The perception that resources are unfairly distributed is at the root of many social conflicts. Researchers at the University of Zurich have investigated the motives influencing our perception of justice in resource distribution. They found that although people feel an aversion to inequality, they are also reluctant to harm others and to upend existing social hierarchies.

Does the history of our languages match the history of our genes? A team of scientists at the University of Zurich and the Max-Planck-Institute have revealed a large number of matches - but also widespread mismatches in around 20 percent of cases, including in Malta, Hungary and Namibia.

Global warming is changing the Arctic by causing permafrost thaw, glacier melt, droughts, fires and changes in vegetation. These developments are strongly linked to the energy exchange between land and the atmosphere. Researchers at the University of Zurich have now shown that different plant communities in the tundra play a key role in this energy exchange but are not taken into account in climate models.

Acoustic communication is not only widespread in land vertebrates like birds and mammals, but also in reptiles, amphibians, and fishes. Many of them are usually considered mute, but in fact show broad and complex acoustic repertoires. According to researchers at University of Zurich, the evolutionary origin of vocal communication dates back more than 400 million years.

Residue from rinse agents is left behind on dishes after they are cleaned in professional-grade dishwashers. This damages the natural protective layer in the gut and can contribute to the onset of chronic diseases, as demonstrated by researchers working with organoids at the Swiss Institute of Allergy and Asthma Research.

Blood stem cell transplantation is a radical but highly effective therapy for multiple sclerosis. A study led by the University of Zurich has now examined in detail the way in which the treatment curbs the autoimmune disease and how the immune system regenerates afterwards. A better understanding of these mechanisms should help the treatment approach, currently approved in only a few countries, to gain wider acceptance.

At least 33 young people have died from polydrug use in Switzerland since 2018. Polydrug use refers to taking two or more psychoactive substances at the same time. The young adults are often unaware of the associated risks and rarely use the available services to minimize the risks, the initial results of a study by the Swiss Research Institute for Public Health and Addiction (IGSF) and the University of Zurich have shown.

News media is reaching fewer and fewer people. Young adults consume just seven minutes of news per day on their smartphones. This poses a problem for democracy: news-deprived people are less interested in politics, have lower rates of participation in the political process and have less trust in political institutions. This was one of the major findings of the Yearbook Quality of the Media 2022 produced by the Research Center for the Public Sphere and Society (fög) at the University of Zurich.