The Swiss government has appointed Anna Fontcuberta i Morral as the new president of the Federal Institute of Technology Lausanne (EPFL). The 49-year-old professor of materials science and engineering will take over from Martin Vetterli on January 1, 2025.
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Appointed for a four-year term, Anna Fontcuberta i Morral is a renowned researcher who has made her semiconductor laboratory a world leader in sustainable nanotechnologies, the government said in a press release on Wednesday. The Swiss-Spanish dual national has also co-founded the start-up Aonex Technologies.
As associate vice-president of EPFL in charge of centres and platforms, she already participates in the academic management of the federal institute. She has also spent over eight years at the Swiss National Science Foundation, where she has been a member of the management committee since 2020.
She also works actively on several scientific boards, committees and organisations.
Anna Fontcuberta i Morral was born in 1975 and grew up near Barcelona, where she studied physics. After obtaining her doctorate at the Ecole polytechnique de Palaiseau in France, she was a visiting researcher in 2001-2002, then in 2004-2005, at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena (United States), during which she helped create the start-up Aonex Technologies.
She completed her habilitation in experimental physics at the Technical University of Munich in 2009. From 2008 she worked as Assistant Professor Tenure Track at EPFL’s Institute of Materials.
Anna Fontcuberta i Morral has won several awards. She received a student prize from the Faculty of Engineering Sciences and Techniques for her teaching.
Other awards and grants include the Marie Curie Excellence Grant in 2005, the Starting Grant from the European Research Council in 2009 and, in 2015, the Back-up schemes Consolidator Grant from the Swiss National Science Foundation and the Emmy Noether Prize from the European Physical Society.
In 2014, she was made associate professor and in September 2019 full professor of materials science and engineering. She speaks Catalan, French, German, English and Spanish.
She will take over from Martin Vetterli, who has led the EPFL since January 2017.
Adapted from French by DeepL/sb
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