Thanks to the support of the Bernese entrepreneur Walter Inäbnit, the University of Bern is able to establish a new endowed lectureship. It is based at the newly opened W. Inäbnit Laboratory for Molecular Quantum Materials at the Department of Chemistry, Biochemistry and Pharmaceutical Sciences (DCBP). The purpose of this new lectureship is to develop new classes of materials which could potentially solve the problem of energy loss in electronics. The lectureship will be held by PD Dr. Shi-Xia Liu.

The University of Bern is revising its climate strategy. Instead of aiming for nominal climate neutrality by 2025 by purchasing a large number of carbon offset certificates, the University of Bern is, in a participatory process, working on a long-term Climate Neutrality 2030 Roadmap which increasingly focuses on carbon reduction measures and innovative approaches.

A work drafted by Alexander von Humboldt but no longer published is being edited at the University of Bern. It contains a pioneering study on global ocean currents, which is more relevant than ever in view of the dwindling Gulf Stream.

At the end of June 2024, the Faculty of Humanities presented a structure report on the new integration of the field of Middle Eastern Linguistics and Cultural Studies. At its meeting on Tuesday, August 13th, the Executive Board of the University of Bern approved the report. Thus, a new department will be created in which Social Anthropology, Religious Studies, and Middle Eastern Linguistics and Cultural Studies will work together.

A research team led by Inselspital, Bern University Hospital, and the University of Bern has shown that a high percentage of kidney stones are excreted without symptoms. This finding should be incorporated into the future treatment of patients with recurrent kidney stones.

A recent study led by Inselspital, Bern University Hospital and the University of Bern shows that stents with a degradable polymer coating offer no long-term advantage over conventional stents. However, patients who consistently take their cholesterol-lowering medication have a lower risk of complications following stent implantation. The study thus underlines the importance of long-term drug therapy after a heart attack.

The Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF) awards three researchers from the University of Bern an SNSF Consolidator Grant each. The funded research projects address indeterminacy in the world, the response of forests to climate change impacts, and age and aging as a multi-layered social and cultural phenomenon in the Roman Empire.

In the USA, the world's most extensive neutrino experiment, DUNE, is being built at Fermilab. The University of Bern is playing a key role in this by developing the "ND-LAr" detector, which features new technology and an innovative design to observe neutrinos. The prototype of the "ND-LAr" has now been successfully tested and has detected its first neutrinos.