Florian Breider: a passion for all things Japanese

Florian Breider © Alain Herzog / EPFL 2020 - Summer series: Careers in research. Florian Breider, who heads EPFL's Central Environmental Laboratory (CEL), knew from a young age that he wanted to become a scientist. But what he didn't know was just how important Asia would be in shaping his career. As a young teen, most of Florian Breider's contemporaries were riding around on mopeds. But he chose to spend much of his time at the Vaud Astronomical Society, indulging his passion for comets, showing visitors around the observatory and discussing the finer points of the cosmos. Add in the fact that his scientist father was the Society's president, and he seemed destined for a career as an astrophysicist. Yet Breider's inquisitive temper saw him follow a somewhat unconventional route into science.