ETH News

In recent years, there have been several incidents of hacked databases, and the hackers published the stolen data on the internet. Are scientists allowed to use such data for their research? ETH Zurich bioethicists Marcello Ienca and Professor Effy Vayena have addressed this question in a paper published in the journal Nature Machine Intelligence. ETH News spoke with Ienca.

The Executive Board of ETH Zurich now has an Associate Vice President for Medicine: ETH Professor Christian Wolfrum. ETH News asked him about his goals, the university’s potential and where he sees the greatest need for action.

ETH researchers have developed an inexpensive, handheld measuring device that can distinguish between methanol and potable alcohol. It offers a simple, quick method of detecting adulterated or contaminated alcoholic beverages and is able to diagnose methanol poisoning in exhaled breath.

Last week the 11th "venture" startup competition drew to a close with an awards ceremony for the submitted projects. The winner in the Business Idea category was theMOFcompany, a startup from ETH Zurich, the Paul Scherrer Institute and the Zurich University of Applied Sciences.

Johan Robertsson is a professor of geophysics at ETH Zurich, a specialist in seismic wave propagation, an amateur historian and an outdoor enthusiast. For his work in development of a new method of acquiring seismic data, he has now been honoured with the ‘New Frontiers of Hydrocarbons’ Eni Award, the world’s most prestigious prize in the field of energy sector.