Prix Schläfli 2024 award for the four best dissertations in natural sciences

Gilles Antoniazza listens to the mountain riverbeds

Prix Schläfli Geosciences 2024: Flooding events in Alpine rivers can cause major damage. Gilles Antoniazza's doctoral thesis at the University of Lausanne provides new approaches towards a better understanding of bed load transport.

Gabriel Jorgewich-Cohen gives turtles a voice – and revolutionises evolutionary biology

Prix Schläfli 2024 Biology: For a long time, turtles were regarded as largely voiceless creatures. In his dissertation at the University of Zurich, Gabriel Jorgewich-Cohen has shown that they definitely do communicate acoustically – and his discovery is revolutionising evolutionary biology. He has been awarded the Prix Schläfli Biology for his work.

Jonathan Gruber splits high-dimensional objects

Prix Schläfli Mathematics 2024: Jonathan Gruber's dissertation at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne (EPFL) has even pushed his supervisor to the limits of her expertise: he breaks multi-dimensional objects down into coordinates, thus earning him the highest acclaim from the mathematical world.

Julia Reisenbauer is speeding up the search for medicines

Prix Schläfli 2024 Chemistry: Even as a child, she wanted to become a scientist. And now, Julia Reisenbauer has been honoured with the Prix Schläfli Chemistry for her dissertation at ETH, the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich, on "skeletal editing". This involves targeted rebuilding of molecules so they can perform specific functions.