All posts by Luisa Last

Energy Transformation

America’s Inflation Reduction Act is asking too much of car manufacturers and electric vehicle supply chains

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Response Doctoral Programme

America’s recently passed climate law, the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), provides strong support for accelerated adoption of clean vehicles in the US. Subsidies are generous for consumers looking to go electric, but only for vehicles that meet strict geographic requirements for critical mineral sourcing, battery manufacturing and vehicle assembly. Unabashedly, the US is seeking to shift the EV supply chain from China to North America, but at what cost?

RESPONSE fellow Bessie Noll discusses whether the isolationist IRA is the right move for the US and, more importantly, the climate.

Read Bessie Nolls’ Energy Blog article.

Bessie Noll is currently a fellow in the RESPONSE Doctoral Programme (DP) «RESPONSE – to society and policy needs through plant, food and energy sciences» funded by the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Grant Agreement No 847585.

Citation: Noll, Bessie. “America’s Inflation Reduction Act is asking too much of car manufacturers and electric vehicle supply chains”, Energy Blog @ ETH Zurich, ETH Zurich, December 6, 2022, https://blogs.ethz.ch/energy/inflation-reduction-act/

Featured photo is ETH-licensed from Adobe Stock.

Courses

Getting Your Message Across: How to Make Yourself and Your Research Visible – RESPONSE Mentoring Workshop

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March 17, 2023, 9:00 – 17:00, ETH Zurich

In this workshop, participants will learn how to reach a wider audience with your topics and texts and how to prepare and convey your content in an understandable and attractive way in the digital age. They will work on a popular science blog post, learn about graphic tools to support the text in a multimedia and interactive way, learn about the pitfalls and strengths of social media and how to create and manage your own web presence for yourself and your research. Another focus is on visibility: How do I build and manage a community? How can I communicate the importance of my research for politics, economy and society – and actually reach them?

Continue reading Getting Your Message Across: How to Make Yourself and Your Research Visible – RESPONSE Mentoring Workshop →
Courses

RESPONSE Mentoring Workshop – Getting Your Message Across: How to Make Yourself and Your Research Visible  

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In this workshop, participants will learn how to reach a wider audience with your topics and texts and how to prepare and convey your content in an understandable and attractive way in the digital age. They will work on a popular science blog post, learn about graphic tools to support the text in a multimedia and interactive way, learn about the pitfalls and strengths of social media and how to create and manage your own web presence for yourself and your research. Another focus is on visibility: How do I build and manage a community? How can I communicate the importance of my research for politics, economy and society – and actually reach them?

Continue reading RESPONSE Mentoring Workshop – Getting Your Message Across: How to Make Yourself and Your Research Visible   →
Professionals

Communicating Science and Policy by Fact Sheets

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PSC Science and Policy Career Talk Series

On November 16, 2022 the first event of PSC Science and Policy Talk series took place. During 1.5 hours our invited guest speaker Dr. Sascha Ismail provided a lively insight into his work at the Swiss Biodiversity Forum at the Swiss Academy of Sciences (SCNAT) in Berne and on his career path.

Sascha Ismail gave personal insights about his science and policy interface work in Switzerland. He explained how he is impacting conservation and biodiversity policies with factsheets that he coordinates in collaboration with Swiss research institutions. From his personal experience, he highlighted important considerations when planning, writing, consolidating, and communicating science-based policy recommendations in policy briefs and factsheets. This included considerations related to data design and layout as well as perspectives and perceptions of stakeholders on the topic of the current biodiversity crisis.

“For a factsheet to have impact, it is not enough to summarize scientific findings in an understandable way. The topic must be relevant to society, it needs careful graphic design, and the publication must be accompanied by other communication measures such as a press release.”

Continue reading Communicating Science and Policy by Fact Sheets →
Plant Breeding, Plant-based Proteins, PSC Science-Policy Fellowship

Response Doctoral Program: Unlock valuable protein sources in the pseudocereal buckwheat

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Pseudocereals such as buckwheat (Fagopyrum esculentum Moench) are under-utilized as sources for plant-based proteins in current times, where the world is searching for a diversification of agricultural cropping systems. Buckwheat was an important crop in recent times in Western Europe including Switzerland and has several qualities:

  • It is a valuable source of proteins for human nutrition. Buckwheat contains all nine essential amino acids which makes it a high-quality, complete protein. It is rich in limiting amino acids like lysine and arginine, which are in shortest supply in plant-based diets.
  • It became popular in satisfying the increasing demand for gluten-free foods.
  • It has a unique taste – in contrast to rice or wheat.
  • So far, it is little affected by pests and diseases in the field that could reduce its yield.
  • As a cover crop, it contributes to soil protection and soil improvement as part of a crop rotation.
  • It is good for pollinators and a rich source of nectar while contributing to a biologically diverse agriculture.

