An international team of researchers from the University of Zurich, LMU and further partners investigated ash residues from incense burners. The substances they discovered show that Pompeii was part of a global trade network. The destruction of Pompeii preserved ash residues on the household altars of its inhabitants.

Scientific expeditions require months of planning before scientists can acquire the first data. A bark cuts through the Arctic silence, waking Anna up.

Planetary scientists at ETH Zurich have shown that the material that makes up the Earth originates exclusively from the inner solar system. This also sheds new light on the history of our planet's formation. Planetary scientists have long debated where the material that formed our Earth comes from. Despite its location in the inner Solar System, they consider it likely that 6-40 per cent of this material must have come from the outer Solar System, i.e., beyond Jupiter.

Thanks to next-generation endoscope technology developed at EPFL, surgeons can navigate hard-to-reach areas of the human body with extreme precision, enabling new minimally invasive procedures.

A study by UNIGE and MHNG shows that 240-million-year-old coelacanths could hear underwater using an ossified lung. How did ancient fish perceive their environment in the deep-sea? An international team led by scientists from the Natural History Museum of Geneva (MHNG) and the University of Geneva reveals that some coelacanths - fish living 240 million years ago - used their lung to detect sounds underwater.

Long considered unrealistic, electron microscopy-based connectomics has established itself as a revolution in neuroscience. In 2025, the journal Nature Methods named it Method of the Year, recognizing a technology capable of reconstructing neural circuits in three dimensions with nanometric resolution.

To increase the biodiversity of meadows, less intensive management is not always enough. Sometimes meadows also need to be actively resown. As part of a research project on the Swiss Plateau, researchers from the University of Bern tested various methods for restoring plant diversity in meadows and demonstrated their effectiveness: After four years, all the methods used had led to effective restoration, with an average increase of 29 percent in the number of plant species present.

For the first time in the world, a team of physicists from the BASE experiment at CERN have succeeded in transporting a trap containing antiprotons across the laboratory's main site on board a truck. The researchers succeeded in accumulating a cloud of 92 antiprotons in an innovative portable cryogenic Penning trap, then disconnecting it from the experimental installation, loading it onto a vehicle and resuming operations after transport.

AI-generated images and videos pose a threat to democratic processes and undermine trust within society. Researchers at ETH Zurich have now developed chip technology that enables verification of the authenticity of sensor data including images or videos. Artificial intelligence (AI) now makes it alarmingly easy to manipulate photos, videos and audio recordings.

When a virus enters the lungs, the immune system has to react fast. The lung maintains its own community of immune cells capable of mounting a local defense on the spot. Researchers from the University of Basel now describe the role of a specialized group of cells that orchestrates this local response, directing neighboring immune cells to work together.

Future lunar missions may rely on a fibre-optic cables to assess vital sub-surface structures. Researchers at ETH Zurich are investigating whether lightweight optical fibres - like those used for internet communication on Earth - could be deployed on the Moon to detect seismic activity and reveal its interior structures.

A study by UNIGE and EMBL shows how differences in tissue mechanical properties shape the diversity of forms across species. Why do animals display such a wide range of shapes, even within the same group? By studying corals, jellyfish, and sea anemones, scientists from the University of Geneva and the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) show that this diversity is partly explained by the physical properties of tissues, such as their ability to contract, stretch, or resist deformation.

Whether a plant can draw water from the soil depends on the soil's physical properties, not the plant itself. This explains why previous programmes aimed at cultivating drought-resistant plants have never been successful. Brief Plants must extract water from the soil through their roots - overcoming the resistance of the capillary forces that retain the water in the soil.

For the first time, researchers at the University of Bern have studied the immune system of brown trout cell by cell and compiled an overview of the gene activity in each cell. The study shows the diversity of the immune system of this ecologically important fish species, which is protected in Switzerland, and demonstrates that rearing conditions can leave measurable traces in the immune cells.

There is a promising new drug for the rare disease mastocytosis, which is associated with skin lesions, among other things. Researchers at the University of Basel have now been able to use artificial intelligence to quantitatively measure for the first time the extent to which it reduces skin lesions.

What is usually burned to generate energy today could protect houses tomorrow. Researchers at ETH Zurich and Empa have found a way to press sawdust with a mineral binder to create a robust, flame-retardant material. It's even recyclable. Every time a tree trunk is sawn, it creates sawdust. Millions of tonnes of sawdust are produced every year worldwide, with most of it is burned to generate energy.

Scientific research has consistently demonstrated that the consumption of misogynistic media content is associated with increased hostility towards women. While it was previously unclear whether men and women exhibit similar negative reactions, recent findings indicate that when media content contains explicit violence against women, it is primarily men - rather than women - who display negative responses.

An international research group involving the University of Bern has shown in the beaver lake near Marthalen that wetlands created by beavers store up to ten times more carbon than comparable landscapes without beavers. By damming rivers and retaining sediment, beavers transform streams into natural carbon reservoirs - with the potential to contribute to climate protection.

Two researchers at the University of Zurich have discovered and described a new, previously unknown palm species found in the virgin forests of Colombia. In close cooperation with a local indigenous community, they mapped the geographical distribution of the palm species and subjected their study to a local peer review process.

A single conversation can make the difference: brief, structured interventions after a person has attempted suicide significantly reduce the risk of a renewed attempt. This is revealed by an international meta-analysis led by the University of Zurich. People who have already attempted suicide once are at much greater risk of making further.