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Students from EPFL and HEC have just launched an app that streamlines how you organize a meal out with friends.

EPFL scientists have developed a scanning transmission electron microscopy method that can quickly and efficiently generate 3D representations of curvilinear nanostructures. Image caption: Superposed, tilt-less electron microscopy stereo image (color-filtered) of carbon nanospheres decorated with nanoparticles.

EPFL scientists show that the STING signaling pathway, which helps coordinate the innate immune system, causes cell death in T cells of the adaptive immune system. This "killing" effect includes cancerous T cells, and has implications for treating T cell-derived cancers. The cells of the innate immune system use a signaling pathway comprising STING (Stimulator of interferon genes) to detect DNA from invading viruses and fight them.

Finger millet has two important properties: The grain is rich in important minerals and resistant towards drought and heat.

Thanks to a new technique developed at EPFL, optical diffraction gratings can now be made out of pure diamond, with their surfaces smoothed down to the very last atom. These new devices can be used to alter the wavelength of high-powered lasers or in cutting-edge spectrographs. A team of EPFL researchers has developed an unconventional way of microscopically cutting diamonds into a particular shape and smoothing them at an atomic level.

EPFL spin-off Cellestia Biotech has just been given the regulatory go-ahead to start clinical testing a molecule it has developed to treat cancers involving mutations of the Notch gene. The molecule is a ray of hope for the 250,000 patients diagnosed every year with this mutation, which sharply reduces their chances of recovery.

EPFL scientists have created the first functional robot powered entirely by vacuum: made up of soft building blocks, it moves by having air sucked out of them.

By studying a worm infection, EPFL scientists have discovered how lymphatic vessels grow within lymph nodes, with major implications for cancer and inflammation. Lymph nodes are small, kidney-shaped organs found throughout the body. Full of immune cells, their function is to clear out foreign objects and support the immune system.

Research by an EPFL PhD student has found a way to boost Madagascar's corn crop yields up to five times while decreasing deforestation at the same time.

According to an EPFL study, butterflies living in urban areas face the threat of consanguinity and potential extinction.

EPFL researchers have shown that a simple camera can detect and track flying drones. Plus, the lightweight, energy-efficient and inexpensive technology could be installed directly on the drones themselves and enhance safety in the skies. The rising number of drones in air space poses numerous challenges.

Does clicking on a link or liking a product have an impact on your privacy and your personal information? An EPFL researcher has come up with a way to browse the internet without revealing too much about yourself and without having to forgo the convenience of online product recommendations. Nowadays it is common for people to buy a book or other product that was recommended to them based on their online profile.

Summer Series: Edward Honein has joined EPFL's Laboratory of Nanobiotechnology from the American University of Beirut.

EPFL scientists have made new insights into the control of cell senescence, which is intimately linked to the development of cancer and ageing. Cells in the body or in cultures eventually stop replicating. This phenomenon is called "senescence" and is triggered by shortening of telomeres, oxidative stress or genetic damage to the cells, either acute or simply due to the cell growing "old".

Answering a long-standing question, EPFL scientists have determined that the sense of body ownership is not affected in schizophrenia patients. Image: In the Full Body Illusion participants view their own backs being stroked, and when the seen and perceived stroking is synchronous a bodily illusion occurs causing them to feel illusory ownership over the viewed body.

Researchers from EPFL, together with other institutes, have developed a robotic eel that swims through contaminated water to find the source of the pollution.

EPFL scientists have discovered gene variants that make children life-threatening susceptible to common-cold viruses. Although most children can handle viral respiratory infections like the common cold, about 2% of children become sick enough to require hospitalization. There are some known risk factors for this, but severe illness still affects 1 in 1000 previously healthy kids.

EPFL scientists have developed a ligand molecule that connects peptide drugs to blood-serum albumin and keeps them from being cleared out by the kidneys too soon. The ligand is easy to synthesize and can extend the half-life of therapeutic peptides from minutes to several days. Peptides are biological molecules, made up of short sequences of amino acids.

EPFL scientists have identified rank in social hierarchies as a major determining factor for vulnerability to chronic stress. They also show that energy metabolism in the brain is a predictive biomarker for social status as well as stress vulnerability and resilience. Stress is a major risk factor for a range of psychopathologies.

It took EPFL researchers only three minutes to detect and locate a short circuit triggered intentionally in the power grid serving Fribourg Canton.