ETH News

Researchers at ETH Zurich have studied topological effects in an artificial solid, making surprising observations. The new insights into topological pumping could be used for quantum technologies in the future.

In a pilot project, apprentices from four different professions in the Department of Physics had to work together to build an interactive exhibition object. They learnt a lot about team building, interdisciplinary work and how to fail productively. "Physics4mation" is now an integral part of the apprenticeship programme.

Studying at ETH Zurich is demanding, and all students have their own personal hurdles to overcome. This video series portrays ETH students.

Physicists at ETH Zurich and the University of Zurich wanted to know whether the planned LIFE space mission could really detect traces of life on other planets. Yes, it can. The researchers reached this conclusion with the help of observations of our own planet.

A new Master’s degree programme in Space Systems will be launched at ETH Zurich in autumn 2024. Interested parties can start applying in April.

Craig Walton is the first NOMIS Fellow at the Centre for Origin and Prevalence of Life at ETH Zurich. With an unconventional idea, he wants to find out the conditions under which life originated on Earth.

Sascha Quanz searches for traces of life on extrasolar planets orbiting alien stars. The astrophysicist believes that gaining an understanding of life and its origin on Earth is an important stepping stone.

Researchers from ETH Zurich, Empa - Swiss Federal Laboratory for Materials Science and Technology, and Stanford have taken snapshots of the crystal structure of perovskite nanocrystals as it was deformed by excited electrons. To their surprise, the deformation straightened out the skewed crystal structure rather than making it more disordered.

ETH Zurich researchers have detected a new type of magnetism in an artificially produced material. The material becomes ferromagnetic through minimization of the kinetic energy of its electrons.

ETH Zurich researchers have succeeded in demonstrating that quantum mechanical objects that are far apart can be much more strongly correlated with each other than is possible in conventional systems. For this experiment, they used superconducting circuits for the first time.

This doesn’t happen often: For his final project, an electronics apprentice at ETH Zurich produced a test device that will save physicists a lot of time in developing a novel microscope. His work has been published in a scientific journal.

Researchers at ETH Zurich have created the heaviest Schrödinger cat to date by putting a crystal in a superposition of two oscillation states. Their results could lead to more robust quantum bits and help to explain why quantum superpositions are not observed in everyday life.

With a constellation of five satellites, the international LIFE initiative led by ETH Zurich hopes to one day detect traces of life on exoplanets. A laboratory experiment in the Department of Physics is now set to demonstrate the planned measurement method.

Around the world, the race is on to achieve a decisive breakthrough in quantum research. ETH Zurich is spearheading its own challenge.

ETH researchers have managed to take three-dimensional pictures of single nanoparticles using extremely short and strong X-ray pulses. In the future this technique could even be used to make 3D-movies of dynamical processes at the nanoscale.

The ETH physicist has received an SNSF Consolidator Grant worth CHF 1.75 million.

Vira Bondar is fascinated by the fundamental questions of physics. She conducts research with ultracold neutrons and is working to make exercise sessions at ETH Zurich even more exciting.

Does life exist elsewhere in the universe? There’s a good chance it does – though it might look very different to life on Earth. Scientists may soon be able to offer a definitive answer.

ETH Professor Klaus Ensslin spent 12 years at the helm of the National Centre of Competence in Research “Quantum Science and Technology”. As the programme prepares to wind down at the end of this year, we spoke to him about scientific breakthroughs and Switzerland’s role in quantum research.

For the first time, ETH Zurich researchers have been able to make a superconducting component from graphene that is quantum coherent and sensitive to magnetic fields. This step opens up interesting prospects for fundamental research.

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.

ETH Zurich is opening a new research and teaching centre with a focus on exploring the origin and prevalence of life on Earth and beyond. Under the leadership of Nobel Laureate Didier Queloz, more than 40 research groups from five departments will address the big questions posed by humankind.

On 11 July, NASA published the first image taken by the James Webb Space Telescope. ETH Zurich Astrophysicist, Adrian Glauser was also involved in the construction of one of the telescope's measuring instruments. In an interview, he explains what he thought and felt when he saw the image.

Researchers at ETH Zurich have redetermined the gravitational constant G using a new measurement technique. Although there is still a large degree of uncertainty regarding this value, the new method offers great potential for testing one of the most fundamental laws of nature.

The Swiss National Science Foundation has awarded Advanced Grants to make up for the loss of European support. Researchers at ETH Zurich did particularly well, with 6 of the 24 grants going to the university.

At its heart, is mathematics an aesthetic discipline? Or what does it mean if someone finds a proof “beautiful”? And what does mathematical beauty say about physical connections?

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.

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.

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?

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.

