A WORD FROM THE DEAN — HIGHLIGHTS — EDUCATION — RESEARCH — INNOVATION — OUTREACH PROGRAMS — FACTS & FIGURES
A WORD FROM THE DEAN
It is with great pleasure that I present to you the 2023 annual report for the School of Engineering (STI) at EPFL.
Committed to upholding academic excellence and fostering leadership in engineering education, research, and innovation, we are delighted to showcase our progress over the past year. Through strategic faculty hires and the enhancement of our research and educational programs, our institutes have continued to make significant strides.
The influx of undergraduate and graduate students in engineering has shown solid expansion, reflecting the attractiveness of our engineering disciplines. Notably, our student body has expanded significantly, showcasing a strong increase in numbers. This growth underscores our commitment to providing top-tier training in areas ranging from electronics to robotics and AI, vital to Switzerland’s industrial and entrepreneurial landscape.
Dedicated to fostering diversity and gender equality, we are proud to report a substantial increase in female faculty members and students. The rise of female researchers among our faculty and student cohorts reflects our commitment to inclusivity and adaptability in today’s world.
In pursuit of staying at the forefront of innovation, we have identified five key themes that guide our endeavors: life and health sciences, AI and intelligent systems, sustainability and energy science, digital transformation, and fundamental research. These themes form the core of our commitment to addressing contemporary challenges and driving progress in engineering and technology.
Furthermore, our dedication to innovation is evidenced by the incorporation of seven start-ups, 22 license and transfer agreements, and the granting of 36 patents. These achievements underscore our role as a strong partner in industry, facilitating the translation of research into real-world applications.
Our commitment to fostering connections between academia and industry is exemplified by our strong events aimed at facilitating potential industrial collaborations. The launch of the Research Day, an internal event designed to connect and promote the work from our different institutes, has been met with great success. Additionally, the Industry Day, an event for both internal and external partners, has facilitated strong links to the industrial world. It serves as a platform to showcase how research translates into real-world applications and to foster strong connections, furthering our mission of bridging the gap between academia and industry.
The commitment and dedication of our faculty, students, and staff are reflected not only in our ongoing efforts but also in the prestigious and prominent places consistently claimed by our school and institutes.
I invite you to delve deeper into our research and ongoing initiatives as you explore this report.
Ali H. Sayed, Dean of the School of Engineering
HIGHLIGHTS 2023
EDUCATION
“Training the next generation of engineers at EPFL and within the School of Engineering is foremost about imparting fundamental theoretical and practical knowledge. Additionally, it is also about fostering a mindset primed for the complexities awaiting them post-Bachelor’s, Master’s, or PhD studies, by emphasizing the necessity to work successfully in teams engaged in multidiscplinary projects. Our commitment goes beyond academic excellence; it aims at nurturing individuals’ learning skills, necessary for engineers to cope with the need for continual learning throughout their career. Finally and most importantly, we encourage our engineers to embrace their professional and societal future responsibilities, through a curriculum encompassing courses on data security and privacy, industry standards, environmental awareness and ethics.”
Aude Billard, Associate Dean for Education
Articles
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Members of the public enjoyed more than 20 engaging and educational activities on a wide variety of engineering topics, animated by researchers from the School of Engineering, at the 2023 edition of the EPFL Open Days on April 29 and 30.
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STUDENT PROJECT – For his Master’s project at EPFL, Mickaël Achkar compiled data on the movements of dogs to develop a robotic version of the animal that, once set in motion, can run without assistance or motors.
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Teaching is part of her job, but Vasiliki Tileli doesn’t view herself as a full-time teacher. That didn’t stop her from completely revamping her lectures in response to negative student feedback – and winning the 2022 best teacher award for the materials science and engineering section.
Key Figures
Number of Students
RESEARCH
“Within the School of Engineering, over 100 laboratories and research groups embark on a collective mission: to unravel the mysteries of our world and enhance its fabric. Spanning diverse realms of science and engineering, these endeavors yield tangible outcomes that resonate across society. Through strategic alliances with global institutions and research hubs, we amplify our impact, pooling our expertise to confront humanity’s most pressing challenges head-on.”
Pascal Frossard, Associate Dean for Research
Articles
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In a step toward more autonomous soft robots and wearable technologies, EPFL researchers have created a device that uses color to simultaneously sense multiple mechanical and temperature stimuli.
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EPFL researchers have designed a bio-inspired robot with a novel trimmed helicoid structure that allows for a wide range of motion and safe interaction with humans.
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Researchers at EPFL introduce the highly-multidisciplinary, AI-enhanced, biosensing tool ImmunoSEIRA for the detection of misfolded proteins linked to Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s disease.
Key Figures
Number of laboratories and research groups
128
INNOVATION
“In addition to research and education, technology transfer and innovation are an inherent part of EPFL’s mission. At the School of Engineering, we take this part of our mission particularly serious because it is the very nature of the engineering disciplines that we aim to translate our best scientific achievements into real-world impact. We are striving to create a culture that helps students and researchers to discover the innovative potential of their ideas and research projects, guide them on their way towards establishing startups, or find industrial collaboration partners. Looking ahead, we will particularly focus on innovations that address some of the major societal challenges, such as climate change, sustainability, the energy transformation, food system resilience, public health, as well as the transformative potential and risks of intelligent technologies and ubiquitous data.”
Holger Frauenrath, Associate Dean for Industry and Innovation
Articles
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After a three-year break due to the pandemic, EPFL’s Engineering Industry Day enjoyed a successful fourth edition on March 8th, when representatives of academia and industry converged at the SwissTech Convention Center to tackle the latest challenges and opportunities in engineering entrepreneurship.
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Jamie Paik and her team of researchers at EPFL’s School of Engineering have created an origami-like robot that can change shape, move around and interact with objects and people.
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EPFL scientists show that breathing may be used to control a wearable extra robotic arm in healthy individuals, without hindering control of other parts of the body.
Key Figures
OUTREACH PROGRAMS
Industry Day
The EPFL’s School of Engineering and Vice Presidency for Innovation held the 6th edition of the Engineering Industry Day on Thursday March 14th, 2024.
This event offers a focused platform for PhD students, researchers, professors, and companies to engage in substantive discussions and explore synergies.
EPFL Excellence in Engineering Program
The E3 EPFL Excellence in Engineering Program has been initiated in 2019 by the School of Engineering and offers an intensive research training opportunity to students from foreign universities interested in research careers in any field of engineering, science and technology.
Mandatory industry Internships for master students
Internships in a company are an integral part of the Master curriculum in every master program at EPFL. This represents an excellent opportunity for students to get a crucial insight into the day-to-day work-flow in industry and also provide the company a broad expertise and skills in engineering sciences.
FACTS & FIGURES
115 Professors
1351 Employees (FTE)
4 Campuses
