News and Events

Researchers from the Tabula Sapiens Consortium, led by D-BSSE Professor Stephen Quake, have published an expanded reference atlas of human cells in Cell. The new dataset contains transcriptomic profiles of more than one million cells from 24 donors across 28 tissues and provides new insights into gene regulation and cellular ageing.

Many biological molecules are short-lived and ephemeral. Now, researchers around Randall Platt, D-BSSE Professor of Biological Engineering, have developed an archive function that allows them to look into a cell’s past for the first time. This could allow scientists to get to the bottom of how cancer cells form.

Jana Musilová, a postdoctoral researcher in the Computational Biology (CoBi) Group led by Dagmar Iber, has been awarded the Swiss L’Oréal-UNESCO “For Women in Science” Award. She is developing a personalised digital twin of the menstrual cycle to decode the complex hormonal interactions underlying women's health. Congratulations on this well-deserved recognition!

Researchers round Martin Fussenegger, D-BSSE Professor of Biotechnology and Bioengineering, have developed an implantable system that clears excess glucose from the blood. The method has proved successful in the lab.

Founded as an ETH Zurich spin-off in 2016, MaxWell Biosystems has grown into a global company bringing advanced electrophysiology technology from academic research into laboratories worldwide, helping scientists study how neurons and other electrically active cells function, communicate, and respond to disease and treatment.

Modern drug discovery relies heavily on modifying existing chemical structures to quickly create new potential medicines, a process that usually requires time-consuming and expensive laboratory testing. To overcome this bottleneck, scientists at D-BSSE and Roche jointly developed a smart, automated approach that combines artificial intelligence (AI) with laboratory experiments to reliably predict chemical reactions much faster and with fewer trial-and-error tests.

On 23 and 24 September, upon application of Joël Mesot, President of ETH Zurich, the ETH Board appointed five new professors and promoted three, amongst them: Konrad Tiefenbacher, D-BSSE faculty member and associated professor at both ETH Zurich and University of Basel. Congratulations on your promotion to Full Professor!

On 24 November, 6:15 pm, the Bio Engineering Lab led by Andreas Hierlemann and the Cleanroom Facility Basel are inviting the public to a 1-hour guided tour to gain an insight into the fascinating world of micro- and nanotechnology manufacturing and applications in biomedical research (tour in German; please register).

For the past two years, Sylke Poehling has been enrolled at the department as our first Professor of Practice. Sylke is an experienced leader in the pharmaceutical and biotech industry, with over 25 years of experience. She currently serves in senior leadership roles at Roche, including heading therapeutic modalities and gene therapy. In this interview, she talks about her role as a bridge builder between academia and industry.