The future quantum computers should be capable of super-fast and reliable computation. Today, this is still a major challenge. Now, computer scientists led by ETH Zurich conduct an early exploration for reliable quantum machine learning.

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.

Researchers at ETH Zurich have succeeded in turning specially prepared graphene flakes either into insulators or into superconductors by applying an electric voltage. This technique even works locally, meaning that in the same graphene flake regions with completely different physical properties can be realized side by side.

A digital twin of our planet is to simulate the Earth system in future. It is intended to support policy-makers in taking appropriate measures to better prepare for extreme events. A new strategy paper by European scientists and ETH Zurich computer scientists shows how this can be achieved.

An international team of researchers led by ETH Zurich has reconstructed solar activity back to the year 969 using measurements of radioactive carbon in tree rings. Those results help scientists to better understand the dynamics of the sun and allow more precise dating of organic materials using the C14 method.

Lavinia Heisenberg has been awarded the ETH Latsis Prize for her outstanding achievements in theoretical physics. The ETH professor dreams of being an astronaut.

Why is gravity the most mysterious force of nature? Lavinia Heisenberg studies how the universe was formed, and how it is changing. She has now been awarded the ETH Zurich Latsis Prize for her outstanding achievements in the field of theoretical physics.

Researchers at ETH have demonstrated a new technique for carrying out sensitive quantum operations on atoms. In this technique, the control laser light is delivered directly inside a chip. This should make it possible to build large-scale quantum computers based on trapped atoms.

Researchers at ETH have managed to make an efficient material for broadband frequency doubling of light using microspheres made of disordered nanocrystals. The crucial idea for the method arose during a coffee break. In the future, the new approach could be used in lasers and other light technologies.

Electrons are able to move within molecules, for example when they are excited from outside or in the course of a chemical reaction. For the first time, scientists have now succeeded in studying the first few dozen attoseconds of this electron movement in a liquid.

ETH researchers have built an ultrafast chip that can speed up data transmission in fibre optic networks. The chip combines several innovations at the same time and, given the growing demand for streaming and online services, represents a significant development.

In a material made of two thin crystal layers that are slightly twisted with respect to each other, researchers at ETH have studied the behaviour of strongly interacting electrons. Doing so, they found a number of surprising properties.

The coronavirus crisis forced ETH Zurich to suspend its experimental research activity and switch to virtual teaching at short notice. A report from the Department of Physics reveals the impact of the seismic switch on a practical level.

Physicists at ETH Zurich have demonstrated a five-metre-long microwave quantum link, the longest of its kind to date. It can be used both for future quantum computer networks and for experiments in basic quantum physics research.

A complex research experiment lasting several years shows that the electric dipole moment of the neutron is significantly smaller than previously assumed. It has thus become less likely that the existence of matter in the universe can be explained by precisely this dipole moment.

Physicists at ETH Zurich have observed a surprising twist in a quantum system caused by the interplay between energy dissipation and coherent quantum dynamics. To explain it, they found a concrete analogy to mechanics.

ETH researchers have developed a compact infrared spectrometer. It’s small enough to fit on a computer chip but can still open up interesting possibilities – in space and in everyday life.

A team of physicists and computer scientists at ETH Zurich has developed a new approach to the problem of dark matter and dark energy in the universe. Using machine learning tools, they programmed computers to teach themselves how to extract the relevant information from maps of the universe.

In the second round of ETH+, the Executive Board’s funding instrument for new research ideas and exchange between disciplines and departments, five new initiatives were selected. These address a range of topics, from living materials to quantum science.

Time is a fundamental dimension of human existence and comes in many forms. Using a comparative approach, philosopher and physicist Norman Sieroka looks at what distinguishes them, using time travel and music.

Bursting balloons and exploding cans – and some weird behaviour from suitcases. Experiments play a vital role in unlocking new knowledge about the natural sciences. This quiz has some surprises in store for you.

In recent decades, NMR spectroscopy has made it possible to capture the spatial structure of chemical and biochemical molecules. Now researchers at ETH have found a way to apply this measurement principle to individual atoms.

A team of students has been developing and building a rocket for nearly a year. This week they will be competing against some 50 other teams at the Spaceport America Cup 2019 in New Mexico. It’s time to see whether all their dedication pays off as they attempt to shoot their rocket to a height of three kilometres.

Researchers at ETH Zurich have developed a process that can provide conclusive evidence with regard to modern fakes of paintings, even in cases where the forger recycled older canvases. This verification process requires less than 200 micrograms of paint.

In quantum physics the vacuum is not empty, but rather steeped in tiny fluctuations of the electromagnetic field. Until recently it was impossible to study those vacuum fluctuations directly. Researchers at ETH Zurich have developed a method that allows them to characterize the fluctuations in detail.

