Real science...
Micro robot
A network of genes and longevity, a cloud of flying robots, the recognition of a fluorescent cancer therapy by the FDA, the observation of quasars — the number of scientific articles in this back-to-school issue is telling; it is our ambition to start off the 2010 – 2011 academic year with more science, more content, and more questions.
A critical study of our image in the general press, undertaken this summer, shows that more than half of the articles about EPFL in the first semester of 2010 concerned scientific knowledge or innovation. Other articles were about institutional politics (12 %), construction of new buildings, education, and campus life. Reassuring or troubling ? This is the question we need to ask. Our image in the press is a reflection of our identity in society. And if our public identity is closer to that of a dynamic “enterprise” than an educational institution, it is our duty to turn this image around.
This is also one of the challenges of the new EPFL website WEB2010 going live on the 6th of September. As you can read in the central pages of this issue dedicated to the new website, the KIS has made a “bottom-up” news publication system that allows for anyone to publish news and content on their own website and automatically propose it for publication on either their School’s homepage or the EPFL’s. It is a collaborative system that hopes to knock the dust off of ideas that, while underpinning the progress of knowledge, tend to remain on the shelves. In fact, do you know why a glass of water is composed of more that 99% empty space? Answer in the next issue…