Media releases 2024

A nuclear waste storage facility needs to be secure, even if glaciers were to churn down from the Alps into the midlands in a distant future. This is why Nagra arranged for a study of the sediments that had been deposited in former, deep glacial lakes. The layers are around 600,000 years old, making them much older than the last ice age, which was around 24,000 years ago. Good news for Nagra: it seems that the layers of stone lying beneath have not been eroded by ice since that time.

Researchers at the University of Bern, in collaboration with international partners, have discovered that a ‘gene desert’ section of the genome plays an important role in the development of the embryo and the heart in both mice and humans. The study provides further evidence for the significance of gene-free DNA segments in gene regulation and offers approaches for early detection of cardiac diseases.

Large parts of the potential habitats of freshwater fish in Switzerland are negatively affected by human activities. Researchers at the University of Bern have shown this in a new study using explainable artificial intelligence methods. Measures to protect biodiversity and potential fish habitats will be developed based on the study.

NASA's Europa Clipper was launched on October 14, 2024 on its mission to conduct a detailed study of Jupiter's moon Europa. It will determine if the icy moon currently has habitable conditions. Four researchers from the University of Bern are members of the scientific teams for the mission cameras, the Europa Imaging System (EIS), and the mass spectrometer MASPEX on board the spacecraft.

Researchers at the University of Bern have developed a new model for the emergence of consciousness. The model suggests that one day artificial agents, i.e. systems which imitate human thought, could gain consciousness. To regulate our interaction with such systems, the researchers propose an agreement between humans and machines: the ‘Human-AI Deal’.

Researchers at the University of Bern and Bern University Hospital have developed a test to simplify the diagnosis of allergies. Its effectiveness has now been confirmed in clinical samples from children and adolescents suffering from a peanut allergy. The results could fundamentally improve the clinical diagnosis of allergies in future.

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.

A team of scientists including researchers from the University of Bern, the University of Geneva and the NCCR PlanetS used the ESPRESSO Spectrograph to discover a sub-Earth mass exoplanet orbiting Barnard's star, the second-closest star system to the Sun. This discovery helps to understand planetary formation around red dwarfs and provides insights into the diversity of planetary systems in our cosmic neighbourhood.

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.

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 recent study led by Inselspital, Bern University Hospital, and the University of Bern in collaboration with six Japanese hospitals has shown that stents with a degradable polymer coating offer no long-term advantage over conventional stents. After three years, both types of stent are equally effective. However, pa-tients who take cholesterol-lowering medication consistently 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.

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.

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.

An international team of researchers led by the University of Bern has used observation-based computer modelling to find an explanation for how macromolecules can form in a short time in disks of gas and dust around young stars. These findings could be crucial for understanding how habitability develops around different types of exoplanets and stars.

A team including researchers from the Laboratory for High Energy Physics at the University of Bern has successfully measured the interaction rates of neutrinos at unprecedented energies using the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN. A better understanding of these elusive elementary particles can help answer the question of why there is more matter than antimatter in the universe.

Cichlids living in groups tend to turn a blind eye to their relatives shirking their duty to help as desired in various tasks in the group, such as caring for the brood. Animals that are not related to them don’t seem to be offered the same lenient treatment. Researchers at the University of Bern have now been able to prove the existence of this form of "nepotism" in fish for the first time in experiments.

A study by the Universities of Zurich and Bern involving over 14,000 ninth graders in Germany has uncovered significant grading biases associated with students’ gender, body size, ethnicity and parental socioeconomic status. The study highlights the need for further research into the causes and solutions to these pervasive biases in education.

The majority of stars in our galaxy are home to planets. The most abundant are the sub-Neptunes, planets between the size of Earth and Neptune. Calculating their density poses a problem for scientists: depending on the method used to measure their mass, two populations are highlighted, the dense and the less dense. Is this due to an observational bias or the physical existence of two distinct populations of sub-Neptunes? Recent work by the NCCR PlanetS, the University of Geneva (UNIGE) and the University of Bern (UNIBE) argues for the latter. Find out more in the journal Astronomy & Astrophysics.

Gender equality and valuing diversity in the workplace are the key to a just future for our societies: This is the main message of G-VERSITY, a four-year European research project led by the University of Bern. The network presented solutions to achieve this objective at its final conference.

The study by a researcher from the University of Bern provides extraordinary insights into the networks of Islamist accomplices in the USA. These are characterized by common socio-cultural features, geographical proximity and ideological affiliation. In particular, the results could well contribute to the fight against terror networks at a local level.

For the first time, water frost has been detected on the colossal volcanoes on Mars, which are the largest mountains in the Solar System. The international team led by the University of Bern used high-resolution color images from the Bernese Mars camera, CaSSIS, onboard the European Space Agency’s ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter spacecraft. Understanding where water can be found, and how it is transported, is relevant for future Mars missions and possible human exploration.

The European Southern Observatory (ESO) has started the design and construction of the ArmazoNes high Dispersion Echelle Spectrograph (ANDES) with an international consortium involving the University of Geneva (UNIGE) and the University of Bern (UNIBE), the two host institutions of the National Centre of Competence in Research (NCCR) PlanetS. This spectrograph will be installed at the Extremely Large Telescope (ELT), currently under construction in Chile. ANDES will enable amongst others, to probe the atmosphere of exoplanets looking for traces of life.

A large-scale interdisciplinary research project on sleep at the University of Bern came to an end this year. The findings of this project will benefit the population through various programs and will be pursued further thanks to numerous grants.

