary year is drawing to a close. ETH News takes a look back at the highlights that emerged amidst difficult and unsettling times, at ingenious ideas, fascinating science and solidarity in action during – and despite – the coronavirus pandemic.

The new episode of the ETH Podcast marks the beginning of a series on the topic of uncertainty. The presidents of the students' umbrella organization and the rector report on how they are dealing with the pandemic.

A team at Balgrist University Hospital successfully completed the first holographically navigated spine surgery. The technology was developed at Balgrist University Hospital as part of a project involving ETH Zurich researchers.

At its meeting of 9 and 10 December 2020 and upon application of Joël Mesot, President of ETH Zurich, the ETH Board appointed 14 professors. They will work in a total of ten departments in a wide range of research areas. In addition, an ecotoxicologist was awarded the title of professor.

At its annual event yesterday, the University Medicine Zurich initiative presented its new flagship project ImmunoPhage: a groundbreaking endeavor that aims to develop bacteriophages for treating urinary tract infections.