Researchers from the Paul Scherrer Institute PSI in Villigen and the ETH Zurich have discovered a special phenomenon in magnets. This phenomenon takes place at the nanoscale and enables magnets to be assembled in unusual configurations, which could also be useful for computer technology and data storage. 

Researchers at ETH Zurich have used trapped calcium ions to demonstrate a new method for making quantum computers immune to errors. To do so, they created a periodic oscillatory state of an ion that circumvents the usual limits to measurement accuracy.

Light particles normally do not «feel» each other because there is no interaction acting between them. Researchers at ETH have now succeeded in manipulating photons inside a semiconductor material in such a way as to make them repel each other nevertheless.

ETH technology that flew to Mars, rubber duckies that travelled around Duckietown in self-driving taxis and moles that warn of tumours – for ETH, 2018 was marked by innovative flair and extraordinary research. We take a look back.

Astrophysicists of the University of Zürich and ETH Zürich show how the icy moons of Uranus were born. Their result suggests that such potentially habitable worlds are much more abundant in the Universe than previously thought.

Sebastian Krinner is the first winner of the Lopez-Loreta Prize at ETH Zurich. The physicist has a clear goal: he wants to build a quantum computer that is not only powerful, but also works without errors.

The theory of quantum mechanics is well supported by experiments. Now, however, a thought experiment by ETH physicists yields unexpected contradictions. These findings raise some fundamental questions – and they’re polarising experts.

Siddhartha Mishra is the winner of the 2019 ICIAM Collatz Prize which is one of the most prestigious prizes awarded in applied mathematics.

The Citizen Science Center of UZH and ETH is ready to hit the ground running. With the new Participatory Science Academy, it aims to bring citizen science to a new level. In this interview, co-director Mike Martin, professor of gerontopsychology at UZH, co-founder Effy Vayena, professor of bioethics at ETH, and managing director Rosy Mondardini explain the concept and future plans for the center.

At the Architecture Biennial in Venice, a group of students, a colour artist, an architect and an ETH surface physicist will examine the symmetries of ornaments at the Basilica di San Marco. There will be an accompanying exhibition.

Today, the ATLAS and CMS collaborations both announced new findings on the Higgs boson from experiments undertaken at CERN’s Large Hadron Collider (LHC) – shortly after the Swiss National Bank’s release of its new 200 franc note with particle physics in pride of place. ETH professor Günther Dissertori played an instrumental role in both projects.

To make qubits for quantum computers less susceptible to noise, the spin of an electron or some other particle is preferentially used. Researchers at ETH Zurich have now developed a method that makes it possible to couple such a spin qubit strongly to microwave photons.

Researchers at ETH have made a nanoparticle turn around its own axis a billion times per second. From such measurements of rotating particles, the scientists hope to obtain new insights into the behaviour of materials under extreme stress.

In the new quantum information technologies, fragile quantum states have to be transferred between distant quantum bits. Researchers at ETH have now realized such a quantum transmission between two solid-state qubits at the push of a button.

ETH physicist Ursula Keller has received the European Inventor Award in Paris for her research into ultrafast lasers. It is Europe’s highest accolade for inventors from around the world.

ETH physicists have developed a quantum cascade laser that can be used to visualise weak infrared signals from space. It is now being put to use on a flight of the world’s largest airborne observatory.

Nowadays, it is accepted among physicists that Albert Einstein was wrong in his scepticism of quantum mechanics. This was also confirmed by the Big Bell Test involving over 100,000 people around the world in November 2016.

With an instrument at the Very Large Telescope in Chile scientists of ETH Zurich observed planet-forming disks around young stars similar to the sun 4,5 billion years ago. Surprisingly, the disks are very different. The data will help to shed more light on the formation processes of planets.

The two ETH particle physicists Jannis Fischer and Max Ahnen are building a brain scanner that is ten times less expensive and much smaller than current models. Their ground-breaking work has earned them a place on the 2018 "30 Under 30" list published by the American business magazine Forbes.

Many school pupils fail at physics because they misunderstand the fundamental concepts. A new teaching method can change this – ETH researchers have now proven its effect. It particularly helps intelligent girls to learn more effectively.

Plants can convert sunlight into chemical energy with a high degree of efficiency. How this is achieved is still not entirely clear. ETH physicists have now constructed a quantum physical model that aims to answer this question.

An international collaboration led by ETH physicists has used machine learning to teach a computer how to predict the outcomes of quantum experiments. The results could prove to be essential for testing future quantum computers.

