New paths for science ...... 10 Cells that regenerate Hunting for drugs Free passage the heart ...... 36 underground ...... 42 for refugees? ...... 44

Elections 2015: Howview the pagepartiesscience 26 Reinventing science

Science is taking a hard look in the mirror, and it’s for the best. The problems it faces are increasingly clear: reproducibility, fraud and statistical bias, to name but a few. Back in 2013 the news magazine The Economist featured the front-page headline “How Science Goes Wrong”. For sure, it may be somewhat alarmist to talk about ‘a crisis of science’, but it does embody the idea behind the critical, unwavering view of the scientific community on the state of affairs in its own house.

It is time then to welcome the wide variety of new solutions that are being proposed by researchers. There’s the DORA declaration, which veers away from the quantitative appraisal of research proposals, the Journal of Negative Results in Biomedicine, which encourages the publication of insignificant studies, and the new Swiss platform ScienceMatters, which allows researchers to publish simple isolated results free of the temptation to embellish them (see p. 22).

Science has everything it needs to change. After all, it’s already in a day’s work for a researcher to question hypotheses and explain erroneous results. And now there are also the right tools. One no longer needs a publisher to ensure that news of discoveries is spread; it is now sufficient to upload manuscripts to free publication servers or online lab books. There’s even talk about replacing the peer-review system – target of so much criticism – with a quick, transparent and participatory online system for comments.

But these new tools will not change anything on their own. They need to be used, and technology is nothing without humans. At any rate, it’s more a case of ‘peer pressure’ than peer review, as social pressure leads us to mimic the behaviour of our colleagues … for better or for worse. To change this, science must radically transform its practices: both in the laboratory and in the field. It is therefore also down to you, dear researcher, to redefine the science of tomorrow’s world.

Daniel Saraga, chief editor Horizons – the Swiss magazine for scientific research No. 106, September 2015 horizons Contents 25 Fotolia/casanowe Photomontage, Parliamentary Service, 3003 Bern Service, Parliamentary Photomontage,

Focus: Renewing science Knowledge and politics

24 Crowdfunding for science A platform should soon come online in 10 ­Switzerland to let scientists seek crowd- Science reinvents itself funding for their projects. Research is producing ever more 25 Elections 2015: How the parties view results – but these results are being science Horizons has asked the biggest Swiss increasingly questioned. Critics are ­political parties what they think demanding new standards for publish- about science.­ 29 ing and assessing research results. “We have not really noticed the right to science until today” Samantha Besson, professor of interna- 13 tional public law, explains what the right Peer review under review to science has to do with seed production. Online discussions, transparency and new review models ­promise an improved system. 30 Promoting clinical research without 18 commercial interests “It’s an illusion that you can manage science by using Independent studies can uphold the measurement data” ­interests of patients. Interview with the economics professor Mathias Binswanger, who’s critical of the lack of incentives in the research world.

21 A yearning for slow science The quantity of research publications is exploding, but there’s no similar increase in quality. Can slower science lead us out of the current science crisis?

◂ Cover: Research offers us an ever more detailed, increasingly complex view ◂ Inside cover picture: It seems as if these peculiar little animals left their of the world. Mistakes are an important part of the process and can also enclosure to explore the world outside it. This ought to remind researchers generate new knowledge. Image: Yoko Ono “Map Piece” 1964, © Yoko Ono that they too must think outside the box. René Zäch “Suchfinder” 2003, Sammlung Kunstmuseum Olten. Photo: Bernhard Schrofer

4 Swiss National Science Foundation – Swiss Academies: Horizons No. 106 31 38 44 Giulio Piscitelli Giulio Jungfrau Zeitung Jungfrau Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research Marine and Polar for Institute Wegener Alfred

Biology and medicine Environment and technology Culture and society

31 38 44 The problem with invasive Ringed by the flat horizon Legal escape routes could alien ­ species­ The physicist Hubertus Fischer braves prevent ­ suffering­ A new method can help us assess which arctic temperatures to reconstruct past While Europe would really prefer to close species are merely alien, and which are climates using ancient ice. its borders, experts are proposing the actually also harmful. exact opposite. 40 34 Playing for the environment 47 People distract primates A board game aims to further the Terrorist on hunger strike The behaviour of lab animals depends on ­sustainable cultivation of oil palm trees. How media reports turned the terrorist the people doing the experiment. Petra Krause into a victim. 41 36 Netflix and scientific predictions 48 RNA can reprogramme the heart New optoelectronic components The place name detective After a heart attack, non-coding RNA Groundwater as a heat reservoir Campaigning for quiet driving can prompt the growth of new heart The Swiss shoe flop muscle cells.­

37 Ancient bacteria colonies produce methane The chip that’s also an organ system Ants use signposts

In pictures Fieldwork Access all areas 6 42 50 The private life of film colours What our sewers know about drugs Ignorant questions promote innovation

Debate How does it work? Inside the SNSF and SA 8 49 51 Should ethicists advise politicians? The toilet of the future Important scientific culture

Swiss National Science Foundation – Swiss Academies: Horizons No. 106 5 In pictures

6 Swiss National Science Foundation – Swiss Academies: Horizons No. 106 Dancing colours

The hem of her rose-red dress ­billows higher and higher, though her ­petticoats chastely keep her knees covered. Joy is written over her com- panion’s wraithlike face; he can truly feel the ‘spring air’ – hence the name of the colour film made in 1908 that offers these slightly saucy images. It was coloured by hand, runs at 16 frames per second, and is just one of thousands of such documents in the archive for historical film colours run by Barbara Flückiger, a profes- sor of film studies at the University of Zurich. “Most of the early films were in colour”, she explains. It took until the 1960s before such hand- coloured images were completely replaced by colour films that could be ­chemically developed. Flückiger has been researching into historical colours in film for several years. When she began her work, the films could no longer be shown in the cinema because they were made of highly explosive nitrocellulose. So they had to be digitised before they could be allowed to circulate again. But digitising them in turn caused problems with their colour reproduction. Professional scanners have a specific light source and a specific sensor. “In many ways, this makes them colour blind”, explains Flückiger. Furthermore, many of the chemical film colours have since disintegrated. Flückiger and her team carried out material analyses to try and find out how the colours might have originally appeared, and their investigations also mean exploring the aesthetic of the time. Last June she was awarded an Advanced Grant by the European Research Council (ERC) for her new project ‘Film Colors. Bridging the Gap Between Technology and Aesthetics’. hpa

Timeline of historical film colours: ­ http://zauberklang.ch/filmcolors/

Photo: Courtesy of Stiftung Deutsche ­Kinemathek, Berlin. Photograph of the nitrate print by Barbara Flueckiger, Timeline of Historical Film Colors,­ University of Zurich. Film: Frühlingsluft (1908).

Swiss National Science Foundation – Swiss Academies: Horizons No. 106 7 Debate Valérie Chételat (photomontage) Chételat Valérie

Should ethicists give advice?

Politicians and authorities consult ethics commissions about moral issues such as euthanasia, pre-implantation diagnostics, and gene technology in agriculture. Is it legitimate for ethicists to give answers to such questions as if they were scientists?

says Klaus Peter Rippe, an ethicist at the Karlsruhe University of Yes Education. hen ethics commissions advise what their experts and commissions think one particular answer is supposedly the parliament, the Federal Coun- is the right course of action. Why should right one. If this is done, then the people cil and other authorities, they ethicists and ethics commissions ignore involved are in a position to consider the don’t do so unprompted, but on this very aspect of their consultancy man- reasons given and, if they wish, to reject Wa sound legal basis. Ethics reports are the date? There’s no reason for it. them. And even if they do agree with those result of official commissions. One impor- A sound ethical recommendation con- reasons, they are still free to reject the rec- tant reason for consulting the opinion of tains the arguments for and against one of ommendation, whether it’s because they ethicists is that ethical issues are raised the options on the table. These are assessed wish to place an emphasis on something in politicised areas such as medicine, the and judged on the basis of their respective else, because they have considered addi- environment and data protection. It would strengths. As a result, there are better rea- tional aspects of the case, or because they simply be unwise to commission expert sons for recommending certain possibili- have reached a different opinion after ex- opinions from scientists, lawyers and econ- ties than there are for others. So reasoned amining the arguments submitted. omists, but not ethicists. recommendations may be given. When ethical recommendations are Yet it’s not just about whether we ‘can’, made following a transparent process, then but whether we ‘may’. If ethical questions everyone is served: it takes the discourse are answered unambiguously – such as say- forward, and leads to better decisions. “Ethical recommendations ing, ‘sperm donation should be permitted lead to better decisions” for unmarried heterosexual couples’, then Klaus Peter Rippe is a professor of Practical Philosophy. He was the Chairman of the Swiss Klaus Peter Rippe it is tantamount to handing out a moral directive. But by their very nature, recom- Federal Ethics Committee on Non-Human Biotech- mendations and advice are not directives. nology, has been a jury member of the Public Eye Politicians and authorities are free to reject Awards and is co-founder of the private consult- When an expert opinion is requested, the reasons laid out before them and to re- ing company Ethik im Diskurs. we’re asked to give both a careful analysis fuse the recommendation. of the state of debate and our own recom- To issue such imperatives would mean mendations. Politicians don’t just need a entering the realm of morality, not ethics. summary of the literature to make their In ethics, like in the sciences, demonstra- decisions; it’s also helpful for them to know ble reasons must be presented as to why

8 Swiss National Science Foundation – Swiss Academies: Horizons No. 106 says Christoph ­Ammann, an ethicist at the University No of Zurich. couple has to decide what to do and other experts who are keen to suppress academically tested, but a moral power of when a pregnancy screening re- the moral dimensions of a problem. That’s judgement that one acquires in the never- veals an anomaly. They ask friends why one of the principal duties of ethicists ending process of self-formation. for advice, including an ethicist. is to fight in such commissions against all Ethicists shouldn’t act as a last port of ShouldA they take the ethicist’s opinion par- attempts to reduce ethical conflicts to mere call, as if society were a quiz show and the ticularly seriously – more seriously, let’s technical or ­empirical ­questions. ethicist were the friend sitting at home by say, than the opinion of a friend who al- the telephone, waiting for a contestant to ready has a child with trisomy 21? use one of his ‘jokers’ and ring up for an ‘No’, is my opinion as an ethicist. And I “Ethicists aren’t there answer. It’s neither the duty of ethicists remain sceptical even when it’s not indi- nor in their competence to solve ethical viduals wanting to solve an ethical dispute, to salve consciences and conflicts in a manner that both salves con- but society as a whole, as it were, appoint- remain impersonal” sciences and remains impersonal. They ing an ethicist to a committee of experts. If have to make explicit how they see things, a problem has a moral dimension, I believe Christoph Ammann in the knowledge that others – experts and it affects ethicists not just as ‘experts’, but laypersons alike – might see things very also as human beings. differently. In ethics, that’s not the result Whether or not a specific drug will work But the fact remains: if an ethicist has of a lack of expertise, but in fact the very is something that an expert can judge something important and just to say about proof of it. better than a layperson. But whether pre- an ethical question, then it’s not because implantation diagnoses are inadmissi- he’s an academic expert, it’s because he Christoph Ammann is Deputy Head of the Institute bly injurious to the dignity of an embryo has a disciplined engagement with ethical of Social Ethics, co-editor of the volume ‘­Müssen is not a question that could be answered issues that has allowed him to give a more Ethiker moralisch sein?’ and the author of one authoritatively by the newest research differentiated, wiser opinion. Further- of its chapters, entitled: ‘Wider die ethische into the moral status of prenatal life. Real more, he should have maintained a sense ­Experto­kratie’. Since 2011 he has been a member of ethical disagreements can’t be solved by of independence and freedom of thought the Cantonal Commission on Animal Experiments expert knowledge.­ that should not be mistaken for ideologi- in Zurich. What is right and good is that ethicists cal neutrality. What matters is not a theo- don’t leave this field to all those stakeholders retical knowledge of ethics, which can be

Swiss National Science Foundation – Swiss Academies: Horizons No. 106 9 Focus: Renewing science

((irrepro ducible))

10 Swiss National Science Foundation – Swiss Academies: Horizons No. 106 Fixing science Too many publications and too many mistakes? Scientists are questioning research practices and establishing new ways of publishing their findings.

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Swiss National Science Foundation – Swiss Academies: Horizons No. 106 11 ((irrelevant?))

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Peer review under review Online discussions, transparency, credits for experts: the scientific community is exploring ways to improve the peer-review procedure. By Sven Titz

ancer can now be combatted using Digitisation has made possible a pleth- ­frequency of downloads and of comments a chemical substance derived from ora of models for a transparent, discursive on articles. These new measurement pa- lichen. That’s the result of a study culture of assessment. Peer review is tradi- rameters allow the ­journal to compete with submitted to 304 journals two years tionally anonymous, but today reviewers the Science Citation Index, a well-known Cago by the science journalist John Bohan- have started putting their name to their article database. non, writing under a pseudonym. More reviews, and an increasing number of new, Meanwhile, 15 journals have come to- than half accepted the article for publica- interactive forms of discussion are being gether under the auspices of the European tion. But in October 2013, Bohannon ad- tried out across the whole process of publi- Geosciences Union with a model similar mitted in the journal Science that it was a cation (see ‘Possible solutions’, p. 14). to that of ACP. “We’ll see what the compe- ‘spoof paper’, penned so as to expose jour- tition brings with it”, says Pöschl, with an nals. So to a large extent, the peer-review A journal fond of discussion eye on these other journals. process had completely failed. A typical example of this development Complaints about shortcomings in peer is the open-access journal Atmospheric The pitfalls of transparency review are as old as the process itself (see Chemistry and Physics (ACP). ACP’s pub- Up to now, only a few journals have been ‘Problems with peer review’). Falsifications lication process has two steps. First, stud- working with an open peer-review process. are overlooked, original work refused, and ies submitted are quickly checked for their It’s primarily the humanities and social shoddy work accepted. Some peer review- plausibility and then placed online in the sciences that prefer anonymous review- ers give full rein to their own prejudices forum ‘ACP discussions’. Besides the regu- ing. “There’s a widespread tendency to towards the background or gender of the lar expert reviewers, other interested sci- more transparency, however”, says Martin authors. And last but not least, the often entists may participate in the ensuing lengthy peer-review process eats up valua- public debate provided they’re registered ble time. Today, however, several new mod- users. The authors’ answers are also pub- els and trends in peer reviewing promise to lished straightaway. The expert reviewers Problems with peer review remedy the situation – or at least to provide take the whole debate into consideration some relief. when writing their reports. If the study • Too long: It can sometimes take months. survives this process, it’s taken up to the second level and published in the actual • Mistakes slip through: Reviewers ◂ p. 11: Two garden gnomes or a journal as a ‘final paper’. ­overlook many unintentional mistakes screeching cat? Everyone sees a An open-review process means several in the ­studies. Rorschach test differently – and birds are killed with one stone, explains sometimes science is like that, when the chief editor, Ulrich Pöschl, an Austrian • Inadequate detection of fraud: Rigged one scientist tries to reproduce and citizen who works at the Max Planck In- data is hardly ever spotted. verify the results of another, but stitute for Chemistry in Mainz, Germany. keeps seeing a different picture. New findings are not held up by a slow • Conformist: New research methods are Photo: Keystone/Science Source/Spencer Grant peer-review process that can otherwise rejected more often than well-known end in several rounds of reviews. Instead, methods. ◂ p. 12: Dog fleas jump higher and the discussion papers go straight into sci- farther than cat fleas: this is the entific circulation. The ensuing interactive • Danger of corruption: Secret collusion result of an experiment carried out in peer review then adds lustre to the ‘final between reviewers and authors is hard to 2000 that won the IgNobel Prize. Its papers’ that are judged to be of higher qual- prevent. measuring methods were remark- ity. To Pöschl, the most important aspect is able, but its societal relevance is as the post-evaluation step. New key figures • Prejudice: The author’s background, yet unproven. are a real breakthrough in achieving better gender or other elements can influence Photo: Keystone/Cultura/ISTL/Max Bailen quality assurance, he says, referring to the the review.

