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16.05.2025 Dies academicus 2025

UZH Awards Eight Honorary Doctorates

The University of Zurich has awarded honorary doctorates to historian Amy Nelson Burnett, legal philosopher Elisabeth Holzleithner, academic economist Laura Starks, linguist Elisabeth Gülich, conservationist Paula Kahumbu, theologian Herman Johan Selderhuis, banking expert Christian Rahn and horse trainer Fredy Knie Jr.

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15.05.2025 Natural History Museum

How Plants Communicate with Each Other

A new exhibition on plant communication marks the inclusion of botany at the University of Zurich’s Natural History Museum.

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15.05.2025 Agroecology

Dual Associations with Two Fungi Improve Tree Fitness

Tree species that form symbioses with two different types of mycorrhizal fungi cope better with water and nutrient scarcity.

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28.04.2025 Psychology

Personality Traits Shape Our Prosocial Behavior

Why do some people do more for the community than others? A new study now shows that personality traits such as extraversion and agreeableness correlate with volunteering and charitable giving.

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23.04.2025 AI and society

Current AI Risks More Alarming than Apocalyptic Future Scenarios

Most people are generally more concerned about the immediate risks of artificial intelligence than about a theoretical future in which AI threatens humanity. This is shown by a new study from the University of Zurich.

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22.04.2025 Psychiatry

Retinal Clues to Mental Health

A new study has shown that evidence of genetic susceptibility to schizophrenia can be found in the retina. This finding could help improve the early detection of the disorder.

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03.04.2025 Language evolution

Bonobos Combine Calls in Similar Ways to Human Language

Bonobos – our closest living relatives – create complex sequences of sounds that resemble human word combinations. A new study by researchers from the University of Zurich and Harvard University challenges the uniqueness of human communication.

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26.03.2025 Global species loss

The Devastating Human Impact on Biodiversity

Humans are having a highly detrimental impact on biodiversity worldwide. Not only is the number of species declining, but the composition of species communities is also changing. These are the findings of one of the largest studies ever conducted on this topic.

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24.03.2025 Precision medicine

Decoys Restore Antiviral Immune Defense

Defects in the immune system are caused by antibodies that inhibit important defense proteins. UZH researchers have now generated "decoy molecules" that can intercept these autoantibodies.

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18.03.2025 Animal research and 3R

Efficient Development of Drugs with Fewer Mice

With a novel technology, around 25 antibodies can now be tested simultaneously in a single mouse. This should speed up the R&D pipeline for new drugs and hugely reduce the number of animals required.

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12.03.2025 Autoimmune diseases

Promising Active Ingredient for Lupus Therapy

In lupus, the immune system attacks its own structures, causing inflammation and organ damage. A UZH study shows that natural active ingredient gluconolactone could offer a more targeted therapy.

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11.03.2025 Birth rate

Swiss Women Had More Children at Start of Coronavirus Pandemic

A UZH study on the impact of pandemics on fertility reveals an unexpected increase in births during the COVID-19 pandemic, contrasting with the significant decline during previous ones.

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04.03.2025 Personality in an Intercultural Context

African Young Adults Balance Self-Determination and Communalism

A new study from the University of Zurich shows that the cultural influence on the transition to adulthood in sub-Saharan Africa is more communal and less self-centered than in Western contexts.

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03.03.2025 Psychiatric research

ChatGPT on the couch: relaxation for stressed AI

Distressing news and traumatic stories can cause anxiety – not only in humans, but also in AI language models. Researchers have now shown that an elevated “anxiety level” in GPT-4 can be “calmed down” using mindfulness-based relaxation techniques.

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27.02.2025 Astrophysics

Young Star Clusters Give Birth to Rogue Planetary-Mass Objects

How do rogue planetary-mass objects form? An international team of astronomers used advanced simulations to show that these enigmatic objects are linked to the chaotic dynamics of young star clusters.

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26.02.2025 Psychiatry

Schizophrenia is Reflected in the Brain Structure

The symptoms of schizophrenia vary greatly from person to person. A new study shows how these differences manifest themselves in the structure of the brain.

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25.02.2025 Innovation Economics

Rising Wages Drive Innovation in Automation Technology

A new UZH study shows for the first time that higher minimum wages for low-skill jobs drive firms to develop automation technologies. Rising wages for high-skill labor, in contrast, can hamper this effect.

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19.02.2025 Glaciology

Melting Glaciers Increase Loss of Freshwater Resources and Rise Global Sea Levels

The melting ice from glaciers worldwide is leading to an increased loss of regional freshwater resources. Since the year 2000, glaciers have been losing 273 billion tons of ice annually.

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13.02.2025 Medical microbiology

Curbing the Global Spread of Sexually Transmitted Diseases

Cases of bacterial sexually transmitted infections are on the rise worldwide. The University of Zurich has now developed a new method for genome sequencing and discovered a previously unrecognized strain of chlamydia

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04.02.2025 Geriatric Medicine

Omega-3s Can Slow Down Aging Process

A daily intake of one gram of omega-3s can slow down biological aging by up to four months, according to an analysis of clinical data from the international DO-HEALTH study led by the University of Zurich. For the first time, epigenetic clocks were used to measure the aging process.

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