ETH News

Most of a planet’s water is generally not on its surface but hidden deep in its interior. This affects the potential habitability of distant worlds, as shown by model calculations of researchers at ETH Zurich and Princeton University.

ETH Zurich is participating in two quantum computing projects that are being financed by IARPA, the US research funding agency, with up to 40 million dollars. Both projects aim to connect two error-corrected qubits with one another and thus lay the foundation for future quantum computers.

Quantum mechanics describes the forces that hold the world together on the smallest scale. The theory of relativity explains the world at the cosmic level. The two seem incompatible – and a unifying theory is nowhere in sight.

Daniel Angerhausen believes that fundamental research is essential, especially in the current crisis. Still, he wonders if we shouldn’t extend the idea of sustainability into the infinite reaches of outer space.

Researchers at ETH have developed a technique to cool several nanoparticles simultaneously to temperatures of just a few thousandths of a degree above absolute zero. This new method can be used to study quantum effects of several nanoparticles and to build highly sensitive sensors.

The physics professor Ursula Keller has received the Swiss Science Prize Marcel Benoist for her pioneering work in ultrafast lasers. Her theoretical models and experimental discoveries have repeatedly tested the boundaries of ultrafast laser physics.

What the “Night of Physics” really aims to do is make physics accessible to a broad audience in a way that’s entertaining. This event will be held on 17 June. Klaus Ensslin, Professor of Physics and co-initiator of the event, explains why it’s worth coming along to the Hönggerberg campus.

Researchers at ETH Zurich have succeeded for the first time in trapping excitons - quasiparticles consisting of negatively charged electrons and positively charged holes – in a semiconductor material using controllable electric fields. The new technique is important for creating single photon sources as well as for basic research.  

This year’s ETH award for particularly innovative teaching projects goes to a course that brings physics experiments for students right into their home. The project was up against 24 others competing for the KITE Award 2022.

Aerosols in the atmosphere react to incident sunlight. This light is amplified in the interior of the aerosol droplets and particles, accelerating reactions. ETH researchers have now been able to demonstrate and quantify this effect and recommend factoring it into future climate models.

Günther Dissertori bases his teaching on the three Es: enthusiasm, empathy and expectation management.

Four researchers from ETH Zurich have been awarded a Consolidator Grant from the European Research Council (ERC). Since Switzerland is no longer fully associated, they will receive the approximately eight million francs in research funding from the State Secretariat for Education, Research and Innovation (SERI).

Researchers at ETH Zurich have developed a new algorithm that allows them to model the dynamics of physical systems from observations. In the future it could be applied to the onset of turbulence and tipping points in climate.

Sylvain Lacroix is a theoretical physicist who conducts research into fundamental concepts of physics – an exciting but intellectually challenging field of science. As an Advanced Fellow at ETH Zurich’s Institute for Theoretical Studies (ITS), he works on complex equations that can be solved exactly only thanks to their large number of symmetries.

The launch of the James Webb Space Telescope is set to take place in the coming days. For ETH Zurich physicist Adrian Glauser, who was involved in two unspectacular but vital contributions to this ambitious project, it will bring to an end a long period of anxious anticipation.

Increasingly large amounts of data are being sent back and forth around the world. To ensure that this exchange continues to function smoothly, new solutions are needed at the interfaces between chips and optical fibres. The ETH Zurich spin-off Lumiphase relies on a new material that efficiently converts electrical signals into optical ones.

Matteo Fadel is investigating the interplay between quantum mechanics and gravity as part of his Branco Weiss Fellowship. He wants to observe quantised sound waves with the help of a sapphire.

Quantum physics opens our eyes to the holistic nature of reality. Nothing can be observed in isolation – and everything is governed by chance.

If only it were less prone to error, quantum physics might already be giving us instant solutions to seemingly unsolvable problems. ETH researchers are therefore working to develop systems that are more robust.

At ETH Zurich researchers have observed a new state of matter: in graphene layers twisted relative to each other, two electrical conductors team up to form an insulator.

Many scientific experiments require highly precise time measurements with the help of a clearly defined frequency. Now, a new approach allows the direct comparison of frequency measurements in the lab with the atomic clock in Bern, Switzerland.

Some physical systems, especially in the quantum world, do not reach a stable equilibrium even after a long time. An ETH researcher has now found an elegant explanation for this phenomenon.

Researchers at ETH Zurich and the University of Zurich have been able to use seismic data to look inside Mars for the first time. Marsquakes recorded by NASA’s InSight lander provided information about the structure of the planet’s crust, mantle and core.

The more connected the world becomes, the greater the demands that data traffic places on communications infrastructure. ETH Pioneer Fellow Marc Reig Escalé and his team develop innovative chips that process information faster than previously possible while requiring even less energy.

Albert Einstein was a student and a professor at ETH Zurich. This year marks the 100th anniversary of his Nobel Prize in Physics. But how much ETH was there really in Einstein? And how much Einstein is there in ETH?

