ETH Day 2022
ETH Zurich celebrated its 167h anniversary at this year’s ETH Day on November 19 2022 together with guests from research, politics, and industry.
As a tradition, ETH Zurich takes the opportunity to honour members of its community who have distinguished themselves over the past year. The student association VSETH awarded lecturers who went the extra mile for their students. In addition, three students from the Department of Materials gave an insight into their work at this year's edition of ETH-Tag.
Impressions from the ETH Day
Please find pictures in this external pagegallery.
Video recording of this year's ETH Day:
Professor Günther Dissertori
Rector of ETH Zurich
Günther Dissertori has been Rector of ETH Zurich since February 2022 and Professor of Physics since 2001. As Rector, he is responsible for all matters relating to teaching and for the organisation and quality assurance of the academic programme. In addition, he is deputy to the President. The physicist grew up in South Tirol and studied at the University of Innsbruck, where he completed his doctorate. He then joined CERN in Geneva as a doctoral researcher, where he was later involved in setting up the CMS experiment in the large particle accelerator, one of the two experiments that made it possible to prove the existence of the Higgs boson. Students in his department have awarded him the Golden Owl for excellent teaching four times, and he has also received the Credit Suisse Award for Best Teaching.
Professor Joël Mesot
President of ETH Zurich
Joël Mesot has been Full Professor of Physics since 2008 and also President of ETH Zurich since 2019. ETH Zurich was where he originally studied and obtained a doctoral degree in solid state physics. As President, he assumes overall legal and political responsibility for the university. He heads the process for appointing new professors and defines university strategy together with the Executive Board and other ETH bodies. His duties also include managing relations with official bodies, policymakers and the public. Between 2008 and 2018, he was Director of the Paul Scherrer Institute. Previously, he spent many years doing research in France and the United States in the field of solid state physics.
Federal Councillor Alain Berset
Head of the Federal Department of Home Affairs (FDHA)
Alain Berset was elected to the Swiss Federal Council in December 2011 and has been Head of the FDHA since 2012. He was Swiss President in 2018. He studied political and economic sciences at the University of Neuchâtel, gaining his PhD in 2005. Whilst still a doctoral student, Alain Berset worked as assistant lecturer and researcher at the Institute of Regional Economics. He then moved to the Hamburg Institute for Economic Research before becoming strategic consultant to the Department of Economic Affairs of the canton of Neuchâtel. He began working as a freelance strategy and communication consultant in 2006. In 2003 Alain Berset was elected to the Swiss Council of States for the canton of Fribourg, becoming president in 2008-2009. Alain Berset is married with three children.
Emir İşman
President of VSETH
Emir İşman is currently studying for a Master’s degree in Computer Science. He has been President of the ETH student association (VSETH) since September 2022. Born and raised in Istanbul, he completed his Abitur at Istanbul German School and enrolled in ETH in 2017. VSETH is the umbrella organisation of all students at ETH and as their official representative body exercises its participation rights in university affairs. With 17 associations and various committees, VSETH is also an integral part of student life at ETH. Before his election as VSETH President, Emir İşman was President of the Association of Computer Science Students (VIS).
Honorary Doctors of ETH Zurich
By awarding honorary doctorates, ETH Zurich recognises people for their outstanding academic work and honours their significant achievements in research, teaching and practice or in the synthesis of research and practical work.
Newly appointed Honorary Doctors of ETH Zurich in 2022
Professor Theodor Hänsch
Head and emeritus member of the Laser Spectroscopy group at the Max Planck Institute of Quantum Optics and Professor of Experimental Physics at Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich
in recognition of his outstanding scientific work that has had such a huge impact on the entire field of modern atomic and molecular physics, especially laser cooling of atoms, and laser-based precision spectroscopy.
Theodor “Ted” Wolfgang Hänsch was born in 1941 in Heidelberg. He studied physics at the University of Heidelberg, where he received his doctorate in 1969. He then moved to Stanford University in California, where he worked in the laboratory of Professor Arthur L. Schawlow (1981 winner of the Nobel Prize in Physics). In 1972 he was appointed associate professor at Stanford, and then full professor in 1975. In 1986 he returned to Germany to head the Max Planck Institute of Quantum Optics in Garching, near Munich, and was also appointed professor at the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich. He has won numerous awards for his ground-breaking research, including one third of the 2005 Nobel Prize in Physics, which he shared with John L. Hall and Roy J. Glauber.