Researchers at the University of Bern have for the first time been able to pin down a prehistoric settlement of early farmers in northern Greece dating back more than 7,000 years to the year. For this they combined annual growth ring measurements on wooden building elements with the sudden spike of cosmogenic radiocarbon in 5259 BC. This provides a reliable chronological reference point for many other archaeological sites in Southeast Europe.

Researchers using NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope may have detected an atmosphere surrounding 55 Cancri e, a rocky exoplanet 41 light-years from Earth. This is the best evidence to date for a rocky planet atmosphere outside our solar system. Brice-Olivier Demory, Professor of Astrophysics at the University of Bern and member of the the National Centre of Competence in Research (NCCR) PlanetS, was part of the international research team that just published the results in Nature.

The University of Bern was able to evolve in a positive direction last year in an increasingly difficult environment and once again proved itself to be an outstanding education and research institution. The increasing deterioration of the financial conditions gave reason for concern, as shown by the 2023 Annual Report.

Cichlid fishes exhibit differing degrees of curiosity. The cause for this lies in their genes, as reported by researchers from the Universities of Bern and Basel in the journal Science. This trait influences the cichlids’ ability to adapt to new habitats.

The mystery of how Pluto got a giant heart-shaped feature on its surface has finally been solved by an international team of astrophysicists led by the University of Bern and members of the National Center of Competence in Research (NCCR) PlanetS. The team is the first to successfully reproduce the unusual shape with numerical simulations, attributing it to a giant and slow oblique-angle impact.

Thanks to the support of the Stiftung für medizinische Weiterbehandlung, Rehabilitation und Prävention BRH (Foundation for Further Medical Treatment, Rehabilitation and Prevention BRH), the University of Bern is now able to set up an endowed Professorship for Interdisciplinary Rehabilitation together with the Insel Gruppe. The latter is endowed with CHF 7.75 million and, along with its remit in teaching and research, is intended to promote innovation.

When crops grow in arsenic-contaminated soil, this toxic element accumulates in the food chain. A study by the University of Bern and the University of Basel has now discovered a mechanism used by corn plants to reduce arsenic uptake: the key factor is a special substance released into the soil by the roots.

Researchers in Bern have co-developed and tested a new method to combat the blockage of tiny coronary arteries after a heart attack. The new approach, born from a cooperation of engineers, clinicians, and industry, offers a treatment option to prevent the death of heart tissue after a heart attack, responsible for poor long-term patient health.

Each person has their own sleep profile, which can be identified by the electrical brain activity during sleep. Now, researchers from the University of Bern show that brain waves during periods of deep sleep in a specific area of the brain can be used to determine how cooperative and prosocial a person is in their everyday life.

With the support of the German Manfred Stärk Foundation for Brain Research, the University of Bern has been able to establish an endowed Professorship for Neuromorphic Systems. The total endowment is 3.6 million Swiss francs and serves to strengthen the successful research in Theoretical Neuroscience at the University of Bern.

Researchers at the University of Bern have investigated the process of decomposition on pig carcasses left in nature. The researchers discovered that the previous standard method for assessing decomposition in Switzerland needs to be adapted – with an impact on forensic analysis. The method presented by the researchers aims to better determine the post-mortem interval.

Ten researchers from the University of Bern have been awarded Sinergia funding from the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF) for their six research projects. The projects are being supported by the SNSF with funds totaling approximately CHF 6.7 million over a period of four years.

Thanks to simulations with a software system developed at the University of Bern, an international team under Bernese leadership has provided important insights into the impact of NASA's DART space probe on the asteroid Dimorphos: it is very likely that not just a crater was created, but the entire asteroid was reshaped. The ESA space probe Hera, which is currently being prepared for its journey to Dimorphos, will bring certainty. The simulations will also provide valuable insights for the defense of planet Earth.

An international team of researchers including the University of Bern shows in a new study that male glassfrogs that care for their offspring have smaller testes than males of species that do not provide any brood care. This indicates an evolutionary trade-off between sperm production and parenting.

On Friday, February 23, 2024, the World Trade Institute (WTI) of the University of Bern will host an international conference on women's economic empowerment. The conference will bring together 16 international experts to discuss a UN recommendation and develop a subsequent workshop recommendation. The United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) is expected to adopt this recommendation in October 2024. The University of Bern is the first Swiss university to participate actively in this process.

Vapes are an effective aid to quitting smoking tobacco cigarettes. However, they do not help to reduce nicotine dependence. This is shown by the results of the world's largest study on this topic, which was conducted by a Swiss-wide interdisciplinary research group led by the University of Bern.

Computer simulations by researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Astronomy and the University of Bern show that the migration of icy, so-called sub-Neptunes into the inner regions of their planetary systems can explain the ominous gap in the size distribution of exoplanets. With increasing proximity to the central star, vaporizing water ice forms an atmosphere that makes the planet appear larger than in its frozen state. At the same time, smaller rocky planets lose part of their original gas envelope over time, causing their measured radius to shrink.

Based on the findings of the report from the administrative investigation of the Institute for the Study of the Middle East and Muslim Societies (ISNO), the Executive Board of the University of Bern has decided to close the institute in its current form. The faculty will present a structural report outlining the reorganization of the subject by the end of June 2024. Prof. Dr. Serena Tolino receives a formal warning for poor management, and the institute is placed under the supervision of the Head of Faculty until the new structure is implemented.

A research team from the University of Münster has discovered for the first time meter-sized rocks on the surface of the moon that are covered in dust and presumably have unique properties - magnetic anomalies, for example. The findings help to understand the processes that form and change the lunar crust. The study has now been published in the "Journal of Geophysical Research - Planets".