Swiss National Science Foundation – Swiss Academies: Horizons No. 106 13 Focus: Renewing science

Reinhart, a Swiss sociologist and assistant The Peerage of Science model reduces professor for Sociology of Science and Re- the number of reviews needed. But the search on Evaluation at the Institute for same effect can be achieved by other means. Social Sciences at the Humboldt Univer- For example, articles are often rejected on sity in Berlin. But he doesn’t just see this ­formal grounds – such as for being too long, as something positive. Transparency, he or because the focus of the article doesn’t says, doesn’t automatically increase qual- suit the journal to which it’s been sub- ity. When there is a mutual dependence mitted. In these cases, some editors hand between the reviewers and the authors of over the reviews to similar journals. This studies, there is a danger that people won’t practice was adopted by the association of be as critical as they need to be. This is why journals Neuroscience Peer Review Con- he believes that anonymous peer review- sortium in 2007, and it has been successful ing should remain legitimate. Reinhart too. After assessment, it transfers some 200 argues that it’s in the interest of science to reviews per year to other ­journals. have a great variety of peer-review systems. Open debate Besides these attempts to reform the clas- sical review process, there are more and On the PubPeer website, more experiments taking place with a kind of peer review after publication. On the studies are sometimes website PubPeer, for example, scientists subjected to harsh criticism exchange views about the value of different studies. “Very interesting discussions take place about the reliability of the research”, Possible solutions says Reinhart. Until now, these discussions had often taken place behind closed doors. Networks: It’s not just the editors of journals who Of course, such discussions can also get out • F1000 (experts recommend articles) are trying out new models, but independ- of hand – a public platform can in principle • Equator (an initiative for more reliable ent companies too. The Finnish start-up also serve to discredit people, not least in health studies) company Peerage of Science, for example, the case of PubPeer, as it does not compel offers to take on the peer-review process the participants to give their names. But Outsourcing: for journals. One important aspect of their Reinhart has the impression that the re- • Peerage of Science (performs peer review system is ‘open engagement’, explains search community is able to address this for a pool of journals) Janne Seppänen, one of its founders. The problem itself through self-regulation. • Pre-Val (quality label for validated identity and competence of the reviewers Whereas studies are occasionally sub- peer review) is checked once, right at the beginning of jected to harsh criticism on PubPeer, things • Rubriq (peer reviews paid for by the author the process. Afterwards, they can decide are less controversial on the platform Fac- before submission) freely which of those studies submitted ulty of 1000 (F1000). One of the things it they would like to review – in other words, offers researchers in the life sciences is a Encourage reviewing: they’re not chosen by editors to review kind of selection service. Exceptional arti- • Elsevier certificates, CME credits specific articles. Furthermore, the reviews cles are recommended on the platform by • Orcid (identifier for researchers) themselves are assessed. “Of course, it’s im- a fictitious ‘faculty’ of a thousand experts. • Publons (online credits for reviews) portant to ensure that this assessment is This second level of peer review is intended • R-Index (proposal for quantifying independent of the decision on the article to provide a guarantee that important arti- ­reviewing activity) itself”, says Seppänen. cles won’t sink without trace in the current At present, some 20 journals are partici- flood of publications. Preprint servers without peer review: pating in this model, most of them from • arXiv.org, bioRxiv.org the life sciences. In return, they get access What does the reviewer • Figshare to a pool of studies that have already been get out of this? • Peer J Preprints reviewed. All the journals of the Springer All these new variants have one thing in publishing house also have limited access common: peer review remains dependent Interactive peer review: to the pool. If the authors of a study are of- on the collaboration of the specialist com- • EMBO Journal fered publication by a journal, they can ei- munity. Because the number of journals • eLife ther accept or refuse. The fact that several has increased with digitisation, editors get journals have access to the pool can im- more and more refusals when they ask a re- Discussion forums and post-­ prove the authors’ chances of publication. searcher for a review. One of the reasons for publication ­review: Furthermore, they avoid their article hav- this is that reviewers get ­little ­recognition. • PubPeer, ResearchGate ing to go through several rounds of peer re- In principle, every science author profits view – which could mean that their article from his or her peers and should at some EU research project: might land with the same reviewer several point give back what he or she has gained, • Peere (New Frontiers of Peer Review, times. The journals only have to pay if they says Erik von Elm of the Institute of Social May 2014–May 2018) accept an article. and Preventive Medicine at the Lausanne

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Swiss National Science Foundation – Swiss Academies: Horizons No. 106 15 ((error!))

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University Hospital. But some don’t show ­scientists are often thrown into the deep solidarity and refuse to take part in peer re- end, writing their first reviews without Controversy surrounding open-access viewing. This is why incentives are needed. any guidance at all. “At university, there ­publishing “What we still lack is recognition within are compulsory courses for teaching, but the system for what reviewers do”. Up to not for peer reviewing”, says von Elm. Ini- Putting studies at everyone’s disposal free of now, he says, it’s been publishing articles tiatives to remedy this are still few and far charge (i.e., on open access) is no universal yourself that’s been important in further- between. Basically, the peer-review system remedy. For example, in May 2015 there was ing your career. is like democracy, says von Elm. Everyone a scandal surrounding the Swiss open- knows that the system has weaknesses, but access publisher Frontiers. A group of 31 no one has yet invented a better one. editors of the journals Frontiers in Medicine, “The system has weaknesses. Frontiers in Surgery and Frontiers in Cardio- Publishing on different levels vascular Medicine criticised their own jour- But no one has yet invented a It was partly because of the problems with nal’s peer-review practices and demanded better one” peer review that researchers in some fields reforms. The Frontiers review process, they began placing their studies on open publi- complained, undermined scholarly stand- Erik von Elm cation servers several years ago. Research- ards and instead served the interests of the ers in physics, mathematics and data anal- publisher in establishing lucrative growth for ysis have been avidly using the arXiv.org the journals. And the publisher was indeed In medicine, the problem has already server to publish review-free studies since growing rapidly: Frontiers founded its first been partly solved, says Ana Marusic, a pro- 1991, and since 2013 bioRxiv.org has served publication in 2008, and today already runs fessor at the School of Medicine at the Uni- the same purpose in biology. They do this 50 journals. It disputed the editors’ accusa- versity of Split, and a member of the Board primarily because these servers allow for tions and eventually removed them from of the European Associations of Science the swift exchange of information. Many of their positions. Editors. So-called CME points (Continu- the studies archived there have later been ing Medical Education points) are now be- published in reviewed journals. ing awarded for carrying out peer reviews. According to Pöschl, it is already Medics have to collect a certain number clear that we shall in future have three Does anonymity offer effective protection of these points every year in order to keep ­basic levels­ for scientific publications. against prejudice? their licence. But many other scientific First, there’ll be publication servers such fields lack such a system. as arXiv.org without any peer review. Sec- Prejudice is also rampant in science – be it It is possible that other initiatives might ond, there’ll be open-access specialist jour- directed against the background, the gender provide the answer here. Several journals nals such as BMC Medicine or ACP, which or other aspects of an author. But fighting publish an annual list of their best review- are characterised by transparency and a prejudice is not easy. A double-blind peer ers. Elsevier awards exceptional reviewers discursive culture. Third, there’ll be inter- review, which guarantees the anonymity with certificates. And the reviews that ap- disciplinary journals of top quality such of both the authors and the reviewers, is pear on the F1000 platform have recently as Nature and Science. These last two will regarded as one of the best approaches for begun to be given the digital identifiers of perhaps only serve as a showcase, their avoiding bias. But Ulrich Pöschl from the the Open Researcher & Contributor Iden- function being to boost studies of public Max Planck Institute in Mainz, Germany, is tification Initiative (ORCID). This ensures relevance from levels one and two and to sceptical. Reviewers can often recognise that the work of reviewers isn’t ­forgotten. raise them up above the general mass of where an author comes from on the basis of But what is also lacking is any kind publications. Ultimately, what will count linguistic characteristics, especially in small of training to become a reviewer. Young is the variety of publication models, says specialist fields. Pöschl prefers open-review Pöschl, because they fulfil different tasks procedures in order to combat prejudice. ◂ p. 15: Spectacular results can and complement each other. This isn’t a catch-all remedy, he says, but bring fame and funding. So it can be at least it would let us see when a negative tempting to pimp up your results. The science journalist Sven Titz lives in Berlin and development emerges. This flying dinosaur from the Chinese writes regularly for the Neue Zürcher Zeitung, the province of Liaoning was exposed Tagesspiegel and Welt der Physik. as an artificial aggregate of several fossils by the National Geographic Society. Photo: O. Louis Mazzatenta/National Geographic Creative

◂ p. 16: Mistakes and errors are part and parcel of research. Science is constantly correcting them with new findings. For example, the Sahara Desert was probably formed about seven million years ago, not three million, as was long believed. Photo: Keystone/imagebroker/Egmont Strigl

Swiss National Science Foundation – Swiss Academies: Horizons No. 106 17 Focus: Renewing science

“We should get away from orchestrating artificial competition”

Publish or perish is an incentive system that produces too much nonsense, says economist Mathias Binswanger.

Prof. Binswanger, you write that In what sense? science is engaged in the production of The incentive system has a negative im- ‘nonsense’. Just how much nonsense, pact on researchers’ motivation – there’s exactly? hardly any incentive left to work for a long I fear it’s producing more nonsense than time on something or to pursue a ‘big idea’. sense. This has to do with the perverse in- It’s actually natural for a good researcher to centives that are supposed to create­ ‘excel- want to find out new, fundamental things lence’. and to seek original approaches to prob- What’s wrong with researchers striving lems. But in order to support this natural for excellence? What’s wrong with drive, above all we have to create the proper competition? conditions. There’s nothing wrong with it, as long as So now we’ve recognised the problem, all Mathias Binswanger believes that today’s incen- competition is linked to a functioning mar- we’ve got to do is adjust the incentives tive system hinders real scientific progress. ket. If that’s the case, there’s an incentive to and find a better balance between Photo: Bob Bigelow produce what consumers want. In science, quality and quantity, is that right? however, there’s no direct demand – at least If we took that to its logical conclusion, not in basic research. So artificial indicators we’d end with a kind of black box – an are defined instead. Behind this is the idea opaque system that no one can understand that there has to be a means of measuring anymore, least of all the researchers them- good science in quantitative terms, such as selves. What we have to do, I believe, is to by the number of publications. stop orchestrating artificial competition in science completely. Is the situation equally bad in all research fields? “It’s an illusion to think you It’s actually different from one discipline to another. But the principle is the same can manage science by using everywhere. For example, large sections of measurement data” the social sciences – including economics – are so far removed from reality that much of their research can only be described as ‘art for art’s sake’. This is also the case with supposedly empirical research and experi- But we’ve got to measure things ments. At best, the system of incentives somehow, so that we know who to fund. serves only to increase the number of pub- I have my doubts about that. As it stands lications. But rarely do they offer results currently, we have to ask the fundamental that are interesting or profitable. question: Why should we measure any- thing? It’s always being claimed that the Interview by Roland Fischer public sphere wants it. But does the pub- lic really want ever more publications in Mathias Binswanger is an economist at the scientific journals that are mostly written University of Applied Sciences of North-West Swit- just to get a good ranking? It’s an illusion zerland. He will deliver a keynote speech at the to think you can create good science from conference ScienceComm on 25 September 2015. above by using measurement data. I’m con- vinced that today’s system of incentives is a hindrance to genuine scientific progress.

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Yearning for slow science Ever more quantity, ever more frequency, but also ever more unreliability? Is science in crisis? Some researchers are urging us to take the pace of things down a notch. By Roland Fischer

he credit crunch! The housing cri- ­subsidies – USD 200 billion – were being the medical research community”, which sis! The Greek crisis! But is there invested in bad research and thus wasted. lets itself be too easily deceived by the sup- perhaps also a science crisis? Sci- Perhaps the most disturbing warning sign posed significance of research results. But ence is supposed to be an engine of is that more and more research results get he doesn’t see this as a fundamental prob- Tsuccess, but we’re hearing more and more past all quality controls, but then can’t be lem: “If you know what you’re doing, you that it’s running into major problems: reproduced by other researchers. Here, too, will still find your way easily amidst this scandals, data manipulation, downright spot checks have shown that in many re- barrage of activity”.­ fraud, and a publications roundabout that’s search fields, only a minority of results are Antonio Ereditato is a professor for turning ever faster. Could it be that there’s based on solid work. experimental particle physics and the something fundamentally wrong with the spokesman of the Opera team at CERN, and world of science today? he has also had to deal with the hazards of One thing is certain; scientific pro- science. Three years ago, he announced a duction has skyrocketed. The number of “A lack of time is creating a sensational discovery. Neutrinos had been research publications has been growing observed travelling faster than light. The exponentially – from roughly 700,000 per feeling of crisis” news went through the international me- year in 1990 to 1.3 million in 2006. And the Ulrike Felt dia like wildfire. Ereditato stresses that his attention received by each publication team had always been very specific about is dwindling accordingly. Furthermore, calling this result an ‘anomaly’, and had in 2014 alone, some 400 articles had to published their findings as a pre-print arti- be withdrawn after publication, because This calls into question one of the theo- cle on the arXiv server. The correction came they contained sloppy work. At the begin- retical foundations of the natural sciences eight months later. The measurement had ning of the millennium, that figure was in particular: the reproducibility of a re- been a result of faulty equipment. Even still only 30. sult, independent of place, time or person. with hindsight, Ereditato still thinks that John Ioannidis, the bad boy of science Ultimately, this notion of reproducibility is the Opera team acted correctly – they had statistics at Stanford University, demon- the bedrock upon which we found all our waited for a long time to go public, and strated plausibly in 2005 that more than claims to anything along the lines of objec- had also eventually only done so in order half of all published findings are wrong. tive ‘truth’. If cracks appear in this, then it’s to invite colleagues to discuss this “rather And in 2014, he estimated that across understandable to fear that the whole edi- improbable­ event”. the whole world, some 85% of research fice could collapse around us. For Ereditato, it’s quite normal that ex- perimental findings can’t always be re- Faulty mass production produced. He thinks that the publication ◂ p. 19: When he proved Poincaré’s So is science today producing only back- of research results should always follow Theorem, Grigori ­Perelman solved ground noise instead of clear signals? In strict statistical rules and should be la- one of the great problems of math- many fields, this truly seems to be the belled accordingly – for example, as ‘indi- ematics. But scientific fame doesn't case – and the exponents themselves don’t cations’, ‘proofs’ or ‘discoveries’ – according interest this exceptional Russian: hesitate to admit it. Until recently, Peter to the quantitative reliability of the data. he refused the Fields Medal in 2006. Jüni was the Head of the Clinical Trials Dealing with the complexity of data is a Since then, he has actually turned Unit at the University of Bern, and he es- normal part of research activity in particle away from science. timates that some 80 to 90% of current physics, he­ says. Photo: Wikimedia Commons studies in the health sector are too small Like Jüni in his field of medicine, Brian in scale, and/or suffer from methodologi- Nosek doesn’t believe that all fields of re- ◂ p. 20: The avalanche of books roll- cal deficiencies that make them essentially search are equal in the reliability of their ing out of the University of Mons is unusable. But he would prefer to view this results. He is a professor of psychology just installation art. But researchers from a different perspective. Within this at the University of Virginia, and in 2013 are under real pressure to produce flurry of research results, he says, at least 10 he founded the Center for Open Science. their own flood of publications. It to 20% of findings provide a substantial im- ­Recently, he set up the ‘Reproducibil- doesn't just make them suffer, it petus to the field. And this is an “immense ity project: psychology’, in order to keep a often also impinges on the quality of gain” compared with 1950, when “our check on his own field. He believes that the their work. medicine was often a kind of voodoo”. Jüni problem lies in “hyper-competition” and Photo: Keystone/Branko de Lang still sees a certain degree of “naiveté in false incentives. “As a researcher, you’re not