Researchers at ETH Zurich have succeeded in observing a crystal that consists only of electrons. Such Wigner crystals were already predicted almost ninety years ago but could only now be observed directly in a semiconductor material.

How is matter distributed within our universe? And what is the mysterious substance known as dark energy made of? HIRAX, a new large telescope array comprising hundreds of small radio telescopes, should provide some answers. Among those instrumental in developing the system are physicists from ETH Zurich.

Officially elected today by the ETH Board, Günther Dissertori is to take over as Rector of ETH Zurich in February 2022. In this portrait, he talks about what tasks he finds the most challenging and what effective teaching has in common with excellence in physics.

Renowned planetary researcher and Nobel laureate Didier Queloz is moving to ETH Zurich, where he will be joining with other professors to study the origins of life in a new centre.

ETH Zurich and the Paul Scherrer Institute (PSI) establish a joint centre for the development of quantum computers. Its aim is to advance the realization of quantum computers based on both ion traps and superconducting components. ETH Zurich provides 32 million francs for this centre, which will host around 30 researchers.  

Uranus and Neptune both have a completely skewed magnetic field, perhaps due to the planets’ special inner structures. But new experiments by ETH Zurich researchers now show that the mystery remains unsolved.

An international research team with members from ETH has developed a new method for directly imaging smaller planets in the habitable zone of a neighbouring star system. This opens up new possibilities in the search for extraterrestrial life.

In experiments at the Paul Scherrer Institute PSI, an international research collaboration with ETH Zurich involvement has measured the radius of the atomic nucleus of helium five times more precisely than ever before. With the aid of the new value, fundamental physical theories can be tested.

ETH Zurich researchers conducted an experiment to investigate the initial steps in the formation of aerosols. Their findings are now aiding efforts to better understand and model that process – for example, the formation of clouds in the atmosphere.

For the first time, researchers at ETH Zurich have successfully automated the modelling of turbulence. Their project relies on fusing reinforcement learning algorithms with turbulent flow simulations on the CSCS supercomputer "Piz Daint".

Quantum research has long since ceased to be an exclusive domain of physics. The purpose of the new ETH Quantum Center is to ensure ETH Zurich’s various competences and activities in this area are networked even more closely and to raise their public profile.

Two research projects with ETH Zurich involvement have been awarded one of the highly coveted ERC Synergy Grants. These EU grants aim to promote pioneering research that is only possible through the synergy of several teams. More than EUR 26 million will now be made available for the two projects.

Experimental epidemiology; bio-​inspired micro- and nanorobotics; ultrafast processes in materials; forest resources Management; construction heritage and preservation; social networks: the incoming professors work in a wide range of cutting-​edge research fields.

Remote research, what does that mean? Andreas Wallraff is currently running the Quantum Device Lab from home.

Metamaterials defy conventions, making rigid media flexible, soft materials transmit signals, and sound and light behave in bizarre ways. Metamaterials are engineered to possess properties not found in nature.

Florian Emaury, CEO and co-founder of Menhir Photonics, has a dream: to shake up the market with ultrafast lasers. The company’s approach is based on reliable, robust, high-precision lasers – and a strong presence both in the markets and on social media.

At the sixth Times Higher Education (THE) World Academic Summit, experts from the research community and higher education explored and reflected on how digitalisation is changing higher education and on nurturing of talent. ETH Zurich hosted the conference.

In the photoelectric effect, a photon ejects an electron from a material. Researchers at ETH have now used attosecond laser pulses to measure the time evolution of this effect in molecules. From their results they can deduce the exact location of a photoionization event. 

Light particles do not usually react to magnetic fields. Researchers at ETH Zurich have now shown how photons can still be influenced by electric and magnetic fields. In the future that method could be used to create strong artificial magnetic fields for photons.

CERN’s CMS experiment – one of the detectors at the Large Hadron Collider received a new heart today – a pixel detector much like a high-speed digital camera that snaps images up to 40 million times per second.

When matter is cooled to near absolute zero, intriguing phenomena emerge. These include supersolidity, where crystalline structure and frictionless flow occur together. ETH researchers have succeeded in realising this strange state experimentally for the first time.

Theoretical physicists from ETH Zurich deliberately misled intelligent machines, and thus refined the process of machine learning. They created a new method that allows computers to categorise data – even when humans have no idea what this categorisation might look like.

Quantum systems consisting of many particles are a major challenge for physicists, since their behaviour can be determined only with immense computational power. ETH physicists have now discovered an elegant way to simplify the problem.

Two years ago, ETH physicist Tilman Esslinger experimentally realised a theoretical model of a new material with unusual properties in his laboratory. Today, the father of the model received the Nobel Prize.

A research team has observed structures racing out from the centre of a young star's debris disk at high speeds. It is still unclear what causes the phenomenon.

In experiments using ultracold atoms and laser light, ETH researchers have measured a stepwise change in conductivity as the atoms pass through tiny structures. This is the first time that this quantum effect has been observed for electrically neutral particles.