Despite all these positive qualities, buckwheat cultivation suffers from low and unstable yields, and in comparison to wheat, the baking quality is inferior. Potentially, this bottleneck can be overcome with breeding. Here, the screening of genetic resources could unlock undiscovered potential and the cultivation of buckwheat on Swiss farms may experience a renaissance!

Continue reading Response Doctoral Program: Unlock valuable protein sources in the pseudocereal buckwheat →
Plant-based Proteins, PSC Science-Policy Fellowship

Response Doctoral Program: Unlock valuable protein sources in the pseudocereal buckwheat

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by Fabian Hess, ETH Zurich

Pseudocereals such as buckwheat (Fagopyrum esculentum Moench) are under-utilized as sources for plant-based proteins in current times, where the world is searching for a diversification of agricultural cropping systems. Buckwheat was an important crop in recent times in Western Europe including Switzerland and has several qualities:

  • It is a valuable source of proteins for human nutrition. Buckwheat contains all nine essential amino acids which makes it a high-quality, complete protein. It is rich in limiting amino acids like lysine and arginine, which are in shortest supply in plant-based diets.
  • It became popular in satisfying the increasing demand for gluten-free foods.
  • It has a unique taste – in contrast to rice or wheat – and can be made into deliciously tart pancakes or pasta.
  • So far, it is little affected by pests and diseases in the field that could reduce its yield.
  • As a cover crop, it contributes to soil protection and soil improvement as part of a crop rotation.
  • It is good for pollinators and a rich source of nectar while contributing to a biologically diverse agriculture.

Despite all these positive qualities, buckwheat cultivation suffers from low and unstable yields, and in comparison to wheat, the baking quality is inferior. Potentially, this bottleneck can be overcome with breeding. Here, the screening of genetic resources could unlock undiscovered potential and the cultivation of buckwheat on Swiss farms may experience a renaissance!

Continue reading Response Doctoral Program: Unlock valuable protein sources in the pseudocereal buckwheat →
Courses

RESPONSE Lunch-Event on “OpenAIRE and Open Access – Increase the Uptake and Impact of RESPONSE Research Results”

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The invited lecturer André Hoffmann is a specialist in the Data Services and Open Access office at the Main Library of the University of Zurich. He will provide insight to publishing infrastructures and requirements related to research manuscripts and data. You will get insight how to deal with your EU open data and open access obligations (H2020, RESPONSE). Moreover, you will dip into resources for increasing the visibility of your research and related outputs (e.g. ORCID, OpenAIRE, etc.). This event will be held online from 12 am to 2 pm.

Slides are available here.

Calls, PSC Science-Policy Fellowship

CALL 4 FOR PHD APPLICATIONS – DEADLINE Jul 1, 2021

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Call 4 for PhD applications within the RESPONSE Doctoral Programme «to society and policy needs through plant, food and energy sciences»

RESPONSE DP is offering 6 early-stage researcher’s positions for 36 months (100%) at the interface of science and policy, as well as science and innovation at one of the three world-leading academic host organization – ETH Zurich.

RESPONSE DP will train ESRs to reflect on their role as scientists in society, contributing with evidence to policymaking and to build capacities to address global challenges in the areas of sustainable food systems, sustainable energy systems and sustainable land use decisions.

For more information about RESPONSE, open positions and further steps (i.e. submit your application), have a look at:

https://www.plantsciences.uzh.ch/en/research/fellowships/response.html

ETH Zurich and University of Zurich are dedicated to promoting the role of women in science, and, therefore, explicitly invites women to apply.

Calls, PSC Science-Policy Fellowship

CALL 3 FOR PHD APPLICATIONS – DEADLINE Dec 1, 2020

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Call 3 for PhD applications within the RESPONSE Doctoral Programme «to society and policy needs through plant, food and energy sciences»

RESPONSE DP is offering 8 early-stage researcher’s positions for 36 months (100%) at the interface of science and policy, as well as science and innovation at one of the three world-leading academic host organization – ETH Zurich and University of Zurich.

RESPONSE DP will train ESRs to reflect on their role as scientists in society, contributing with evidence to policymaking and to build capacities to address global challenges in the areas of sustainable food systems, sustainable energy systems and sustainable land use decisions.

For more information about RESPONSE, open positions and further steps (i.e. submit your application), have a look at:https://www.plantsciences.uzh.ch/en/research/fellowships/response.html

ETH Zurich and University of Zurich are dedicated to promoting the role of women in science, and, therefore, explicitly invites women to apply.

Novel Molecular Breeding Techniques

Public Round Table: What’s next after the ECJ judgment on gene editing?

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The participants of the TNAM 2019 (Tri-National Arabidopsis Meeting) took a tri-national view (Switzerland, Germany and Austria) of the main issues and potential consequences of the ruling of the European Court of Justice (ECJ) on organisms obtained by mutagenesis. A summary of this public round table is available here. Further information and recommendations are published by the German National Academy of Sciences Leopoldina.