Olympic gold medallist and former Alpine ski racer Dominique Gisin reveals how sports shaped her life, how injury inspired new passion, and, ultimately, how sports bridges gender, geopolitical, and cultural boundaries in society.

ETH physicists have developed a silicon wafer that behaves like a topological insulator when stimulated using ultrasound. They have thereby succeeded in turning an abstract theoretical concept into a macroscopic product.

In our daily experience space has three dimensions. Recently, however, a physical phenomenon that only occurs in four spatial dimensions could be observed in two experiments. The theoretical groundwork for those experiments was laid by an ETH researcher.

When symmetries in quantum systems are spontaneously broken, the collective excitation modes change in characteristic ways. Researchers at ETH have now directly observed such Goldstone and Higgs modes for the first time.

Scanning tunnelling microscopes can make individual atoms of a material visible. Researchers at ETH Zurich have now also measured their magnetization using such a microscope. The new technology could be used in magnetic imaging as well as in magnetic information processing.

The observation of gravitational waves last year captivated professionals in the field. Experts, including at ETH Zurich, expected that this discovery would be awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics.

Physicist Laura Corman is fascinated by the behaviour of electrons in solids. But this up and coming researcher’s other interests give her plenty of opportunities to get out of the lab.

What do the smallest particles locked up in protons have to tell us about how the universe began and how it will end? This week, physics Nobel laureate David Gross will present three public lectures at ETH Zurich on the theme “A Century of Quantum Physics – from Nuclear Physics to String Theory and Beyond”.

Magnetic data storage has long been considered too slow for use in the working memories of computers. Researchers at ETH have now investigated a technique by which magnetic data writing can be done considerably faster and using less energy.

Science and the IT industry have high hopes for quantum computing, but descriptions of possible applications tend to be vague. Researchers at ETH Zurich have now come up with a concrete example that demonstrates what quantum computers will actually be able to achieve in the future.

Sensitive sensors must be isolated from their environment as much as possible to avoid disturbances. Scientists at ETH Zurich have now demonstrated how to remove from and add elementary charges to a nanosphere that can be used for measuring extremely weak forces.

Lavinia Heisenberg is a theoretical physicist. She is reluctant to accept that General Relativity can be used to describe the universe only on the assumption of exotic materials and energy sources. Her goal is thus to update Einstein’s theory.

Accurate measurements of the frequencies of weak electric or magnetic fields are important in many applications. Researchers at ETH Zurich have now developed a procedure whereby a quantum sensor measures the frequency of an oscillating magnetic field with unprecedented accuracy.

On behalf of CERN, researchers at ETH Zurich have developed a high-tech device for the production of extremely precise, high voltage pulses that could be used in the next generation of particle accelerators.

Gases in the environment can be spectroscopically probed fast and precisely using so-called dual frequency combs. Researchers at ETH have now developed a method by which such frequency combs can be created much more simply and cheaply than before.

Using a trick with the optical resolution limit, Stefan W. Hell managed to break through the diffraction barrier in light microscopy, making it possible to obtain high-resolution images of the innermost workings of life. The chemistry Nobel laureate will now deliver this year’s Pauli Lectures at ETH Zurich.

Switzerland’s credentials as a research location have been enhanced with a major new facility: the SwissFEL X-ray free-electron laser was put into operation at the PSI yesterday. ETH researchers are among those expecting to use the system to gain insights into hitherto hidden processes at the molecular and atomic level.

The ETH Zurich Latsis Prize 2016 goes to ETH physics professor Jonathan Home. He studies the frontier between quantum and classical physics using individual charged atoms that he controls with high precision.

Electrons in a solid can team up to form so-called quasiparticles, which lead to new phenomena. Physicists at ETH in Zurich have now studied previously unidentified quasiparticles in a new class of atomically thin semiconductors. The researchers use their results to correct a prevailing misinterpretation.

Researchers at ETH Zurich have discovered a peculiar feature in oscillations similar to that of a child‘s swing. As a result, they have succeeded in outlining a novel principle for small, high-resolution sensors, and have submitted a patent application for it.

Ultrafast processes beyond the human imagination occur in nature, but basic research has been able to measure and explore them only since the turn of the millennium. A book and an exhibition by the National Centre of Competence in Research Molecular Ultrafast Science and Technology (NCCR MUST) now connect this to everyday life by inviting you on a journey into time.

Elsbeth Stern, Professor for Research on Learning and Instruction, explains in a Polybahn Pitch why physics is a difficult school subject and why it may be worth familiarising children with its basic concepts at an early age.

The electronic energy states allowed by quantum mechanics determine whether a solid is an insulator or whether it conducts electric current as a metal. Researchers at ETH have now theoretically predicted a novel material whose energy states exhibit a hitherto unknown peculiarity.