science wire

Adolescents are chronically sleep deprived on school days, which negatively impacts their well-being and ability to learn. A new study conducted by the University of Zurich and the University Children's Hospital Zurich reveals that a flexible start to the school day can improve adolescents' sleep, health and academic performance.

Physical aggression by adolescents against their parents is more common than many might believe, according to a long-term longitudinal study from Zurich.

Climate change, trust in science and health were among the most popular topics covered by UZH media releases and articles in 2025. As in past years, our stories about research at UZH resonated all'over the world. Last year, the UZH media relations team published over 70 media releases and articles about the university's research findings and institutional developments.

Large Language Models change their judgment depending on who they think wrote a text, even when the content stays identical.

Artificial intelligence is increasingly taking root in everyday life. Most people in Switzerland are worried about AI and the next generation of digital technology, but those who regularly use AI are more sanguine about it.

Fewer and fewer people in Switzerland are consuming journalistic news media. They know less about current events, have less trust in politics and feel less connected to democratic society, according to the Yearbook Quality of the Media 2025 from the Research Center for the Public Sphere and Society (fög) at the University of Zurich.

Strength and coordination change over the course of our lives, decreasing dramatically with age. But when it comes to the fine motor skills of our hands and fingers, this is not the case.

A vast majority of media professionals in Switzerland use AI tools in their day-to-day work but do so mostly to support their tasks rather than produce content, according to a study by the University of Zurich. They are rather ambivalent in their assessment of the impact of AI tools on media quality, and they are in favor of introducing industry-wide standards and strengthening cooperation in the area of IT infrastructure to reduce the sector's dependency on tech platforms.

The majority of the Swiss public supports scientific research and condemns attacks on science, according to the 2025 Science Barometer survey conducted by the University of Zurich.

Do new laws requiring corporate due diligence in supply chains harm the economy, as some business associations claim?

Wheat production is threatened by a major fungal disease: yellow rust. Researchers at the University of Zurich have found traditional wheat varieties from Asia that harbor several resistance-conferring genes.

In 2022, Western Europe experienced the largest surge in reported diphtheria infections in 70 years. Clinical and genomic data from the outbreak point toward transmission routes along established migration pathways into Europe. Rapid interventions successfully contained the outbreak, yet strains from that period continue to cause new infections in the region.

When trees and soil fungi form close associations with each other, both partners benefit. Many tree species have further enhanced this cooperation by forming a concurrent symbiosis with two different groups of mycorrhizal fungi.

Lupus is an autoimmune disease where the body's immune system attacks its own tissues and organs, causing inflammation and damaging organs. A new study co-led by the University of Zurich has now shown that the natural active ingredient gluconolactone restores immune regulation, reduces inflammation and could enable targeted therapy with fewer side effects.

A new study from the University of Zurich shows that the cultural influence on the transition to adulthood in sub-Saharan Africa is more communal and less self-centered than in Western contexts.

Are humans or machines better at recognizing speech? A new study shows that in noisy conditions, current automatic speech recognition (ASR) systems achieve remarkable accuracy and sometimes even surpass human performance.

Until now, contraception has been the method of choice for zoos to avoid surplus animals.

People who use SRG news also consume commuter, tabloid, and subscription media more frequently than those who do not. Furthermore, the use of SRG news does not detrimentally affect people's willingness to pay for online news. These are the findings of the Yearbook Quality of the Media 2024 published by the University of Zurich's Research Center for the Public Sphere and Society (fög).

The UZH Space Hub leverages its strong interdisciplinary research and international network to help advance the fields of remote sensing, astrophysics, space life sciences and autonomous drone navigation.

Efforts to tackle false information through fact-checking or media literacy initiatives increases the public's skepticism toward "fake news". However, they also breed distrust in genuine, fact-based news sources, a UZH-led study using online survey experiments in the US, Poland and Hong Kong shows. Studies have shown that few people actually come across false information in their day-to-day lives.

UZH has made a spectacular acquisition of an important manuscript by Richard Wagner. In "Eine Mitteilung an meine Freunde" (-A Message to My Friends-), the composer takes autobiographical and artistic stock and looks to the future.

How does listening to live music affect the emotional center of our brain? A study carried out at the University of Zurich has found that live performances trigger a stronger emotional response than listening to music from a device. Concerts connect performers with their audience, which may also have to do with evolutionary factors.

Diagnosis of sepsis in children has been improved based on new research findings. An international research team co-led by the University Children's Hospital Zurich harnessed artificial intelligence to analyze data from over 3.5 million children suffering from this life-threatening disease. Sepsis is a life-threatening infection that can lead to organ failure.

Media Transformation The next generation of digital technology is spreading in Switzerland: Artificial intelligence has already arrived, cyborg technologies for self-optimization have not yet.

Media research People in Switzerland generally have a critical attitude toward the use of artificial intelligence (AI) in the production of news coverage. There is currently little appetite to consume and pay for AI-produced news, and in addition, people fear that quality will decrease. These findings are shown in the 2023 Yearbook Quality of the Media published by the Research Center for the Public Sphere and Society (fög) at the University of Zurich.

Evolutionary Biology Genetic quality or genetic compatibility? What do female fruit flies prioritize when mating? Researchers at the University of Zurich show that both factors are important at different stages of the reproductive process and that females use targeted strategies to optimize the fitness of their offspring.

Media Research In the run-up to elections and referendums, the news media play an important role in shaping public opinion.

History An independent team of historians was given unprecedented access to archives of the Swiss Catholic Church to investigate cases of sexual abuse within the church. The researchers have now documented 1,002 cases of sexual abuse committed by Catholic clerics, church staff and members of Catholic orders that have occurred in Switzerland since the mid-20th century.

In a milestone for artificial intelligence (AI), the AI system -Swift-, designed by researchers, has beaten the world champions in drone racing - a result that seemed unattainable just a few years ago. The AI-piloted drone was trained in a simulated environment. Real-world applications include environmental monitoring or disaster response.

A sociological study by the University of Zurich confirms that a considerable proportion of employees perceive their work as socially useless. Employees in financial, sales and management occupations are more likely to conclude that their jobs are of little use to society. In recent years, research showed that many professionals consider their work to be socially useless.

The newly established Postdoc Team Award allows UZH to recognize outstanding interdisciplinary research.

Over a dozen climate-related lawsuits are pending at the European Court of Human Rights, putting legal processes at the institution to the test.

Paul Glimcher, co-founder of the field of neuroeconomics and professor at New York University, recently held a keynote speech at UZH.

The challenges facing the global community today are complex and manifold: climate crisis, war, poverty, inequality, digitalization, a new political world order.