Dr Thomas H. Zurbuchen
NASA Associate Administrator
in recognition of his role as an outstanding champion of the scientific exploration of space and, in particular, for his scientific contributions and leadership in past and future space missions.
As NASA’s Associate Administrator for the Science Mission Directorate, Dr Thomas Zurbuchen is tasked with helping us answer some of humanity’s biggest questions: Where did we come from? Are we alone? How does the universe work? Dr Zurbuchen is well versed in the practice of asking difficult questions that help us seek interconnected answers leading to real world impacts. After studying physics and maths he completed his PhD in 1996 at the University of Bern. He then moved to the University of Michigan, where he was appointed Professor of Space Science and Aerospace Engineering in 2008. He is also well known for his personal work on innovation and entrepreneurship. During his time at the University of Michigan he helped set up the Center for Entrepreneurship at the College of Engineering. One of his biggest successes as Associate Administrator at NASA is the James Webb telescope. His scientific curiosity drives him to continue reaching for the stars.
Dr Irene Kaufmann
Vice Chair of the Mobiliar Group
in recognition of her extraordinary personal commitment in the areas of education and nurturing young talent, as well as her many years spent building bridges between academia, industry and society.
Irene Kaufmann studied Economics at the University of Zurich, where she completed her PhD in 1985. Subsequently, she worked in the fiduciary and consulting sector. Up to 2008 she managed numerous consultancy projects for public administrations and companies, specialising in finance and organisation. She has held seats on boards since 2009, including Coop Genossenschaft and other businesses in the Coop Group (up to 2021), Bank Cler (up to 2014), the foundation Juventus Schulen and the University of Applied Sciences in Business Administration Zurich, HWZ (up to 2020), as well as the ETH Foundation (up to 2021). Her specialist area has been finance and strategy. Today she is Vice Chair of the insurance group Mobiliar and also sits on the board of trustees for several social institutions.
Professor Giatgen A. Spinas
Emeritus Director of the Endocrinology and Diabetology Clinic, University Hospital Zurich
in recognition of his long-standing commitment and boundless expertise in providing such tremendous support for teaching and research at ETH Zurich, particularly in the field of medicine.
Giatgen A. Spinas studied medicine at the University of Basel where he completed his medical training and doctorate in 1979. In 1985 and 1988 he obtained a specialist qualification in internal medicine, with a further specialism in endocrinology. After the mandatory period as a resident doctor, he worked as a clinical senior physician in the Department of Endocrinology and Metabolism at the Cantonal Hospital Basel from 1988 to 1992. In 1992 he began work in Zurich, where he served as Director of the Clinic of Endocrinology, Diabetology and Clinical Nutrition at University Hospital Zurich from 1996 to 2017. Since 2017 Giatgen A. Spinas has been a member of the Steering & Planning Committee for the Bachelor’s course in Human Medicine at ETH Zurich. Since 2020 he has also been co-director of The LOOP Zurich.