Swiss National Science Foundation – Swiss Academies: Horizons No. 106 21 Focus: Renewing science

­rewarded for proving the reproducibility of Slowing down the results you’ve achieved. It’s far better But do we really need to go even quicker? for your career to produce as many results There’s a growing resistance to this. In as possible and to publish them”. analogy to the slow food trend that aims to increase our enjoyment when we eat, a Creating the right incentives ‘slow science’ movement has taken off in And so people happily keep on publish- recent years, with manifestos and articles ing, ever more and ever more often. The appearing in different countries arguing number of publications has been growing for a more cautious, more sedate approach exponentially. Lutz Bornmann is a sociolo- to science. However, there’s no real unity gist of science at the Max Planck Society in about what such slow science would essen- ­Munich, Germany, and together with Rüdi- tially entail. None of its exponents yearns Every result is a publication ger Mutz from ETH Zurich, he has recently for a nostalgic return to some putative per- shown that the number of sources cited in fect world of yore. What’s certain, however, “Stories can wait. Science cannot”. This publications has also been growing expo- is that many researchers today feel that motto sums up a plan to revolutionise the nentially, and that since the 17th century, they can’t fulfil their proper mission any ways and means of publishing scientific re- the growth rate has jumped considerably more. Ulrike Felt, an Austrian social scien- sults. The platform ScienceMatters has been on three occasions. Today, the volume dou- tist at the University of Vienna, believes devised by Lawrence Rajendran, a systems bles every nine years. Whether this gener- that this is an expression of a phenomenon biologist at the University of Zurich, and it’s ates a similar growth of knowledge itself is that’s taking place in society as a whole: due to come online in September 2015. something on which the empiricist Mutz it’s a different approach to time itself. “It The idea behind this completely digital prefers not to comment. “You’d first have to is fundamentally a lack of time that cre- network is that researchers should no longer determine criteria by which to ­measure it”. ates a feeling of crisis”, says Felt. In recent wait until all the individual elements of their decades, our temporal structures have work come together to produce a complete changed, she says, and this is perceived in picture, or until they can derive a neat con- “As a researcher, the form of stress and acceleration. clusion from it. The individual components This is also something that has been of an article – in other words, individual you’re not rewarded for observed by Fortunato Santo from the Uni- observations – should be placed before the reproducibility” versity of Helsinki, whose group recently international research community for them published the article ‘Attention decay in to examine. The researchers could then get Brian Nosek science’. They claim that research projects valuable feedback from other experts while are being forgotten at an ever quicker rate they are still busy with their actual research. because they are quickly submerged by the This should allow them to bring their scien- Nosek has nothing against growth per next wave of publications. Santo would also tific ‘story’ to its conclusion in peace, and se. But transparency and reproducibility like research authorities to change their with much better arguments. should be rewarded, not just quantity. The views, and he would like ways and means Rajendran also hopes that this will help to incentive to produce as much as possible to be found so that we might place qual- counter scientific misdemeanours. Research- isn’t just going to disappear. And other ef- ity above quantity once more. Felt makes ers would feel less tempted to squeeze data forts at reform have taken this as their a more general observation, namely that to fit their arguments, even when it doesn’t starting point, too. For example, one ini- politics should also be about tending the really do so properly. tiative that has recently acquired a certain temporal landscape. There is too little time Publishing on ­ScienceMatters will be level of popularity is the San Francisco for reflection today, and knowledge produc- as easy as registering with a Facebook Declaration on Research Assessment, or tion suffers consequently from the loss of profile. ­Rajendran believes that there is a DORA. It aims at a state of affairs in which our ability to spend longer periods of time large, potential pool of able researchers in research is evaluated by placing a greater on one task. developing countries who could contribute emphasis on the quality of each individu- Just how the goal of slow science might individual components to a large digital al project instead of on the indices of the be achieved, however, remains unclear. In science network such as this. Others will scientific journals in which the results are this regard, Ereditato poses a fundamen- perhaps write the ‘story’, but even people published. tal question, “even if we ultimately decid- without a university degree could help In the Netherlands, a number of re- ed that we need a slower science, where’s with data collection. ScienceMatters could nowned researchers have called for a ‘Sci- the brake?” thus contribute to a diversification of the ence in transition’ that is intended to be research profession – and also lead to better nothing short of a fundamental reform Roland Fischer is a science journalist who lives reproducibility. “Many scientists are good at of science. Science, they say, has been re- in Bern. seeing the big picture and are born discover- duced to a self-referential system in which ers, while others are meticulous in check- quality is determined almost solely by bib- ing the work of others. Everyone should do liometric parameters, and in which soci- what he or she does best – and get proper etal relevance is not emphasised enough. ­recognition for it”. The European Commission welcomed the Quality control is to be organised accord- Dutch initiative and, after a process of con- ▸ p. 23: Lots of money for a small ingly. Just as in a social network, everyone sultation, it recently proposed guidelines plant with uncertain chances of will be able to like, evaluate and comment for an ‘open science’ that is intended to be success. The ­Wendelstein 7-X on contributions and thereby influence the both more transparent and better anchored nuclear fusion plant at the Max status of the user. In this manner, important in society; digital means are to be utilised Planck ­Institute for Plasma Physics observations will reliably float to the surface, to achieve these goals. It is also hoped that in Greifswald, Germany, cost EUR believes Rajendran. The only ‘upstream’ the initiative will help us to keep up with 1.06 billion – more than twice as measure will be a check, carried out by the the current exponential growth, and in much as planned when the project editorial team, that will weed out everything the process attain quicker, more efficient started back in 1997. that does not meet the necessary standards. means of knowledge production. Photo: Keystone/apn Photo/Frank Hormann

22 Swiss National Science Foundation – Swiss Academies: Horizons No. 106 ((money, money))

Swiss National Science Foundation – Swiss Academies: Horizons No. 106 23        Money is thelifeblood of research GRAPH onthefringesing people ofuniversities want surprises, there tobe by alsoallow The riskisminimalbutaccounted for. We something inreturnfortheirmoney. particularly intermsofgivingthepublic science asitisatechnologicalgadget, countered. Butit’s notaseasy topromote things aregoing andonthedifficultiesen funding, onhow keepingthemup-to-date provide who people communicate with public andresearchers. Researchersmust creates anew kindofdialogueamongthe ideas are well-founded. Crowdfunding also Above all, quickstudiestesting whether of fundscantakeuptoa year. CHF 100–500,000. And theallocation the SNSFhave abudget ofbetween than CHF50,000. to Mostproposals for scientific studiesneeding less very difficulttofindquickfinancing For many reasons. Forexample, it’s for Swissscience. todevelophopes crowdfunding Hackarium nearLausanne, the community laboratory Luc Henry, of co-founder INTERVIEW 24 development ishigherinSwitzerland. spending 10 times morethanGermanandFrenchagencies receive. capita, Butper researchand The UnitedStates allocates CHF32billionannually totheNIHandNSF–almost  Knowledge and politics “We wantsurprises” popular, oreven fanciful proposals. The system runs therisk of funding crowdfunding? What kind of proposals are suitable for crowdfunding? Why finance science through Swiss National ScienceFoundation –Swiss Academies: Horizons No. 106 Budget of funding agencies (CHF million) SNSF CH NIH +NSF US FWF AT

DFG DE - - on track before theendof2015. on trackbefore public. We tohave hope thefirstproposals example, match thesumsraisedby the well as with afoundation that might, for help themincludescientific proposals, as platform forgeneral crowdfunding to We arenow negotiating with aSwiss ally enduponcrowdfunding platforms. putforwardNot alloftheproposals actu course there will always common sense. be science projectssetupby amateurs. And of of LSDoncreativity –as well ascrowd-led England, forexample, studiedtheeffects cally sensitive –aneuroscienceprojectin financing ofstudiesthatpoliti aretoo Crowdfunding will alsoallow forthe to carry outtheirown originalresearch. CNRS At what stage are you currently? FR +ANR R&D expenditure percapita (CHF) ERC EU Source: OECD, annual report RCUK UK CNR IT -         -

Catherine Cattin to thepreviousrole, whose incumbent re with acouncilofseven scientists. Contrary Glover until it was axed inNovember 2014) ofChiefScientificpost Adviser (held by Ann Commission The European will replacethe including intheirspaceprogramme. decline inRussia’s capacity toinnovate, agency Stratfor predictsacontinued agent’ by thegovernment. The analysis research, afterit was asa‘foreign labelled first Russian private organisation tofund ed tofinancehisDiversity Foundation, the Zimin announcedthat henolonger want At theendofMay 2015theoligarchDmitry and will leadtotheclosingofinstitutions. done inahaphazardandopaquemanner allocation. They fearthat thelatter will be the introduction ofcompetitive funding protest againstareformoffinancingand the streetsat ofJune2015to thebeginning Some 3,000Russian to researcherstook NEWS indifference. attention ofthecommunity after years of A scientific study that suddenly draws the Sleeping beauty DEFINITION tions. Science and EngineeringEthics, 2015 Randomly Selected Pool of Life Science Publica M.P. Oksvold: Incidence of Data Duplications ina fromtheauthorspondence ofthestudy. the publishingjournalsrepliedtocorre is that, over asix-month period, noneof study publishedinJune2015. Also ofnote articles contained duplicated data, says a Almost aquarterof120cancerresearch nal orinoneofa“cartel” ofrelated journals. i.e., ofarticlespublishedinthesamejour unusually highlevel citations: ofsuspect journals. thismoveThe reasonbehind isan analysis ofthecitations in11,149scientific has deleted39titlesfromitsannual The publication Journal Citation Reports ple ofamilitiacouncillors. new structureandparticularly theprinci tist expressedtheirconcernsregardingthe writing intheonlinemagazineEuroscien and Innovation, CarlosMoedas. Scientists the CommissionerforResearch, Science mission, thenew council will go through directlyported tothePresident oftheCom adviser with councillors adviser with replacesan Europe Turbulence inRussian science Double data Wheat vs.chaff ------+! –!

The 2015 elections: how the political parties view science Political parties vote two-dimensionally, says the political geographer Michael Hermann. This fact is also reflected in the answers party bosses gave to four questions on science policy that Horizons asked them. By Valentin Amrhein and Daniel Saraga

When it comes to science policy, where do the In order for our readers to form their front lines lie in our party-political spectrum? own opinions, here are the answers party Primarily along two dimensions, says the executives gave to four questions asked political geographer Michael Hermann. The by ­Horizons, along with the results of four first dimension involves science funding. votes in the National Council. Here, the left says invest, while the right says economise. The second dimension no longer functions according to the left/right pattern, and Hermann describes it as the ‘Physicists’ dilemma’, in reference to the play by Friedrich Dürrenmatt. Should scientists do what’s do- Politicians offer their opinion able, just because they can? When deciding whether political decisions should be made ScienceDebate is a joint initiative of the according to scientific possibility or the needs Swiss Academies of Arts and Sciences, the of society, often those on the far right join up SNSF and the online electoral assistance with those on the far left. organisation Smartvote. ScienceDebate Some two-thirds of the politicians in the drew up 13 questions on science policy and National Council and the Council of States put them to Swiss politicians. Its website ­ have a university degree. “But given today’s www.sciencedebate.ch features the state of permanent election fever, it’s not aca- arguments of party chairpersons and their demic politicians who’re in demand in parlia- executive committees, along with answers ment, but communications experts”, says from all ­candidates standing for seats on the Hermann. “Furthermore, there’s a shift taking National Council in 2015, listed according to place away from facts and towards opinions”. their respective parties.

Swiss National Science Foundation – Swiss Academies: Horizons No. 106 25 Knowledge and politics

Science policy in 200 characters The presidents of the seven biggest Swiss political parties

Should the economic Should the government usefulness of research and the authorities have projects be given greater a greater influence on the consideration when type of research that is federal subsidies are publicly funded? being awarded?

Martin Bäumle Economic considerations should be an In defining the criteria for allocating Green-Liberal Party (GLP) important criterion when awarding federal research monies, politicians already have subsidies, although the funding of pure sufficient influence on what research is research may be excluded from this require- subsidised today. ment.

Toni Brunner Research shouldn’t be an end in itself; it Research is not a core responsibility of the Swiss People’s Party (SVP) should be applied research. The societal state. The state should rather provide fa- and in particular the economic use of vourable conditions for researchers instead research projects should be given greater of pouring too much taxpayers’ money consideration. into it.

Christophe Darbellay Research and innovation can and must No. The federal government gives roughly Christian Democratic serve economic progress and enhance a quarter of its research and development ­People’s Party (CVP) our level of knowledge. In this sense, the funding to the SNSF, which then uses it to economic usefulness of research projects subsidise research. That shouldn’t change. should be borne in mind.

Martin Landolt By definition, research projects don’t dem- The BDP welcomes research programmes in Conservative Democratic onstrate their concrete economic useful- the field of renewable energies, for exam- Party (BDP) ness right from the start. Any other criteria ple. But we have to guarantee the right bal- would impose too great a limitation on the ance between state influence and research breadth of research. freedom.

