Archive News

November 17, 2021The separation toilet save! has won the Design Award Switzerland 2021. This is also a milestone for Tove Larsen. She is a member of the Eawag Directorate and has been researching for almost 30 years how the nutrients in wastewater can be recovered in a useful way. In this interview on the occasion of World Toilet Day 2021, she explains how crucial our handling of wastewater is for climate change and for achieving the SDGs sustainability goals.

November 17, 2021Together with a team of researchers and designers, Kai Udert has designed a toilet system that makes it possible to recycle nutrients from wastewater on-site. As a result, valuable nutrients can be recovered and used as fertilisers so that they no longer end up in lakes and oceans where they do a lot of damage. Now he wants to make the system ready for market together with industry partners.

November 2, 2021Our lakes, rivers and streams are teeming with the smallest creatures, plants and bacteria that are barely visible to the naked eye, if at all. An underwater camera makes it possible to observe and identify the species of these creatures in real time.

October 26, 2021Microplastics, owing to their chemical properties, can carry micropollutants into a fish’s digestive system where they are subsequently released through the action of its gastric and intestinal fluids. Scientists of EPFL and Eawag, working in association with other research institutes, have studied this process by looking specifically at progesterone – often pointed to as an endocrine disrupter.

September 28, 2021Eawag scientist and EPFL professor Urs von Gunten is to receive the prestigious ACS Award for Creative Advances in Environmental Science and Technology. His research on oxidative processes in water has led to practical applications and improvements in both drinking water and wastewater treatment.

September 23, 2021The "gene scissors" CRISPR/Cas9 can be used to precisely modify genes in order to study their function in an organism. A researcher at Eawag has now succeeded for the first time in establishing the gene scissors for a fish cell line of rainbow trout. This means that, as of now, genetically modified cell lines can be produced. These allow alternatives to ecotoxicological tests on living animals.

August 26, 2021There has been a floating laboratory on Lake Geneva called LéXPLORE since 2019. Natacha Tofield-Pasche, limnologist at EPFL and project leader of LéXPLORE, and Damien Bouffard, researcher at Eawag and member of the LéXPLORE steering committee, tell us what is being studied there and why this research platform is unique.

August 17, 2021Toxic substances in the environment can harm the nervous system of fish embryos. Now, researchers at Eawag have developed a computer model that helps to better understand how the damage occurs.

July 1, 2021On July 1, Benoit Ferrari will permanently take over as director of the Ecotox Centre, which he has already led ad interim for the past two years. He will be supported by Etienne Vermeirssen, group leader of Aquatic Ecotoxicology, as deputy director.

June 24, 2021The OECD gives the green light to the fish cell line assay developed at Eawag. This paves the way for companies and authorities around the world to determine the environmental toxicology of chemicals without having to resort to animal testing.