Endowed by ABB Switzerland, this award is given to outstanding dissertations in the fields, alternately, of energy technology and information & automation technology. In 2022, the award goes to a researcher working in the field of energy technology:
Dr Anne Streb
for her doctoral thesis 'Low-Carbon Hydrogen Production: Development of an Adsorption Process for H2-CO2 Co-Purification'
Heinrich Hatt-Bucher prizes are awarded to the three best Master’s theses in the Department of Architecture or the Department of Civil, Environmental and Geomatic Engineering. The two departments receive the award in alternate years. In 2022, the prizes were awarded in the Department of Civil, Environmental and Geomatic Engineering. They are going to:
First prize: Karin Lu Yu
for her Master’s thesis 'Distributed Virtual Sensing via Bayesian Filtering for Wind Energy Structures'
Second prize: Yannick Jäggi
for his Master’s thesis 'Application of a Delayed Failure Model to the Leimbach Landslide in Zurich'
Third prize: Tinet Levi Ruch
for his Master’s thesis 'Construction and Evolution of Plastic Yield Surfaces for Cellular Solids'
The IBM Research Prize is awarded for student dissertations in the fields of computational chemistry, biology and materials science. In 2022, the prize goes to:
Bastien Francesco Grosso
for his doctoral thesis New Structures and Functionalities in Multiferroic Bismuth Ferrite. First-principles-based studies'
This prize is awarded to outstanding dissertations in the field of water protection and hydrology. The 2022 prize is being awarded to:
Dr Wenzel Johann Gruber
for his doctoral thesis 'Long-term N2O emission monitoring in biological wastewater treatment: methods, applications and relevance' and
Dr Urs Schönenberger
for his doctoral thesis 'The overlooked pathway: Hydraulic shortcuts and their influence on pesticide transport in agricultural areas'
Every year since 1985, the ETH Zurich Latsis Prize, which is endowed by the Fondation Latsis Internationale, has been awarded to young researchers from all disciplines at ETH Zurich up to and including the rank of assistant professor. The focus is on excellent and independent research conducted at ETH Zurich. The 2022 prize goes to:
Professor Alessandro Carlotto
for his outstanding contributions in the field of geometric analysis, and in particular for the construction of localised solutions to Einstein’s equations of general relativity and for proofs of fundamental theorems about geometrical and topological properties of minimal surfaces.
The Association of Students at ETH Zurich (VSETH) represents the interests of students vis-à-vis the Executive Board and university bodies. On ETH Day, the President of VSETH, Emir İşman, awards particularly dedicated lecturers the Golden Owl for excellence in teaching. One lecturer in each department is selected by students to receive this mark of approval.
Students can rate all teachers for whom they have attended at least one lecture. Titles, origin, training and quality of research are all here – all that counts is the quality and commitment of lecturers’ teaching. Based on these ratings, the student associations select the prize-winners. Factors considered include the teaching materials used by the lecturers, their dedication outside the classroom or lecture hall, and the quality of supervision they offer to students.
Dr Ghislane Fourny
Department of Computer Science
The Credit Suisse Award for Best Teaching was launched in 2006 by the Credit Suisse Foundation in collaboration with the universities, institutes of technology and universities of applied sciences. In this way, the Foundation enables Swiss institutes of higher education to honour their best teachers every year. At ETH Zurich, candidates for the Credit Suisse Award for Best Teaching are nominated based on the student survey for awarding the Golden Owl. Drawing on the overall ranking and additional criteria, VSETH and the student associations determine the winner of the award.
Tatiana Akhmetshina completed her Master’s degree at the University of Samara in Russia and undertook the experimental part of her doctoral thesis at the University of Genoa in Italy. In 2019 she started her doctorate at ETH Zurich, with Professor Jörg Löffler acting as her supervisor. Her doctoral thesis is part of an interdisciplinary project on the development of magnesium-based biomedical implants. She focuses on developing and controlling their properties. The overarching goal is the development of a superior and safer material for medical applications. The project also aims to create a complete production chain, from raw materials to ready-to-use implants.
Claudiadele Polinari
Claudiadele Polinari began studying Materials Science at ETH Zurich this year. While still at Rämibühl secondary school, she became interested in colour synthesis as part of her baccalaureate paper. She wanted to explore an innovative – and for her unconventional – way of creating colours. This brought her to the Laboratory of Nanometallurgy in the Department of Materials at ETH Zurich, working with Dr Henning Galinski and Jelena Wohlwend. Together they have developed an ultrathin coating based on structural coloration which is capable of generating a broad palette of colours. EFPL has awarded Claudiadele Polinari the “Prix des Matériaux” in recognition of her baccalaureate paper.
Jelena Wohlwend
Jelena Wohlwend completed her Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in Materials Science at ETH Zurich and in 2020 began her doctoral studies in the Laboratory of Nanometallurgy in the Department of Materials at ETH Zurich, under the supervision of Dr Henning Galinski and Professor Ralph Spolenak. Her research focuses on disordered optical metamaterials that are man-made rather than natural. Metamaterials can be designed to have special characteristics. Jelena Wohlwend is particularly interested in how these materials interact with light.
Further information
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