Christian Levrat The distribution of federal subsidies for There are already sufficient instruments Social Democratic Party (SP) research purposes is well balanced today. to implement research focus programmes A greater orientation towards economic that are democratically legitimate and that usefulness would call research freedom respect the current and future needs of into question. society.

Philipp Müller There is usually no recognisable ­economic The independence of research (and teach- Free Democratic Party (FDP) use in pure research, which is why ing!) is a precious asset and must be scientists, not politicians, should de- guaranteed. All political influence must be cide which research projects have the prevented. ­greatest ­potential.

Regula Rytz No. But research must help us to confront Today, the Federal Council is already able Green Party (GPS) the challenges of our century. These include to initiate national research programmes our dwindling resources and climate change and research focus areas that investigate with its far-reaching consequences. the core problems of our society. That’s how things should remain.

26 Swiss National Science Foundation – Swiss Academies: Horizons No. 106 Should nationality play Should scientific a role when appointing findings play a greater professorial chairs? role in politics?

When appointing professors, the candi- Evidence-based policy is to be recommend- dates should be judged on their expert ed. Science can help to show politicians the knowledge and their pedagogical skills, not reality of circumstances and possible paths their nationality. to solutions.

A constitutional article was approved last Science, as part of society, should con- year that confirms our right to manage tinue to bring us its findings, its concerns immigration by prioritising Swiss nation- and its proposed solutions, though in the als and by means of quotas. This must also knowledge that there is no such thing as a apply to universities as employers. uniform scientific opinion.

Fundamentally, nationality should not play Scientific findings should play a role in any role. But if professors are available who politics, but they must be discussed in a so- are of Swiss nationality and who possess cietal and economic context. This is where the desired qualifications, then they should the role of politics begins. be given preference.

It is fundamental that research institutions It would be good if politics made more use should not be hindered by rigid quotas of scientific findings in order to find sustain- when recruiting personnel. able solutions.

Rather not. The goal must be to have the Scientific findings are an important pre- best people working at our universities. requisite of political decision-making. The freedom of politicians to take decisions is just as important as freedom in research and teaching.

Teaching autonomy must also apply to the More science and less ideology would do appointment of teaching staff. If Switzer- parliament good. But science itself has to land wants to retain its leading position in enter into a far more intensive dialogue with research, then it should appoint the best, the people – for they are sovereign under most suitable people. the Swiss Constitution.

No. Research and teaching are international Scientific findings are already important today. Only the job profile and the appli- today and are included in politics. But cant’s qualifications are relevant. But we many questions don’t have a clear scientific must invest in young talent and the better answer. representation of women.

For more extensive answers and other questions, please go to www.sciencedebate.ch Photos: Parliamentary Service, 3003 Bern

Swiss National Science Foundation – Swiss Academies: Horizons No. 106 27 Knowledge and politics

Votes in the National Council on science policy matters In the last legislative period, ending in spring 2015, there were 106 votes in the National Council in the field of science and research. We have chosen four votes that were particularly relevant for Swiss scientists.

PARTICIPATION IN HORIZON 2020 MODERNISATION IN THE SOCIAL SCIENCES Swiss participation in the EU research programme, A national action plan will help to modernise research to the tune of CHF 4.4 billion, means that Swiss facilities in the social sciences and create longer-term ­researchers can apply for EU grants. research positions. Supporting research and innovation in the years Modernising and developing research in the social 2014–2020 (27. 9. 2013, reference 13.022-2) ­sciences (19. 3. 2014, reference 12.3217)

79% yes 21% no 35% yes 65% no 153 votes 40 votes 61 votes 113 votes

46 43

31 30

12 12 13 13 9 5

1 11

24 26

40 51 SP GPS CVP GLP BDP FDP SVP SP GPS CVP GLP BDP FDP SVP EVP Lega EVP Lega CSP MCR CSP MCR indep. Indep.

RESEARCHING OFF-PATENT DRUGS REMODELLING ACADEMIC CAREER STRUCTURES Funding for studies on drugs for which the patents have A programme should be developed for remodelling expired and which are therefore no longer the subject ­career structures for scientific and scholarly staff at of research. Swiss universities. Reliable decision criteria for pharmaceutical therapy Funding for emerging researchers in Switzerland (9. 3. 2015, reference 14.4007) (9. 3. 2015, reference 15.3000)

54% yes 46% no 51% yes 49% no 91 votes 77 votes 82 votes 78 votes

42 41

18 13 13 14 10 8 7 5 1 1 1 2 6 7

24 22

46 47

SP GPS CVP GLP BDP FDP SVP SP GPS CVP GLP BDP FDP SVP EVP Lega EVP Lega CSP MCR CSP MCR Indep. Indep.

The details of these legislative proposals can be found by entering the respective reference number on the following website: http://bit.ly/parlsci

28 Swiss National Science Foundation – Swiss Academies: Horizons No. 106 “The right to science can be used as the foundation for dialogue” At the end of 2015, Switzerland will start to apply the Nagoya Protocol on Access to Genetic Resources. This issue is part of the universal right to science, promoted with renewed intensity by the United Nations since 2012. Interview by Florian Fisch Negotiations on patenting on seeds have given new impetus to the right to science, explains Samantha Besson. Photo: Valérie Chételat

The human right to science aims to sterile opposition that can be found in de- protect scientists living in authoritarian bates on the right to food, where scientists’ systems and to ensure that scientific pro- rights to intellectual property are often gress benefits all citizens. From the 1960s used to oppose the rights of farmers to ac- and up to 2012 this right was no more than cess seeds and to develop new varieties. words on paper. Then new consultations The right to science can set out a new foun- were held by the UN Special Representa- dation for dialogue and for finding innova- tive on Cultural Rights. For Samantha tive solutions. Samantha Besson Besson, professor of international public Doesn’t this movement bring with it the law at the University of Fribourg, there can risk of increased bureaucracy? Samantha Besson is the human rights be concrete consequences from consider- Nations may be tempted to create new delegate at the Swiss Academies and has ing science as an integral part of cultural regulations in the field of research. But I taught international and European law at rights, for example during international think there are already enough and that we the University of Fribourg since 2004, having negotiations on the patenting of seeds. shouldn’t fear a new avalanche of restric- previously spent time at the universities of tions. Oxford and Columbia. Isn’t access to the results of scien- Do you think that the right to science can tific research already included in our weaken research? universal­ rights? In and of itself, more democracy is of It can be found in almost all other rights. course good news. However, the relation- Accessible and shared advantages Scientific knowledge is necessary for pro- ship between science and democracy is ducing food or for developing medicines. relatively sensitive. Increased democratic Biodiversity is essential for agriculture and That’s why we havn’t really noticed the participation in science could result in a livestock, as well as for the development of right to science until today. However, there- form of threat to researchers. But research- new medicines. The Nagoya Protocol, ratified in lies the interest in a period of reflection, ers’ autonomy is one of the most precious by Switzerland, facilitates access to genetic not just to see what science does but also victories of today’s science. We must there- resources in different countries for scientists who it benefits. fore remain vigilant. and entrepreneurs. In exchange, states that What is the advantage of it? hold these resources must be able to gain Let’s take the example of international seed F. Shaheed: The right to enjoy the benefits of from the advantages that come from their policy, the ramifications of which travel as scientific progress and its applications. use. The Nagoya Decree, which complements far as the work of biologists and agricul- A/HRC/20/26, HRC (2012). the Federal Act on the Protection of Nature tural scientists. The double-edged aspect and Cultural Heritage, will come into force of the right to science receives ­widespread most likely towards the end of 2015.

Swiss National Science Foundation – Swiss Academies: Horizons No. 106 29 Knowledge and politics

Putting patients first

Clinical research costs a lot of money. New financing models are needed to answer questions that are of importance to patients, but that are of lesser economic interest. By Oliver Klaffke

Whether it’s new drugs or new forms of therapy, they all require the same degree of attention from researchers. Photo: Keystone/Science Photo Library/Jim West

he pharmaceutical industry likes to SNSF programme from those of other Eu- the money from its 1999 Nobel Peace Prize, invest in the development of profit- ropean countries or the USA, where inves- and in collaboration with five other organi- able drugs. However, wealthy inves- tigator-initiated studies are also given spe- sations used it to help set up a foundation tors are lacking when it comes to re- cial funding, but in general only when the in Geneva called the Drugs for Neglected Tsearching new forms of treatment. “Studies topic has been decided in advance. Diseases initiative (DNDi). In 2013 DNDi that focus on the patients, not commercial had a budget of CHF 30 million, of which interests, still play an important role in im- Money from the industry half came from private patrons, and it fills proving the treatment and care of the sick”, “In Italy, where I work, such research is a gap in the development of drugs. Together says Stephanie Tan. She’s a doctor who funded by the AIFA Fund of the national with industrial partners, it produces drugs works for Quintiles Asia, a company that medicines approval authority”, says Gi- for weak markets that help to combat dis- carries out clinical trials. Early in 2015, Tan useppe Traversa of the public Istituto eases such as leishmaniasis, malaria and and her colleagues published a handbook Superiore di Sanità in Rome. The Italian HIV in children. Such sources of income are for clinical studies set up by researchers, programme is financed by a fee that the essential if we are to make clinical progress appropriately titled Investigator Initiated pharmaceutical industry has to pay, equiv- in niche areas that are not economically Trials Made Easy. Such studies have been alent to 5% of their marketing expenses ­lucrative but medicinally important. on the rise since the mid-1990s. In these flowing into independent clinical research. cases, medics choose their research topics This means that some EUR 40 million are Oliver Klaffke is a freelance journalist in Zurich. independent of economic interests. available every year for research topics such A new, special SNSF programme is now as drugs for rare diseases or comparisons Y.-J. Ban et al.: Investigator Initiated Trials Made offering funding to help realise independ- between different treatment strategies. As Easy. Quintiles, 2014. ent studies in Switzerland: ‘Investigator Traversa wrote in an article in Annals of V. Muñoz et al.: Can medical products be devel- initiated clinical trials’. There will be two Oncology, a specialist journal for cancer re- oped on a non-profit basis? Exploring product bidding rounds offering CHF 10 million search, this kind of funding is an opportu- development partnerships for neglected diseases. each, which will suffice for four or five nity that you have to grasp with both hands. Science and Public Policy, 2015. studies. “We would like to encourage re- Viviana Muñoz from EPFL proposes fi- searchers to carry out clinical studies on nancial support from foundations. Along issues that they think are relevant”, says with the researchers of the Chair of Eco- Ayşim Yılmaz, the head of the Biology and nomics and Management of Innovation at Medicine Division of the SNSF. The type of EPFL, she believes that philanthropic fund- therapy involved and the illness to be in- ing has proven itself worthwhile in fields vestigated are of no consequence whatever. that are not economically lucrative, such The design and quality of the project alone as tropical diseases or the use of off-patent will decide whether the study gets the go- generic pharmaceuticals. ahead or not. “It’s a bottom-up approach”, One such example is the aid organisa- she says. This is what distinguishes the tion Doctors without Borders. It invested

30 Swiss National Science Foundation – Swiss Academies: Horizons No. 106 Biology and medicine

Alien invaders Invasive fauna and flora are an immense problem for conservationists, foresters and farmers alike. Now researchers have developed a method for appraising which species are especially dangerous. By Simon Koechlin

Swiss National Science Foundation – Swiss Academies: Horizons No. 106 31 Biology and medicine

heir names sound exotic, even aus- However, it’s been difficult to set picious. There’s the red-eared slider, ­priorities until now, because there’s been the Asian long-horned beetle, the no means of appraising the impact of inva- tree of heaven and the giant hog- sive species accurately or of allowing us to Tweed. But these species of fauna and flora compare the influence of different groups all belong to the most ‘persecuted’ in Swit- of organisms, such as mammals and plants. zerland. Customs officials, municipal gar- A consortium of scientists from across the deners and conservation societies all over world has been developing such methods, the country are trying to ferret them out, and Nentwig and his colleagues at the Uni- trap them or dig them up, because they’re versity of Bern are involved in it. They have on the list of species that are known as ‘in- developed a kind of damage rating that vasive’. And yet they are animals or plants functions as follows. They hunt for exist- that at one time were introduced here by ing studies on the impact of alien species, us (in some cases intentionally, in others which can range from studies on quantifi- not) and that spread naturally. They are dis- able effects to estimates made by experts. placing native species, damaging land and Then, on the basis of this quantitative and forests, and even leading to human health qualitative data, the impact of every indi- problems. vidual species is assessed and allocated to one of twelve different categories, such as 12 billion euros per year their impact on animals, vegetation, agri- These problematic species are so great in culture, forest management and human number that the ecological and societal health. consequences are literally unimaginable. The Swiss Federal Office for the Environ- Fish less harmful than birds ment (FOEN) has so far counted more than In a recently published study, Nentwig 800 alien species that have established and his colleagues have used this method themselves in Switzerland. More than 100 to examine and compare 300 alien species are regarded as being invasive. In Europe that have taken root in Europe – mam- as a whole, the number of non-native spe- mals, birds, fish, arthropods and plants. It cies is reckoned to be more than 12,000, of transpires that, on average, alien mammals which 10% are invasive. Earlier this year, have the most serious impact – on the en- the EU enacted a new regulation against vironment, on the economy and on society. them. The EU already spends more than The least damage, they suggest, is done by EUR 12 billion a year, both in combatting fish. Mammals are often of particular im- invasive species and in repairing the dam- portance in an ecosystem because of their age they do. And the costs are rising. size and their adaptability, and also be- Given this order of magnitude, one cause they have a broad diet, says Sabrina has to ask what priorities our politicians Kumschick, the lead author of the study. should be setting. Should our money and She wrote her doctoral dissertation at the resources be spent combatting the zebra University of Bern and today works at the mussel that’s displacing native mussels Centre of Excellence for Invasion Biology and blocking our water pipelines and sluice at the University of Stellenbosch in South systems? Or would it be better spent in the Africa. “For this reason, we weren’t really fight against the corn rootworm that can surprised by the position that mammals destroy whole fields of maize? What’s more assumed in our assessment”. important: that a nature reserve isn’t com- pletely overgrown with giant hogweed, or that a city park isn’t littered with the drop- pings of Canadian geese? “Current approaches often lack clear priorities” Comparing mammals and plants Pro Natura These are questions that the authori- ties everywhere find difficult to answer, including in Switzerland. In a position paper published in late 2013, the conser- This assessment tool will in future ­allow vation association ‘Pro Natura’ wrote, “cur- authorities to carry out a better compari- rent ­approaches often lack clear priorities son of the consequences of invasive spe- about combatting invasive, alien species, cies. This in turn can help them to focus just as they fail to specify the habitats their resources better when trying to pro- where the scarce financial means avail- tect native species. Gian-Reto Walther is ◂ page 31: Introduced to Europe from able might be deployed on a priority basis”. responsible for alien species at FOEN, and Central America, the corn rootworm Wolfgang Nentwig shares their opinion. he is grateful for such practically oriented Diabrotica virgifera virgifera destroys He’s an ecologist at the University of Bern research. What’s especially valuable is that whole fields of maize. and one of the best-known researchers in this new method allows for comparisons Photo: Keystone/Science Photo Library/Peggy the field. “Regrettably, too little is being between different groups of organisms. Greb/US Department of Agriculture done”, he says. Previous systems allowed you to compare

32 Swiss National Science Foundation – Swiss Academies: Horizons No. 106 plants with plants, he says, but not plants with mammals. Walther doesn’t think that Switzerland is doing too little, however. “There are already lots of measures under- way to combat invasive species”, he says. Often, however, they’re not well enough coordinated. But that is going to change, he says. FOEN is currently developing “a strat- egy to combat alien species”. Someone has to decide Fighting uninvited intruders is going to be a Herculean task, but all the experts are aware of this. Not least because no one quite knows how to proceed. “According to the information we have at present, it’s already too late to exterminate many spe- cies”, says Nentwig. One example is Japa- nese knotweed, which comes from East Asia and has spread rapidly across Europe since the mid-20th century. In Switzerland, only the Upper Engadine is still free from this robust plant that is so quick to pro- liferate. And because Japanese knotweed can sprout from the tiniest piece of shoot left in the soil, it’s almost impossible to cope with it.

