Research

A team of EPFL scientists turned Bois-Chamblard park in Buchillon, on Lake Geneva, into a temporary research station for collecting experimental data. Their goal is to better understand how anthropogenic air pollution affects plant growth.

Researchers at ETH Zurich have trapped a tiny sphere measuring a hundred nanometres using laser light and slowed down its motion to the lowest quantum mechanical state. Based on this, one can study quantum effects in macroscopic objects and build extremely sensitive sensors.

EPFL researchers have pioneered an innovative approach to implementing virtual memory in data centers, which will greatly increase server efficiency.

An international team of scientists led by EPFL has developed a system that combines information from the brain’s connectome – the “wiring” between neurons – and machine learning to assess and predict the outcome of stroke victims.

Rea Lehner has been running the “Future Health Technologies” research programme at the Singapore-ETH Centre since 2020. Together with her team, the ETH researcher is working on the principles of how healthcare can be changed through digital technologies.

Based on observational data from Europe, climate researchers from ETH Zurich have shown for the first time that forests lead to a rise in precipitation. Their analyses also revealed that if the available agricultural land were reforested, the amount of precipitation in Europe could increase by more than 7 percent.

EPFL Summer series: How science works. From data collection to environmental and public-health advocacy, amateur scientists make a valuable contribution to scientific research.

Artificial intelligence (AI) is able to recognise the biological activity of natural products in a targeted manner, as researchers at ETH Zurich have demonstrated. Moreover, AI helps to find molecules that have the same effect as a natural substance but are easier to manufacture. This opens up huge possibilities for drug discovery, which also have potential to rewrite the rulebook for pharmaceutical research.

An EPFL study shows that suburban commuters do not necessarily take environmental concerns into account when deciding whether to use their car. Many car commuters – especially those with hectic schedules – feel they have no other choice. That’s especially true when it comes to working mothers.

Synhelion and Empa are conducting a joint research project, co-funded by the Swiss Innovation Agency Innosuisse, to further develop a high-temperature energy storage solution that is a key component in the production of climate-friendly solar fuels. The project will enable the cost-effective and scalable storage of high-temperature solar heat at over 1'000°C for the first time. The storage technology is expected to be used in Synhelion’s first industrial-scale solar fuel production facility, which will be built in 2022.

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.

Chemical engineers at EPFL have developed a machine-learning model that can predict a compound’s oxidation state, a property that is so essential that many chemists argue it must be included in the periodic table.

In the laboratories of PSI, researchers are producing proteins of the novel coronavirus Sars-CoV-2. The University Hospital of Zurich is using these in a long-term study to investigate how many people in Switzerland have actually been infected with the virus.

In his PhD thesis, EPFL researcher Martí Bosch proposes a method for spatially quantifying the impact of mitigation measures – planting green spaces and using different building materials – on the urban heat island effect.

The Paul Scherrer Institute, in cooperation with the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne EPFL, is establishing a new research division: Scientific Computing, Theory, and Data.