News EPFL

A breakthrough in our understanding of ionic liquids

Published:17.02.11 — Electrolytes are usually conducting media, in which charged ions move freely in a solvent. Now an experiment led by Professor Jacques-E. Moser has revealed a new mechanism for electrical conduction in ionic liquid electrolytes.

A large African dam modeled in EPFL laboratory

Published:16.02.11 — The dam creating Lake Kariba and its spillway have been modeled in EPFL’s Hydraulic Constructions Laboratory. The school has been commissioned to study the erosion caused by the high-velocity jets issuing from the spillway gates during flood. A few years from now, if no action is taken , the stability of the dam might be endangered.

Good waves for saving lives

Published:15.02.11 — A device developed at EPFL, in cooperation with Colombian universities, enables the remote-control explosion of improvised land-mines by using electro-magnetic energy.

A waffle-mold for improving Grätzel cells

Published:14.02.11 — A new process, developed and refined at Stanford University, and based on work performed by Michael Grätzel at EPFL, will result in improvements in the efficiency of dye-sensitized solar cells.This method could also enable reductions in manufacturing costs.

Streetcar lines that widen the social gap

Published:11.02.11 — An astonishing conclusion has resulted from Hanja Maksim’s thesis work: public transport expansion policies can actually reinforce certain inequalities.

Mobility grants boost academic careers

Published:09.02.11 — 16% of doctoral students who were granted fellowships for prospective researchers by the Swiss National Science Foundation (FNS), giving them the possibility to do research abroad, have obtained a professorship, some of them at EPFL.

Using cell phone signals to measure rainfall

Published:08.02.11 — Mobile telephone relay antennas can be used for measuring rainfall, according to an innovative idea from EPFL’s Environmental Remote Sensing Laboratory (LTE) and EAWAG, the Swiss Federal Institute of Aquatic Science and Technology.