“Measures are not ­coordinated well-enough” Gian-Reto Walther

Damage ratings are at least a further piece of the jigsaw helping us to bundle our strengths and prioritise properly in the battle against invasive species. That’s why Nentwig and Kumschick are planning to develop their method further. But these as- sessment lists will never be more than an aid to decision-making. Because whether it’s more important to society to keep a park free of goose droppings or a nature reserve free of hogweed is something that will still have to be decided by someone on the spot. The poison of the giant hogweed can cause severe burns. This ornamental Simon Koechlin is a science journalist and the plant came to Central Europe as a chief editor of Tierwelt. gift from Tsar Alexander I, but today it is eroding our river banks. S. Kumschick et al.: Comparing impacts of alien Photo: Konrad Lauber, Flora Helvetica @ 2007 plants and animals in Europe using a standard Haupt Bern scoring system. Journal of Applied Ecology, 2015.

Swiss National Science Foundation – Swiss Academies: Horizons No. 106 33 Biology and medicine

Male marmosets are not less intel- ligent than the females. They’re just less motivated. Photo: Keystone/Science Photo Library/Visuals Unlimited/Ken Lucas

34 Observing the observers The behaviour of laboratory animals often depends on the person carrying out the experiment. This could explain why many animal tests can’t be reproduced. By Ori Schipper

or several years now, behavioural one glass into another, or placing a grass- the animals to be taken back to their group scientists have been investigating hopper – a delicacy to marmosets – under as soon as they no longer showed any inter- themselves. Before this, they rarely one of three black cups on the table in front est in the experiment. paid much attention to the influence of the animals’ cage. “The smaller the laboratory animal, the Fof people on laboratory animals. Of the four researchers, two of them, greater the probable influence exerted by Indeed, since 2004, several independent both women, were known to the marmo- the person carrying out the experiment; investigations have suggested that female sets from previous experiments. But they and the greater is its fear of people”, says common marmosets are superior to the had never before seen the other two re- Burkart. For example, a study by research- male of the species when it comes to solv- searchers. As expected, the unknown visi- ers in Montreal in Canada in 2014 proved ing problems, such as picking out a raisin tors unsettled the male monkeys far more that even the scent of male researchers is from an empty film container. The females than the females. This was why the male enough to put mice under stress – which did not just find more varied ways of open- marmosets were worse at guessing correct- means that they display less signs of feel- ing the container, but they also reached ly which cup hid the grasshopper. Instead ing pain than when they are examined their goal quicker and more efficiently of watching what was happening, they by female researchers. We have to be- than the males. So are female marmosets were trying to get out of their test cage to come aware of this kind of influence, says simply cleverer?­ return to the other group of primates. Burkart, so that we can do our best to avoid research results being unreproducible, or Lack of motivation even falsified. “Animals behave differently But when the males did concentrate on their task, they were as competent as the Ori Schipper works for the Swiss Cancer League when they’re under stress” females in finding the grasshopper. “The and as a freelance journalist. Maria Emília Yamamoto fact that the males perform their task less well is not because they’re less intelligent M. N. Schubiger et al.: High emotional ­reactivity than the females. They’re just less motivat- toward an experimenter affects ­participation, ed”, says Burkart. but not performance, in cognitive tests with As Judith Burkart and her team from Maria Emília Yamamoto of the Univer- common marmosets (Callithrix jacchus). the Anthropological Museum of the Uni- sity of the Rio Grande do Norte in Brazil is ­Animal ­Cognition, 2015. versity of Zurich have shown in a recently the behavioural scientist who was the first published study, it’s probably not quite so to demonstrate that female marmosets simple. In this new test, the males were solve problems better than the males. But still the less efficient gender, but the re- the idea that the males are less attentive is searchers were able to show that the male an explanation that she, too, finds compel- marmosets were more often distracted ling. Yamamoto finds the new study impor- from their task than the females. tant because it shows “that animals behave Burkart’s team recorded the behaviour differently when they’re under stress”. For of 14 common marmosets that watched Burkart, the well-being of the marmosets is from their cages how four differentpeople ­ also a primary concern. For this reason, she carried out tasks such as pouring sand from defined abort criteria that wouldenable ­

Swiss National Science Foundation – Swiss Academies: Horizons No. 106 35 Biology and medicine

RNA against heart attacks

Researchers are hoping to be able to use non-coding therapeutic RNA ‒ snippets of genetic information ‒ to allow cardiac muscle to regenerate following a heart attack. By Caroline Ronzaud

Arteriograms, like this historical photo from 1904, can reveal blockages in coronary arteries. Photo: Keystone/Science Photo Library ne of the manifestations of a heart attack is the death of sections of cardiac muscle. Over a certain lim- it, this sometimes leads to heart Ofailure. According to Thierry Pedrazzini, Biotechnology in Trieste, Italy. “It’s also progenitor cells taken from the hearts of professor in experimental cardiology at the slow and difficult to set up”, he says. patients suffering from heart failure. “For Vaud University Hospital Centre (CHUV) a long time we believed that adult mus- in Lausanne, the heart of adult mammals Reprogramming heart cells cle heart cells could not divide,” explains is unfortunately incapable of auto-regen- A new approach, however, involves repro- Pedrazzini. “However, this ability can be eration. Whilst it does contain progenitor gramming cardiac muscle cells to activate reactivated through the manipulation cells, which are similar to stem cells and the molecular mechanisms in the heart of non-coding RNA, without having to necessary for regeneration, the quantities that are responsible for creating muscle. use stem cells”. are not large enough. Furthermore, these The CHUV has set out to study this, using Thomas Thum, director of the Institute cells are not naturally inclined to produce non-coding RNA: short segments of genetic of Molecular and Translational Therapeutic new cardiac muscle cells. information that do not produce proteins. Strategies in Hanover, Germany, also sees To get the heart to create new cells and “RNA are like switches for the genes, al- the interest in non-coding RNA therapy. hence restore cardiac function, regenera- lowing proteins to be produced at the right “What still needs to be resolved, however, tive medicine has for a long time placed time and in the right place, for example is increasing the efficacy and finding a its chips on cellular therapy providing the during stress or to differentiate stem cells”, way to administer active substances into solution through the use of injected stem says Pedrazzini. “There are different types patients’ hearts”.­ cells. But results in human and mouse ex- of RNA in every type of cell, making them periments have let them down, showing excellent therapeutic targets”. Caroline Ronzaud is a science writer based improvements in heart functioning but The researchers have identified the non- in Lausanne not any production of cardiac muscle – ex- coding RNA molecules that control the dif- cept in a recent study in primates with em- ferentiation of stem cells in cardiac muscle. bryonic stem cells. We also need to show They have since been able to stimulate the that this method does not lead to tumours, regeneration of an adult mouse heart fol- says Mauro Giacca, Director of the Interna- lowing a cardiac arrest. They were also able tional Centre for Genetic Engineering and to produce a culture of muscle cells using

36 Swiss National Science Foundation – Swiss Academies: Horizons No. 106 Biology and medicine

An organ system on a chip iver damage is one of the most fre- quent reasons for the failure of new Christoph Grüter Christoph U Patrick Meister Meister U Patrick drugs during the development stage. LIn order to recognise problems as early as possible, and to avoid unnecessary animal testing, a research group led by Oliver Frey at ETH Zurich’s Department of Biosystems Science and Engineering in Basel has developed a new cell-culture system in collaboration with the start-up company This limestone was excreted by bacteria. Insphero. It offers an intermediary step These marked ants have found their own way to between testing on cells and animals: a this food source. Ancient methane-makers miniature organ system that comprises spheres half a millimetre in size that Ants make a beeline hree and a half billion years ago, the are made of cells – such as liver cells or first-ever micro-organisms dwelled ­tumour cells, for example. nts are perfect examples of the in self-built, mat-like limestone These ‘spheroids’ replicate the func- social insect, and their behaviour Tstructures called stromatolites. They used tions of organs better than normal cell cul- is very complex. When faced with photosynthesis to produce the first oxy- tures can, because there is more intra-cel- theA choice between different sources of gen, and thereby created the basic prereq- lular contact than on the two dimensions food at equal distance from their nest, the uisites for higher forms of life on Earth. of the bottom of a petri dish. All manner of common black garden ant, Lasius niger, will Patrick Meister, a geologist at the Universi- tissue-type combinations can be used for choose the source of food that lies at the ty of Vienna, has now shown that the stro- these spheres. They are then placed in re- end of the simplest path. And it uses visual matolites at times also emitted methane, cesses on a chip developed by Frey’s team, landmarks to help it get there, as has been which is a potent greenhouse gas. which is linked to others like it by narrow shown by Christoph Grüter and his col- In order to gain insights into the very little channels. By slowly swivelling the leagues at the Department of Ecology and beginnings of life, Meister and his col- chip, the nutritive solution flows around Evolution of the University of Lausanne. leagues at ETH Zurich and the Univer- the different mini-organs and allows the They created two mazes with bifurcat- sity of Zurich have been investigating exchange of messenger materials and ing T-shaped paths. The first was the sim- carbon in the limestone of prehistoric metabolites. pler to memorise: worker ants had to turn stromatolites from Australia. Although This allows the team to test the anti- twice in the same direction (either twice photosynthesis primarily traps the lighter tumour effect of new substances that left or twice right). In the second maze, isotope carbon-12, the proportions of it only become active after they have been they were required to turn alternately (left in the stromatolites don’t correspond to metabolised by liver cells. “It’s the simplic- then right). Having tested both paths, the expectations. “There is a lot of the heavier ity of our system that makes it so beauti- ants tended to take the first. carbon-13 in the stromatolites. That’s ful”, explains Frey. The miniature scale of In a second experiment, the research- ­unusual”, says Meister. the chip saves material, it’s easy to use, ers laid out visual markers along another According to these researchers, the and in its present design it allows up to a maze, which was yet more difficult to micro-organisms that produced oxy- hundred experiments to be conducted in memorise. The worker ants preferred this gen, sugars and lime must have lived parallel. Angelika Jacobs to a labyrinth without the visual guides. in the stromatolites alongside a second “Thanks to the visual markers, they can bacterium, which ate the sugar, releas- K. Jin-Young et al.: 3D spherical micro­ move around more quickly and, when they ing carbon dioxide and methane. In the tissues and microfluidic technology for multi- take the wrong path, they correct their process, the lighter carbon was taken up tissue ­experiments and analysis. Journal of mistakes more quickly”, says Grüter. This into the methane, and the tiny residue of ­Biotechnology, 2015. shows us then that when it comes to find- the heavy carbon into the carbon dioxide, ing sources of food, ants don’t just follow which after further reactions precipitated the pheromone trails left by scout ants, as

as limestone. The researchers found con- Kim J.Y. was previously thought; they also use their firmation of their theory in a modern stro- visual memory. Elisabeth Gordon matolite from a lagoon in Brazil, where the microbes to this day produce both oxygen C. Grüter et al.: Collective decision making in a and methane. Atlant Bieri heterogeneous environment: Lasius niger colonies preferentially forage at easy to learn locations. D. Birgel et al.: Methanogenesis produces strong Animal Behaviour, 2015. 13C enrichment in stromatolites of Lagoa Salgada, Brazil: a modern analogue for Palaeo-/­­Neo­ proterozoic stromatolites? Geobiology, 2015.

The micro-tissues in these chambers are pro- vided with metabolites and messenger materials through the coloured channels.

Swiss National Science Foundation – Swiss Academies: Horizons No. 106 37 O the flat horizon by Ringed the outset. and thesubjectfascinated himright from tending lecturesinphysics onatrialbasis, mathematical approach”, at hebegan instead. missing“thestringent Butsoon theless, hedecidedtostudy architecture felt drawn to the natural sciences. Never climate research. so passionate exploration polar about and Fischerexplainshow­Hubertus hebecame Environmental Physics, the49-year-old in an office oftheDepartment of­ capped Alps inthedistance. Justnextdoor, By Daniela Kuhn the climate ofthefuture. predictionsabout for better using ancient ice. This allows to reconstructpastclimates braves arctictemperatures The physicist Fischer Hubertus 38 the climates of past centuries and measure pedition was touse icecorestoreconstruct world’s biggest island. The goal of theirex colleagues trekkedinto theinterior ofthe snow andtents, groomers heandseven far north. Equipped with snowmobiles, his proposal, because he’d always loved the thesis. tion andhisdoctoral his undergraduate both supervise disserta to doinGreenland”. Wagenbach went onto I mightand cook? have something for you versation, Wagenbach asked: “Can you ski Wagenbach. Hedid, andintheirfirstcon dents recommendedthat hego toDietmar his thesisinfinal year, hisfellow stu ics. When he was hunting foratopic tofinishoffhisdegreein Heidelberg phys then returned to Germany and switched to study fora year at theUniversity ofOregon, world”, says Fischer, laughing. Sohe went to toget outandtastethebig,I wanted wide “After my intermediate examinations, Environment and technology Fischer didn’t needtothinktwiceabout The climate lies embedded intheice When heleftschool, Fischeralready Swiss National ScienceFoundation –Swiss Academies: Horizons No. 106 naturally wanders to the snow- the University ofBern, your gaze ing, sitting in the main campus of n thisradiant morn summer’s

