wire - news in brief

Silvia Arber - group leader at the FMI and at the Biozentrum, University of Basel - and a team of international experts receive 8 million Swiss Francs from the Aligning Science Across Parkinson's (ASAP) initiative to investigate Parkinson's.

Green tea is seen as healthy and promotes a longer life supposedly due to its high level of antioxidants.

The Artificial Swissness exhibit - a larger than life-sized "design brain" developed by EPFL's Media x Design Lab (LDM) - is currently on display at the Seoul Biennale for Architecture and Urbanism, which runs until 31 October 2021.

Human cells are like tiny, multi-purpose factories. In his research, biologist Gabriele Alessandro Fontana investigates how cells repair damaged DNA.

An EPFL scientist has pinpointed the signs of brain activity that make up our brain fingerprint, which - like our regular fingerprint - is unique. "I think about it every day and dream about it at night. It's been my whole life for five years now," says Enrico Amico, a scientist and SNSF Ambizione Fellow at EPFL's Medical Image Processing Laboratory and the EPFL Center for Neuroprosthetics.

Researchers led by the Nobel Laureate Charles Rice of The Rockefeller University and Volker Thiel of the University of Bern and Institute of Virology and Immunology have developed a non-contagious model of SARS-CoV-2 that makes it easier, faster and safer to study the virus and new variants. In addition, the realistic model can be used to better test drugs.

Trillions of benign bacteria live in the intestine. They are kept in a continuous balance by the immune system, which thereby makes them harmless to humans.

Technologies that interfere with our brains have great potential. But their ethical implications are such that they may require an expansion of human rights frameworks, argues Marcello Ienca.

Sediments in the Spöl, a small river in the very south of the canton Graubünden, are contaminated with PCBs.

Immersive virtual reality disrupts the child's default coordination strategy, scientists show, something that should be taken into account when developing virtual reality rehabilitation protocols for children. While very little is known on the effects of immersive VR on adults, there is next to no knowledge on the impact of such systems on the sensorimotor abilities of young children.

The 'in conversation' series features members of the Wyss Center community discussing their work, their collaborations and imagining the future.

Two EPFL engineers have come up with a revolutionary new method for tackling plastic pollution by harnessing the inner workings of proteins.

The Catalyst [email protected] Biotech program, introduced by the Bertarelli Foundation in 2017, aims to support research on innovative treatments for nervous-system diseases.

We often hear that Swiss consumers want their agriculture to be free from genetic engineering. But consumer acceptance of genetically modified crops is likely to be higher than the media leads us to believe, Angela Bearth says. The ban on growing genetically modified crops in Switzerland is set to expire at the end of this year.

The Capture dream journaling mobile application Scientists have known of the existence of lucid dreams - in which the dreamer becomes aware that they are dreaming - for decades, but the neurobiology is poorly understood and it remains unclear why some people have them while others do not. Lucid dreaming is thought to bring benefits including reduced anxiety, improved motor skills, memory consolidation and enhanced problem solving.

There has been a floating laboratory on Lake Geneva called LéXPLORE since 2019.

UZH Space Hub and Airbus Defence and Space are sending an experiment into space on the next resupply flight to the International Space Station (ISS) with the aim of advancing the industrial production of human tissue in microgravity.

Artificial intelligence can help predict the three-dimensional structure of proteins. Beat Christen describes how such algorithms should soon help to develop tailored artificial proteins.

Scientists at EPFL have developed two complementary bladder models to study urinary tract infections (UTIs) caused by E. coli: bladder organoids and a bladder-on-a-chip.

Blue-green algae and other phytoplankton are very important for the proper functioning of aquatic ecosystems.

Salmonella infections can result in a broad spectrum of illnesses. According to the latest research findings, one reason why some cases are harmless while others are very severe lies in the intestinal flora. An infection with Salmonella can have very different consequences. While some infected people do not notice the infection with the bacteria at all - this is called an asymptomatic progression - others suffer from severe gastrointestinal complaints.

SUMMER SERIES: HOW SCIENCE WORKS - For millennia scientists have manually combed through data in a bid to find meaningful patterns to solve complex problems.

ETH professor and molecular biologist Ernst Hafen retires at the end of July. We look back at the colourful career of a leading scientist with many different interests beyond the narrow world of molecular genetics.

The new device will interact with the nerves responsible for constriction of brain arteries - a common complication after hemorrhagic stroke Geneva, Switzerland - The Wyss Center and Artiria Medical

Swiss specialists in data semantics define the national strategy for the interoperability of research data to enable a strong policy of promoting personalised medicine.

Rea Lehner has been running the "Future Health Technologies" research programme at the Singapore-ETH Centre since 2020.

In noisy environments it is difficult for hearing aid users or people with a hearing implant to understand their conversational partner because current audio processors still have difficulty focusing precisely enough on specific sound sources.

In autumn 2021 a new Centre for biomedical reseach will be inaugurated in Bellinzona. To support this event, Ticino Management features a special series of articles presenting the activities of the two main residents of the facility, IRB and IOR.

Is natural always good and artificial always bad? We talked to psychologist Angela Bearth and biotechnologist Sven Panke about science, scepticism, misunderstandings and how language influences the way we think.

Formerly widespread, native crayfish in Switzerland are now highly endangered. With support from Eawag, experts are doing everything they can to preserve the secretive river dwellers.

Using chemical synthesis, Bright Peak Therapeutics can produce proteins that have never before existed.

The UNIGE is awarding its 3R prize to the creator of a cell model which, by reproducing a lung infection, has enabled the identification of a promising treatment. Pseudomonas aeruginosa is a bacterium responsible for many lung infections, particularly in people with cystic fibrosis or a weakened immune system.

There is a strong link between hormonal contraceptives and breast cancer risk. The main culprit are progestins, synthetic mimics of the pregnancy hormone progesterone that stimulate cell growth in the breast.

Fear protects us by making us alert to danger, but the persistence of fearful memories can lead to serious mental conditions. Now, an international team of researchers co-led by Andreas Lüthi has found that the activity of different cells in the brain's threat-detector hub regulates the switch between high and low fear states.

The Amazon rain forest may have reached a tipping point. According to a recent study, it now emits more CO2 than it absorbs, which could speed the pace of climate change.

22 May is the International Day for Biological Diversity. In 2021, the theme is: "We are part of the solution".