Climate & ------out any hint ofoutrage, and without any ­Fischer says allthisquiteobjectively, with on ourclimate systemtoday”. ­ and it’s already having a significant impact –inrecentriod centuries it’s risen by 150%. ties today than at any point inthat samepe methane isalsopresent inhigherquanti the past800,000 years. The greenhousegas of CO His results show that the concentration of landbio-mass. orfromthedecomposition from theocean of thegreenhousegas– whether itcomes content. revealsThis isotope thesource tration ofCO changesabout intheclimate, theconcen millilitres of air can offer up information samples extracted from the ice. Just a few urements air usingthe smallest possible was abletotakeultra-precise tobe meas eral kilometresinto theice. The challenge urements, heandhisteamhadtodrillsev the sourcesofthesegases. To get themeas allowedThese methods himtoquantify ny, thenlater alsoat theUniversity ofBern. Marine ResearchinBremerhaven, Germa the Alfred Wegener Institute forPolarand tigations ofgreenhousegasesinice, first at developed new for isotopic inves methods ice cores. Oncehe was backinEurope, he field,special namely investigating gasesin he familiarisedhimself with hiscurrent California on a postdoc. It was there that doctorate, hefirsttravelled to SanDiego in last arcticexpedition. After completinghis perience, says Fischer. Nor would his itbe the USA andEurope. Greenland caused by aerosolparticles from the state innorthern oftheairpollution Those weeks were anoverwhelming ex “This isallaresultofhumanactivity “This Experts with opinions 2 isgreater today for thanithasbeen 2 andthecarbon-13 isotope Hubertus Hubertus ------

Valérie Chételat “I never wanted to save the world”

hint of a call to arms. But when asked about accepted last year, Fischer launched an on- the political relevance of his research, he line petition demanding that “Switzerland says, “like all climate researchers, I have my must remain part of European science”, own personal stance and I’m aware of the emphasising that the exchange of knowl- drastic consequences of man-made climate edge and experts is imperative in today’s change. But I am also able to keep my pro- international scientific network. He got fessional role as a scientist separate from several thousand signatures, and gave the my role as a citizen”. The two roles don’t petition to the Federal Council and the Eu- contradict each other, because ­Hubertus ropean Parliament. There’s a pillar in Fis- Fischer’s research results are acting as a cher’s office that’s covered in nameplates stimulus to the societal debate that’s so listing different university towns, illustrat- necessary. “At the beginning of my profes- ing the success of his petition. On interna- sional career it wasn’t my desire to save the tional polar expeditions, the teams always world”, he says. “But as an expert you have set up just such a ‘tree’ of names, he says. to stand up and put the clear facts in front It’s been a long time now since Fischer of everyone”. And that’s what he’s doing. was himself in the far north. In 2019, as Ever since an incident where climate scep- part of the ‘Oldest ice project’, an ice core tics misused one of his findings in order to is due to be bored in the Antarctic that for draw illogical conclusions – namely that the first-ever time should cover theclimate ­ CO2 supposedly doesn’t have an impact on history of the past 1.5 million years. For the climate – he is entirely more careful this project, Fischer is planning to go back about his information superiority. into the field for three months – into those endless, flat, icy wastes that extend out to Flying ruins his CO2 footprint the horizon. “In such extreme situations, Fischer has been living in Bern for the past I can get away from the whole terror of seven years. His move to the University of emails and I become perfectly calm inside. Bern made sense twice over. He has long In that unending silence I become aware had contact with researchers there through of little things of beauty, such as the vari- drilling projects in the Alps and Greenland, ety of the glittering snow crystals or the and his partner of many years also lives in nuanced shadings that you see as the sky Bern with their two children. So getting a changes colour”.­ professorship in Bern was like “winning the jackpot”. He only needs ten minutes to Daniela Kuhn is a freelance journalist. get from his home to the office by bike. He doesn’t have a car, which he says is his con- tribution to the climate. But he regrets that his job means he often has to fly, as it ruins his own carbon footprint. He compensates Recognised ice core researcher for his many flights through the organisa- tion ­Myclimate, which invests the money Hubertus Fischer (49) is a Professor for Ex- in sustainable climate-protection projects. perimental Climate Physics at the University But the roles of scientist and citizen of Bern. He was recently awarded a prestig- aren’t always so easy to keep separate. ious ERC Advanced Grant by the European ­After the mass immigration initiative was Research Council, for the second time.

Swiss National Science Foundation – Swiss Academies: Horizons No. 106 39 Environment and technology

Playing the palm plantation game

Researchers at ETH Zurich want to use board games to help cultivate oil palm trees more sustainably. The goal is to find a balance between environmental impact and economic efficiency. By Atlant Bieri

he spread of oil palm plantations is one of the main reasons for the loss of rainforests in South Amer- ica, Africa and Asia. But a world Twithout palm oil is unthinkable. It is the most important lipid used in the food in- dustry and is also an ingredient of many creams and beauty products. Now an in- ternational team of researchers under the auspices of ETH Zurich hopes at the very To cultivate oil palms, huge areas of rainforest are cleared and ground- least to make the production of palm oil water reserves are overused. Photo: Jaboury Ghazoul more eco-friendly.­ In order to achieve this, they’re resort- ing to unusual means. They’re using board games in the regions affected to try and land. Each of the different interest groups In the past, such games have proven show farmers, landowners, companies and will be invited to several rounds of the their worth several times. In the 1990s in politicians just what consequences can game. Every participant will be given a Senegal, for example, farmers and irriga- arise if they don’t take care of their natu- playing piece along with money and land, tion planners decided on the course of ral resources. The project is called ‘Oil Palm and can cultivate the natural resources of an irrigation channel after using a board Adaptive Landscapes’ (OPAL, see ‘The sci- rainforest, water and biodiversity. game devised by the French research insti- ence of development cooperation’). It be- “Using such a game, we can run through tute CIRAD. gan in May this year and is expected to last processes in minutes that in real life take for six years. It is focussed on three coun- years”, says Ghazoul. The researchers will Atlant Bieri is a freelance science journalist. tries: Indonesia, Cameroon and Columbia. make a note of all the moves and their im- “Indonesia is the biggest palm oil produc- pact. They will then pass this information er in the world, but the plantations in the to the interest groups, along with the par- other two countries are also growing rap- ticipants’ own feedback. “Knowledge trans- idly today”, says the project head, Jaboury fer in these countries isn’t simple. A board Ghazoul, who is an ecologist at ETH Zurich. game is an ideal form of communication In the first phase of their project, the for it”, says Ghazoul. The science of development cooperation researchers measure the environmental The researchers also want to compare parameters of the rainforest: the loss of the mechanisms in the three countries – The ‘Oil Palm Adaptive Landscapes’ biodiversity, the availability of groundwa- Indonesia, Cameroon and Columbia – in project, OPAL, is one of the first Swiss ter and its carbon storage capacity. Using order to be able to recommend universal- programmes for research on global issues this data, the researchers enter their sec- ly valid measures for managing oil palm for ­development (the ‘r4d-Programm’). ond phase, designing a simple board game cultivation. The Director of the Palm Oil The Swiss Agency for Development and to reflect reality. Research Center at the Technical Univer- ­Cooperation (SDC) and the SNSF are to- sity of Malaysia, Sune Balle Hansen, thinks gether supporting research on food security, Interest groups around one table that the board game is a good idea: “If this public health, ecosystems, work and social On the board, the jungle stands next to the game includes people from the value chain, conflicts. Between 2012 and 2022, almost oil palm plantation. Both are traversed by then it could truly lead to a collaboration CHF 100 million will flow into transna- waterways and irrigation channels, and that might improve the sustainability of tional ­research projects with developing they are divided up into different plots of palm oil production”. ­countries. ff

40 Swiss National Science Foundation – Swiss Academies: Horizons No. 106 Environment and technology

Creating bespoke optoelectronic components team at the University of ­Stanford has developed software that ­automatically generates designs forA optoelectronic components. “This is an Basic Books, New York (2015) York New Books, Basic important step towards creating comput- & Jaime A. Rivera Bayer Peter

Hidalgo CA. Why Information Grows: Grows: Information CA.Why Hidalgo ers based on not only electrons but also photons”, says Konstantinos Lagoudakis, who, thanks to an SNSF grant, joined the University of Stanford having defended The Evolution of Order from Atoms to Economies. Economies. to Atoms from Order of The Evolution Models can estimate international trade. his thesis at EPFL. The idea of applying Buildings and tunnels warm up the groundwater. light and optoelectronics to computing Netflix predicts the economy aims to get around the disadvantages Groundwater as a heat reservoir of current microprocessors. Electricity s it possible to predict international is subject to both slow speeds and heat he warmth of cities increases the trade? Alexandre Vidmer of the Uni- dissipation, neither of which affects light temperature of groundwater by sev- versity of Fribourg is working on it particles. ­Photons are, however, difficult eral degrees. This has been proven Iusing digital models and complex systems to manipulate.­ Tby a study carried out by ETH Zurich, the theory. The physicist and his team have “Our method makes it easier to create Karlsruhe Institute for Technology and been delving into a United Nations data- optoelectronic devices”, he continues. The the University of Cambridge. Normally, base on the trade of 65 countries covering team, led by Jelena Vučković, has devel- groundwater has roughly the same tem- some 770 products for the years 1996 to oped a new algorithm ‒ using an inverted perature as the annual average tempera- 2000. “Our aim was to estimate trade in design ‒ to create a nanoscopic demulti- ture of the air – which at our latitude is 2001 using a variety of predictive models”, plexer from silicon. The device separates circa 10 degrees Celsius. But directly under he says. He did this without resorting to a single incoming light signal into several the centre of the German cities Karlsruhe economic models based on supply and outgoing signals, depending on the wave- and Cologne, the groundwater is five demand, instead using just data from the length of the light. degrees warmer.­ past. One of the new models was inspired “The demultiplexer is a passive ele- Geoscientists have now begun chart- by an algorithm developed by Vidmer ment. What we want to do next is to create ing underground water temperatures by for establishing recommendations from active components, such as transistors. making hundreds of different measure- the 9,000 films and series that are avail- For that, we must find a way of control- ments. They have found that it is primarily able in the Netflix catalogue. This new ling photons using light, the same way buildings and asphalt streets that heat up model, for example, accentuates already we use electricity to control an electric the groundwater – though district heating popular items.­ current moving through a traditional pipelines and tunnels also do their part. Of the trade in 2001, the model’s predic- transistor”. Such a device could serve as This phenomenon can also be observed tive success rate was 7-8% on average. This the basis for tomorrow’s optoelectronic in Zurich. The deeper the groundwater, is a modest score, but one which rises microprocessors.­ Pierre-Yves Frei the less it is heated up by the city infra- to 12%, “if we take a longer period into structure. But the heating effect is all the account”, says Vidmer. Although Didier A. Y. Piggott et al.: Inverse design and demon- greater, the further north the cities lie. In Sornette, a professor of entrepreneurial stration of a compact and broadband on-chip Moscow, for example, the groundwater risk at ETH Zurich, qualifies these re- ­wavelength demultiplexer. Nature Photonics, 2015. is nine degrees warmer than the air at sults as “reasonable”, she regrets that the the surface. study does not go into further detail, for These “urban, underground islands of example by identifying “specific find- warmth” offer great potential for geother- ings in terms of wealth, a key factor for mal energy. “In Karlsruhe, the warmth of economists and decision-makers”. This artificially enriched groundwater could may be an idea for further studies. ­Vidmer deliver a third of our heating needs every is now trying to apply these results to year”, says the hydrogeologist and study predicting the price of shares on the co-author Peter Bayer from ETH Zurich. stock market. ­­ Fabien ­ ­Goubet But this effect could also have negative consequences. “The increase in tempera- A. Vidmer et al.: Prediction in complex systems:

Alexander Piggott, Stanford University Stanford Piggott, Alexander ture puts a stress on the underground eco- The case of the international trade network. system”, says Christian Griebler, a ground- Physica A, 2015. water ecologist at the Helmholtz Centre By separating light, these components could in Munich. “It means more oxygen is used function as a new kind of computer. up, and many organisms can’t survive this”. Anne-Careen Stoltze

S. A. Benz et al.: Spatial resolution of anthropo- genic heat fluxes into urban aquifers. Science of the Total Environment, 2015.

Swiss National Science Foundation – Swiss Academies: Horizons No. 106 41 Fieldwork

In the bowels of the city

The sewers of Zurich provide us with important data about the drug consumption of its citizens. As part of her doctoral thesis, the No, there are no rats down there. environmental engineer They’d have nowhere to run because the pipes are knee-deep in water, right Ann-Kathrin McCall has up to the walls. And yes, it stinks, but been developing a method “you get used to it. Sometimes weird things that uses samples from our float past you – like dentures, for example. More often it’s toilet paper and faeces, but sewers to help us assess I just ignore all that. What matters is that trends in the use of cocaine the sewer is an incredibly exciting place! In scientific terms, of course. and ecstasy. “It’s very slippery down there. But noth- ing’s ever happened to me. I’ve only once landed on my behind. I’m well equipped with waders, a protective suit, a helmet and a facemask, and I’m secured by means of a wire cable that’s fixed above the man- hole cover. I also have a small device with me to warn me if carbon monoxide or hy- drogen sulphide fumes reach a level where they’re poisonous. What’s really exhaust- ing is that I’m 1.8 metres tall, but the sew- ers are often less than 1.5 metres from top to bottom. So I have to work bent over most of the time, and my back really hurts after collecting samples for half an hour. “The basis of my work, to put it crudely, is that every drug-user has to go to the toilet at some point. The residues and metabolic products of their amphetamines, ecstasy and cocaine enter the sewers through their urine. You only have to do a chemical anal- ysis of the wastewater to know what a city fungi and other microorganisms able to is flushing away. Theoretically, everything metabolise drugs and other substances. humans excrete can be measured – even “I go into the sewers mostly to take sam- alcohol, caffeine, pregnancy hormones and ples of this biofilm. Most of my actual work stress hormones. The sewer offers you a takes place in the laboratory at Eawag, the fingerprint of society. Swiss Federal Institute of Aquatic Science “The problem is that illegal drugs and and Technology. I’ve built a kind of artifi- their metabolites are altered by microor- cial sewer there that I can observe under ganisms and other chemical and physical controlled conditions, and where I can processes on their path from the toilet to measure what the biofilm does with stand- the sewage treatment plant. My research is ardised drug samples. about trying to find out exactly what hap- “All the countries in Europe are inter- pens. Then we would be able to offer a more ested in assessing trends in drug consump- reliable interpretation of the samples from tion. In 2014, our international work group the treatment plants. What’s especially presented its first large-scale study. We’d important in these transformation pro- measured the values of five different drugs cesses is the so-called biofilm that grows in the sewers of 42 European cities for one along the sewer walls, especially where the week at a time. The results showed, for ex- wastewater flows constantly. The biofilm ample, that Zurich has the third-biggest is about a centimetre thick, very slimy and consumption of cocaine after Antwerp slippery. It is home to the bacteria, algae, and Amsterdam. What was less surprising

42 Swiss National Science Foundation – Swiss Academies: Horizons No. 106 was that there’s an ecstasy peak in Zurich The researcher Ann-Kathrin McCall at weekends, or that we find rather exotic climbs into the Glattstollen sewer, drugs after the Street Parade. Wastewa- a 5.3 kilometre-long tunnel run- ter analysis has already improved when ning from the north of Zurich to the it comes to assessing trends in drug con- Werdhölzli sewage plant. Here she sumption. Above all, it offers quicker re- collects samples of wastewater (top) sults than anonymous surveys. and of biofilm (bottom). This lets her “That’s why, when I give a paper at a con- determine the drug consumption of ference, I often start with a joke. I ask eve- the people living in the city above ryone in the audience to put up their her. hand if they’ve used cocaine. Usually, Photos: Aldo Todaro © Eawag, Ann-Kathrin McCall no one responds. Then I say, “you see, that’s why we need my method”! ” Recorded by Christian Weber, science journalist at the Süddeutsche Zeitung

Swiss National Science Foundation – Swiss Academies: Horizons No. 106 43 Culture and society

Coming to Europe means huge ex- pense and risk to life, but they're not welcome when they get here. Photo: Massimo Sestini

Legal escape routes could prevent suffering

The EU and Switzerland would prefer to close their borders to the growing flood of refugees. Migration experts propose the exact opposite ‒ that we should open up the borders instead. By Pascale Hofmeier

44 Swiss National Science Foundation – Swiss Academies: Horizons No. 106 ­stringent border controls would indeed lead to more immigrants. The dangers of rejection If we look at things from a historical per- spective, we see that national borders re- mained open for a relatively long time. “Until the early 20th century, the whole world recognised the free right of resi- dence”, says Achermann. One of the first countries to restrict that right was the USA, which began to control access to its land in 1875. From 1917 onwards, this also applied to economic migrants coming by boat from Asia, and later also from Europe. “These immigration controls were the beginning of the refugee problem”, says Achermann. Now the state was faced with the tasks of registering arrivals and of finding ways to accommodate them.

“No one knows whether more refugees would come if we opened the borders” Alberto Achermann

After the USA, it was Europe that adopt- ed the principle of immigration control. In Switzerland, for example, free immigra- tion ended with the First World War. But selective immigration criteria were only introduced in 1931 with the Federal Law on Temporary and Permanent Residence, which was intended to protect the country from being ‘overwhelmed’ by foreigners. Whoever sought asylum in Switzerland on grounds of belonging to a specific race was now simply turned away. This practice was widespread in Europe and, as we know, it had devastating conse- n 2015 the EU expects to have to cope on the assumption that yet more refugees quences after the Nazis assumed power in with a total of 900,000 refugees from would arrive if the borders were open. “But Germany. “At the Evian Conference of 1938, war zones and crisis areas. That’s 50% no one knows if that is true or not”, says which was supposed to settle the matter more than last year. The boat people Achermann. There is evidence that emigra- of Jewish emigrants, no country showed Iwho try to cross over to Italy, Greece and tion increases from certain countries when any desire to accept them”, says Acher- Malta in flimsy boats have been a main freedom of movement is instituted, but mann. And when the Nazi machinery of source of headlines. Because they don’t that the opposite is the case in other coun- extermination was set into motion, all want to stay in those countries, they try tries. “It’s rarely the legal situation that countries – including Switzerland – turned to move elsewhere without registering in determines the flow of refugees. It’s eco- away Jews at their borders, sending them their country of arrival. nomics”. This suggests that border controls back to certain death instead. “It was the This increasing flood of asylum seekers are not an effective instrument, because Second World War that created an aware- and economic refugees has made the idea such controls can often be circumvented in ness that refugees need rights”, says Acher- of closing Europe’s borders increasingly some way or other. mann. These rights are governed today by popular. “The EU’s main problem is that its For example, there has been an investi- a multitude of national and international member countries only agree on a common gation into the impact of increased ­border laws and conventions. The Geneva Con- policy when it’s about trying to strengthen security between Mexico and the USA. The vention on Refugees of 1951 states a core their outer borders”, says Alberto Acher- results suggest that this doesn’t lead to principle: that of ‘non-refoulement’. This mann, professor of migration law at the less immigration, but to less return mi- principle of non-rejection forbids a coun- University of Bern. This means it’s only by gration, because it’s become more difficult try from sending­ people back to where they taking illegal, highly dangerous routes that for people to get back home again across are threatened by torture or by other grave asylum seekers can actually get to Europe the border.­ Achermann says that studies ­violations of human rights. and apply for asylum. into the public administration of western How a country deals with asylum seek- Concentrating on securing our borders European countries have actually come to ers is a domestic issue that’s dealt with is done for reasons of state and is based a different conclusion, namely that less very differently across Europe. The EU has

Swiss National Science Foundation – Swiss Academies: Horizons No. 106 45 Culture and society

agreed on basic principles and on ­various instruments for a ‘Common European Asylum System’. But those principles are applied only sporadically, and often not at all. So it’s actually impossible speak of any ‘common’ European asylum policy today. Instead, countries are busy haggling about an allocation formula according to which the boat people could be distributed among all the countries of the ­European Union. The same approach, again and again Achermann is convinced that this isn’t a proper attempt at a solution. “People don’t function according to the way technocrats think”. Overall, it is striking that it’s the same solutions that are propagated, again and again. These include closed borders, camps in transit countries and protected zones in the countries of origin. The fact that these ideas are problematical is prov- en once again by history, as in the case of Western Sahara. In the border area be- tween Algeria, Morocco and Mauretania, People-smugglers will always find new ways to get across borders. some 200,000 refugees have been waiting Photo: Keystone/AP Photo/Emilio Morenatti for a solution for 30 years. Meanwhile, a third generation of refugees is growing up in the camps. “And since the war in Bosnia, we all know what can happen in protected zones”, says Achermann, referring to the massacre of Srebrenica.

“People would wait for their legal opportunity to come, instead of spending immense people every year to be allowed to come to amounts of money on a very Europe. “I’m convinced that people would Europe: a childhood dream risky endeavour” wait for their legal opportunity to come, instead of spending immense amounts of What are the reasons and the expectations François Crépeau money on a very risky, illegal endeavour”, that drive asylum seekers to risk their lives? said Crépeau recently when he visited Bern David Loher, a PhD student at the University to give a lecture. And he also pointed out of Bern, has investigated this in the project François Crépeau has a different solu- that people smugglers will always be one ‘How does border occur?’. His research tion. He is the Special Rapporteur on the step ahead of border ­authorities. focusses on the question of how migrants Human Rights of Migrants to the UN, and This conviction is shared by Acher- and state authorities deal with borders. the incumbent of the Hans and Tamar Op- mann. He points to the refugee catastrophe “Borders are constantly being created anew, penheimer Chair in Public International that helped coin the phrase ‘boat people’ subverted and reformulated by those on all Law at the Faculty of Law of McGill Univer- in the first place. At the end of the war in sides”, says Loher. sity. He proposes applying the completely Vietnam in 1975, 2.5 million people tried He has been examining the biographies free movement of persons to migrants. to flee from the communist regime there, of Tunisian asylum seekers who came to Whoever registers voluntarily in a country using rickety boats to try and get to Laos, Switzerland shortly after the fall of the dicta- on arrival should be able to travel on af- Cambodia or China. Some 200,000 people tor Ben Ali. The ‘harraga’ – their clandes- terwards into his or her country of choice. died in the process. In the late 1970s, the tine journey across the Mediterranean – is “Whoever has personal reasons to go to USA established the Orderly Departure Pro- an important collective topic among the Sweden won’t stay in Estonia”, says Cré- gram, which offered people an opportunity Tunisian youth, says Loher. “In contrast to peau. He is thus proposing the exact oppo- to emigrate through legal channels. More refugees from failed states such as Eritrea, site of the current situation, in which rigor- than 600,000 people were allowed to leave or crisis zones such as Syria and Iraq, young ous border controls have essentially turned as a result. “This would be a good approach Tunisians fled from high youth unemploy- the Schengen Agreement into waste paper. for Europe – only it’s politically unpopular, ment, an authoritarian regime and rigid fam- and there isn’t a single country that would ily structures”. In most cases, however, the Creating legal channels support it”, says Achermann. harraga remained imaginary. It was different And instead of continuing to invest huge during the turmoil of the revolution when sums into securing borders, Crépeau pro- Pascale Hofmeier is a science editor at the SNSF. the state security apparatus was weakened: poses controlled mobility and controlled mi- tens of thousands seized the opportunity to gration channels. For example, he suggests­ Movements, Journal for Critical Migration and get out. But in many cases – some voluntary, that teams should go to the migrants’ home Border Studies. others involuntary – this only ended in a countries and choose a ­certain number of return journey home.

46 Swiss National Science Foundation – Swiss Academies: Horizons No. 106 The terrorist who became a victim

Forty years ago, the Italian- German terrorist Petra Krause was arrested in Switzerland. She went on a hunger strike to protest against her solitary confinement, and this caused a major storm in the media. By Urs Hafner

he 1970s were the era of left-wing When she was extradited to Italy, Petra Krause looked more like an anorexic model than a terrorism in western Europe. confirmed terrorist.Photo: Keystone/AP Photo/Gianni Foggia Armed groups carried out a struggle against capitalism. The goals of the TRed Army Faction (RAF) and the Red Bri- gender aspect of the Krause case as the key ­concept of ‘terrorism’ in the form of a wom- gade were world revolution and the estab- to it all. On the one side there was a woman an’s emaciated body, the general public was lishment of a ‘just’ society. Anti-fascist rev- who was becoming increasingly frail and unsettled, because this seemed to blur the olutionaries were active in Switzerland too. who only weighed 35 kilos at the end of her conventional demarcation between the le- In 1975 the police arrested the ‘Petra Krause third hunger strike, which lasted from 19 gitimate force of the state and the illegiti- Group’. Petra Krause was a young anarchist June to 16 July 1976. Krause had survived mate force of terrorists. The figure of Petra of dual Italian and German nationality. Af- Auschwitz as a child, and when she became Krause was transformed from a capricious ter taking part in an arson attack in Italy, an adult she had resorted to using violent, culprit into a vulnerable victim, while the she had fled to Switzerland. Here, she had implicitly ‘male’ means to attack the state. notion of a sovereign state that protects its linked up with Zurich-based anarchists On the other side was the Swiss state, es- citizens from terrorists was increasingly and continued her struggle, stealing weap- sentially a centuries-old male club that de- replaced by the image of an impotent state ons from Swiss Army depots to pass on to manded obedience from all its members, that injures those ­entrusted to it. like-minded comrades in southern Europe. and that had only deigned to offer political Did Krause’s hunger strike have any real Krause spent nearly three years in soli- rights to its female population five years impact? Hardly, says Grisard. Several ques- tary confinement before being extradited earlier, in 1971. tions were asked in parliament about pris- to Rome in 1977. She went on hunger strike Krause was supported by feminist and on conditions, but no laws were changed. three times in Switzerland to try and left-wing groups, and Grisard believes that All the same, Krause achieved a certain im- achieve the following demands: the aboli- she came to be seen as a threat to the bi- provement in the conditions of her impris- tion of solitary confinement for all those nary order of the genders. With her body – onment. Before her protests, she had been in detention while awaiting trial, permis- a woman’s body, emaciated by prison and harassed in prison, apparently even being sion to get exercise in the prison yard for hunger – she made visible the repressed denied tampons by the guards when she one hour every day and the right to choose vulnerability of the male citizen and his asked for them. But her actions brought one’s own doctor. These hunger strikes dependence on the state. about no changes in the practice of solitary proved a major source of controversy in confinement. the Swiss media. Just how this controversy Shifting perceptions came about is something that the histori- This shift in perceptions is striking, says Urs Hafner is a historian and a science journalist. an Dominique Grisard from the Center for Grisard. First Krause was a terrorist, some- Gender Studies of the University of Basel one depicted as an irrational perpetra- D. Grisard: The spectacle of the hunger-stricken has been investigating. tor who was using her body as a weapon. body: a German-Italian terrorist, Swiss prisons and But then she became stylised as a fragile the (ir)rational body politic. European Review of A woman on the offensive ­victim. “The left-wing press saw her body History, 2015. Grisard’s doctoral thesis, published in 2011, as a victim of state oppression, while the dealt with ‘The gender ­history of left-wing right-wing press saw it as a means of black- terrorism in Switzerland’, and she sees the mail”, says Grisard. When confronted by the

Swiss National Science Foundation – Swiss Academies: Horizons No. 106 47 Culture and society

Tracing places Giving the boot osshäusern is a district in the he ‘people’s shoe’, produced in a uni- municipality of Mühleberg near form design by state decree, is the Bern. But where does its name come Chételat Valérie kind of thing one might associate Rfrom? ‘Ross’ means ‘horse’, while ‘Häuser’ Twith the command economy of the Soviet means ‘houses’ – so it sounds like the place Union, not with capitalist Switzerland. should at some point have had something And yet, during the First World War, the to do with? stables.RAF But in fact its name is Swiss Federal Council used its plenipoten- derived from a certain Rudolf who lived tiary powers to have shoes produced for there long ago. The earliest proof of this the broad population, as explained by Ro- dates back to 1261, when Rosshäusern was man Wild of the Research Centre for Social a little hamlet that our ancestors called ‘de Role models and our social environment deter- and Economic History at the University of Rodolfhüsern’ (‘Rudolf’s houses’). Over the mine who drives quietly. Zurich in his as yet unpublished doctoral ensuing centuries, the dialectal abbrevia- dissertation. The Volksschuh-Zentrale AG tion ‘Ross-’ established itself. This example Campaigning for quiet (‘People’s Shoe Headquarters Ltd’) drew is one of many in the latest volume of the on nearly 25 shoe factories to manufac- Ortsnamenbuch des Kantons Bern – the hat could prompt motorists to ture three series of uniform leather shoes Book of place names of the canton of Bern drive quietly? This has never be- for men, women and children: 100,000 of – which has been prepared by the research fore been properly investigated each model, plus 20,000 wooden shoes. unit in onomastics at the Institute for byW scientists. But many people suffer from All of them were to be sold at ‘people’s German Studies at the University of Bern. noise pollution, and driving more quietly prices’ – in other words, cheaper than the The unit is supported by the SNSF, and it could help to reduce the negative effects of other shoes on the market. has been documenting and interpreting noise on our health and wellbeing. The reason for this state intervention- names in the German-speaking part of the First of all, a moral sense of obligation ism was the massive rise in prices dur- canton of Bern since the 1940s. The staff can increase our willingness to drive less ing the war – rent, coal and clothes all of the unit investigate the origins of the noisily or buy less noisy tyres. This is a became far more expensive. Thousands names of places, mountains, valleys, rivers conclusion drawn by Elisabeth Lauper suffered as a result, and even the more and forests. “In the process, we evaluate all from a survey of more than 1,000 German- right-wing newspapers complained about the sources that we can find”, says Thomas speaking Swiss drivers, both men and ‘extortionists’ and ‘war profiteers’. The Franz ­Schneider, the head of the unit. women. She carried out this survey in the Federal ­Council saw itself compelled to The unit’s researchers are interested in course of her doctoral research that was act. It began with shoes because these had the structure of naming. Besides people co-funded by the SNSF with monies from a great symbolic value. In many German and ownership issues, it is often the condi- Marie Heim Vögtlin grant. Lauper comple- cities, people were protesting against the tions of the ground and the types of ter- mented her data with the noise pollution misery of the war by marching through rain that are at the origins of names. The figures compiled by the Swiss Federal the streets as well-dressed as possible, names also testify to the cultivation of the ­Office for the Environment. but with bare feet. The ‘shoe policy’ of the land, as in ‘Sang/Gsang’, which is derived Of course, some drivers get angry about Federal Council was intended to be a vis- from the process of scorching and burn- traffic noise themselves when they’re ible act to help the poverty-stricken and to ing in order to clear the land. “The people sitting at home, but perhaps surpris- combat the profiteers in the shoe industry. made the world their own by naming it”, ingly, this doesn’t translate into different But the plan didn’t work. The shoes says Erich Blatter, who has worked at the behaviour when they’re back behind the were somewhat crudely manufactured research unit for many years. If you look wheel. Similarly, the amount of noise pol- and were supposed to have been sold in into names, he says, you gain insights into lution they experience where they live has 3,000 shops. But only 900 participated, the settlement history and the economic little impact on their driving. The sense of and the ‘people’s shoes’ were left on the history of a region. The unit has already personal obligation to drive differently is shelves, looked down upon as a poor meticulously researched tens of thousands influenced only in part by an awareness of man’s shoe that hardly anyone wanted to of Bernese names, in alphabetical order. the problem of noise, but most of all by a be seen in. In the end, they were all sold The new volume of the set covers the sense of respect for the environment. off at a loss.Urs Hafner ­letters Q to S. Susanne Wenger So how could a campaign convince drivers not to rev their engines? Lauper is R. Wild: Volksschuhe und Volkspreisen. Zur Be- Ortsnamenbuch des Kantons Bern, volumes 1–4 researching into this at the Institute for wirtschaftung lederner und textiler Bedarfsartikel (already published); volume 5 will be published Psychology and at the Centre for Develop- im Ersten Weltkrieg in der Schweiz. Schweizer- in autumn 2015 by A. Francke Verlag, Basel and ment and Environment at the University ische Zeitschrift für Geschichte, 2013. Tübingen. www.germanistik.unibe.ch/namenkunde.­ of Bern, and she recommends focussing more on the environment and less on the suffering that noise creates. Another

relevant psychological factor is the social Anwendung norms of those questioned. For example, drivers are more willing to drive quietly if Susanne Wenger Susanne others in their social environment commit to reducing traffic noise. Combating noise pollution can thus be promoted via social

processes – for example, if prominent 11. 44 (1918), No. in: Nebelspalter celebrities were to issue a call to reduce

noise levels. Anna-Katharina Ehlert Der Boscovits, J. F. Zürich, Zentralbibliothek Bundes schuh und seine praktische ­ seine praktische und schuh Bundes E. Lauper et al.: Explaining Car Drivers’ Intention The Nebelspalter magazine suggested a less This place has nothing to do with horses to Prevent Road-Traffic Noise: An Application of complimentary use for the ‘people’s shoe’. (‘Rosse’) – it’s named after a man. the Norm Activation Model. Environment and Behavior, 2015.

48 Swiss National Science Foundation – Swiss Academies: Horizons No. 106 How does it work? Clean toilets for slums

The Blue Diversion Toilet developed by Eawag may resolve the problem of inadequate sanitation in developing countries. By Daniel Saraga, Infographic: Ikonaut

1. The problem More than 2.5 billion people go to the toilet in either the open air or unsanitary toilets. The lack of proper sanitation facilities leads to polluted waterways and cases of severe diarrhoea, which kills 1.8 million people annually.

4.8 bn 2.5 bn 2. The project 66% 34% The water research institute Eawag near Zurich has been de- veloping the Blue Diversion Toi- let since 2011, thanks to a contri- bution of USD 4.5 million for the “Reinvent the Toilet ­Challenge” by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. In March 2015 the toilet was nominated as one of the Designs of the Year 2015 by the London Design Museum.

3. An automatic toilet The Blue Diversion Toilet works without access to water, sewer or electricity networks. Urine and faeces are separated and stored in containers to be recycled later. Water used for washing hands and 4. The economic model for flushing the toilet is recovered, Waste is collected twice a week and taken sterilised on-site and then reused. to a processing plant. The urine under- Disinfection is done through an goes nitrification and is transformed into ultra-filtration technique devel- concentrated ammonium nitrate, a com- oped at Eawag and powered by a mon agricultural fertiliser. Faeces are par- small 60 W solar panel. tially burnt, formed into bricks and used as heating fuel. The trade of these two products constitutes a viable economic model for the owner of the toilet. And with the cost of using the toilet at around five cents, it is acceptable for local popula- tions. Autarky, a new project at Eawag, aims to introduce on-site transformation of the waste into tradable products, par- ticularly by stabilising urine using lime.

Swiss National Science Foundation – Swiss Academies: Horizons No. 106 49 AusAccess erster all areasHand

23 September 2015 The young, who else? Advanced Researchers’ Day By Martin Vetterli The SNSF offers information on funding possibilities to researchers from all over Ignorance is a very important driver of Unfortunately, however, academia does Switzerland research. It is said that the 12-year-old not seem to have enough space for young SNSF, Bern Albert Einstein asked his mother what he researchers today. The magazine Nature would see if he travelled at the speed of showed recently that retirement-age in- light holding a mirror in front of him. And vestigators of the US National Institutes of 11 to 14 October 2015 in the early 17th century, Pierre de Fermat Health have outnumbered those under 36 World Resources Forum 2015 asked himself if the equation a2 + b2 = c2 for a few years now – and the trend is get- would have integer solutions for powers ting worse. Furthermore, the average age Conference for a sustainable economy greater than two. More recently Michel at which a young life scientist in the US re- through technology and education Mayor from the University of Geneva ceives his or her first independent grant – Congress Centre, Davos decided to build an not even a professorship – has ­increased instrument to find from 36 in 1980 to 42 today. out if there were In Switzerland, the trend points in a 15 to 17 October 2015 Nik Hunger Nik planets outside our similar direction. While in the 19th cen- Future Economic Systems solar system, think- tury, the average age of becoming a (full!) ing he might not see professor at the ETH Zurich’s Chemistry 14th Dialogue on Science them in his lifetime – department was around 35 years, today Academia Engelberg reality contradicted scientists can consider themselves lucky Engelberg Monastery him in 1995. if they manage to get some independence Thus, many at that age. It has thus become very dif- relevant questions ficult for young scientists to realise their until 19 November 2015 in science are the own ideas and to achieve an independ- Stem cells – the origin of life result of a naïve and ent academic career. Many bright young sometimes slightly minds are therefore leaving academia and Touring exhibition of the National ignorant mind-set. looking for opportunities elsewhere. Research Programme 63 But when combined This is a very delicate situation. Because Natur-Museum, Lucerne with intelligence, losing these minds also means losing the curiosity, creativity and a bit of luck, these very engine for ignorant innovation and ignorant questions can generate new discovery. Or, to put it in the words of Syd- until 31 January 2016 knowledge, new artefacts and eventually ney Brenner, a Nobel Laureate in medicine, The crocodile in the tree new tools to benefit society at large. “I strongly believe that the only way to From the science funding point of encourage innovation is to give it to the Exhibition about evolution and biodiversity view, the question that obviously arises is, young. The young have a great advantage Zoological Museum, University of Zurich where can one find this innocent scien- in that they are ignorant. Because I think tific ignorance in today’s science? The ignorance in science is very important. If answer is – and probably always has been – you are like me and you know too much, until 19 June 2016 in young researchers, as is nicely illus- you cannot try new things.” Faces of violence trated by the example of Albert Einstein. In fact, we know scientists are often most Martin Vetterli is President of the National Exhibition about the many forms productive at a young age. And it is thus ­Research Council and a computer scientist of violence the young that generate breakthroughs by at EPFL. Musée de la Main, Lausanne asking bizarre questions and coming up with strange new theories.

Letters to the Editor Corrigenda The solutions to the puzzle

Caution, please In the article ‘The fear of a divided mother’ in Ho- Here are the names of the people featured on I always read Horizons with great interest, and rizons 105 (June 2015, p. 34), the incorrect impres- page 11 of the last issue of Horizons. find the quality of articles very good. I was all the sion was given that Barbara Bleisch, an ethicist more unpleasantly surprised then by the phrase at the University of Zurich, adopts a utilitarian 1st row: L. A. Thurston, N. Copernicus, ‘Slow reading is out’ in the lead text for the arti- position. However, she is in fact arguing from a ­Catherine II., F. Chopin, J.R. Hawley 2nd row: cle ‘200 years of world literature’ (Horizons 105, deontological background. Furthermore, she does W. C. Röntgen, Jeanne d’Arc, J. Kepler, C. Darwin,­ p. 17). In order to get to know the literature and not regard bans as ‘problematic’, as we wrote, but R. Sanzio 3rd row: Voltaire, C. Magno,­ Vasco to be able to assess it, ‘slow’ reading remains ‘in need of justification’ in a liberal society. da Gama, J. Watt, P. ­Stuyvesant 4th row: indispensable. Data processing is helpful only J. W. von Goethe, J. M. Good, C. ­Monet, when researching into specific topics; then W. ­Shakespeare, I. Newton 5th row: indeed it opens up new possibilities. So please C. ­Columbus, B. Franklin, G.W. Leibniz, K. Marx, be careful with sensational phrases! J. P. Parker 6th row: F. Nietzsche, A. G. Bell, T. Hobbes, R. Descartes, J. Verne 7th row: Martin Steinmann, Binningen Rembrandt van Rijn, M. Luther, G. Washington, J. ­Winthrop, W. T. Kelvin

50 Swiss National Science Foundation – Swiss Academies: Horizons No. 106 Inside the SNSF and SA

Back to the top Better representation

for life sciences Horizons The postdocs Anna Nele Meckler and The Swiss magazine for scientific research Armelle Corpet are being awarded the Three societies for experimental biology is published quarterly in German, French and Marie Heim-Vögtlin Prize in Bern on 23 joined up to form Life Sciences Swit- English. Volume 27, No. 106, September 2015. September 2015 on account of their bril- zerland (LS2) in June 2015. Besides now www.snf.ch/horizonte liant return to research after each taking ­having greater political clout, LS2 is also a break to start a family. Meckler used to being awarded the Friedrich Miescher Publisher Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF) be a paleo-oceanographer at ETH Zurich, Prize. Their next annual meeting takes Jürg Dinner, Communication Department investigating past climates by means place in Lausanne in February 2016. Wildhainweg 3 of sedimentary limestone. Today she is Postfach 8232 CH-3001 Bern building up a new research group at the Tel. 031 308 22 22 University of Bergen (Norway). Corpet Health literacy in Switzerland [email protected] used to be a cancer researcher at the Zu- Swiss Academies of Arts and Sciences rich University Hospital and is studying Many people find it difficult to orient Haus der Akademien the impact of the herpes virus on genetic themselves in the health system, to Laupenstrasse 7 structure. She is now an assistant profes- understand their doctor or to grasp the PO Box CH-3001 Bern sor at the ­University of Lyon 1 (France). ­symptoms of their disease. The Swiss Tel. 031 306 92 20 Academies would like to combat this lack [email protected] of ‘health literacy’ with their roadmap Editors ‘A sustainable healthcare system for Daniel Saraga (dsa), Chief Editor Switzerland’. As one of their measures, the Florian Fisch (ff) Academies decided in September 2015 to Pascale Hofmeier (hpa) Mirko Bischofberger (mb) publish a report entitled ‘Health literacy Marcel Falk (mf) in Switzerland’. For the first time ever, it Valentin Amrhein (va) will sum up the state of health literacy in Switzerland and assess its perspectives. Graphic design, photography

SNSF: H. Lütcherath/A. Guillemaud H. Lütcherath/A. SNSF: 2. stock süd netthoevel & gaberthüel, Valérie Chételat Illustration: Gregory Gilbert-Lodge

Screenshot Translation and proofreading More flexible project funding Max Crisp, Chris Walton, Interpreters’ and Translators’ Association, Zurich

The SNSF is reforming its policy as of Printer and lithographer ­autumn 2016: the maximum possible Stämpfli AG, Bern and Zurich length of its projects will be increased Climate neutral, myclimate.org Paper: Refutura FSC, Recycling, matt from three to four years, while the funds Typography: FF Meta, Greta Text Std provided may be utilised more flexibly. Researchers should in future concen- Distribution 39,000 copies in German, trate where possible on one project only. 16,100 copies in French. With these innovations, the SNSF aims Focus on science culture to promote the diversity of research. © All rights reserved. Please obtain the approval of the Editor prior The ­Sinergia programme is also being Education and furthering young talent, a to reproducing any part of this publication. repositioned. In future it will give grants sustainable use of limited natural resourc- ISSN 1663 2710 for collaborative and interdisciplinary es, and campaigning for a sustainable, Subscription is free. Distribution of the paper research that has the potential to make effective, affordable health care system: version is usually restricted to Switzerland and breakthrough findings. these are focus areas in the multi-year foreign organisations. planning of the Swiss Academies. The new The opinions in the articles are those of their focus ‘Science culture’ intends to tackle the authors and do not necessarily reflect those Three new research following problems: poor quality research of the SNSF and/or SA. Research presented is programmes articles; the precarious situation of young generally supported by the SNSF. academics and of the work-life balance in The SNSF In June 2015, the Federal Council approved academia; the low proportion of women in The SNSF is the principal body for the promo- three new National Research Programmes academic leadership positions; and false tion of scientific research in Switzerland. It is mandated by the Confederation to promote (NRPs). NRP 72, ‘Antimicrobial resist- incentives resulting from today’s forms of basic research in all fields and disciplines and ance’, will develop strategies against the research evaluation. each year distributes some 755 million Swiss ­increasing resistance to antibiotics in francs amongst more than 3,500 projects hospitals and livestock farming. NRP 73, involving about 8,750 scholars. ‘Big Data’, will investigate the technologi- The Swiss Academies cal and societal questions raised by the Also mandated by the Confederation, the Swiss Academies of Arts and Sciences are committed increasingly huge amounts of data we to an open dialogue between science and produce. NRP 74, ‘Smarter Health Care’, is society. They are on the side of science, each dedicated to finding improvements in the specialising in a respective domain, yet also acting in an inter-disciplinary way. Being Swiss healthcare system. The first studies anchored to the scientific community rewards are due to begin in autumn 2016 and will them with access to the expertise of around last four to five years. 100,000 researchers.

Swiss National Science Foundation – Swiss Academies: Horizons No. 106 51 “There’s a shift taking place away from facts and towards opinions” Michael Hermann page 25

“The males perform their task less well, not because they’re less intelligent than the females, but because they’re less motivated” Judith Burkart page 35

“I am able to keep my professional role as a scientist separate from my role as a citizen” Hubertus Fischer page 38