About us

History

Environmental Physics has a long history at ETH, and particularly within the Department of Environmental Sciences (D-UWIS). Since 2006, the Environmental Physics group is part of the newly formed Institute of Biogeochemistry and Pollutant Dynamics (IBP).

The group was founded at EAWAG more than 30 years ago, and through Prof. Dieter Imboden's appointment as full professor in 1988 became part of ETH. The chair in environmental physics was instrumental in the development of the new diploma curriculum in Environmental Sciences, which was split into separate bachelor and master programs with the introduction of the Bologna model (»» BSc and MSc in Environmental Sciences). When the Department of Environmental Sciences was founded in the early 1990s, Prof. Dieter Imboden  became one of its first Chairs. In 2005, Prof. Dieter Imboden was elected president of the research council of the Swiss National Science Foundation. Subsequently, he reduced his presence at ETH, and a search for a successor was launched.

Later in 2005, Prof. Nicolas Gruber was selected as the new chair of Environmental Physics. He joined the ETH faculty from UCLA in the summer of 2006. Prof. Dieter Imboden formally retired from ETH in the summer of 2008.

The research of Prof. Gruber's research group concerns biogeochemical cycles and climate.  We are also interested in the biogeochemical cycles of other important elements of life, such as nitrogen, silicon, and oxygen, as they are tightly connected to that of carbon. The scales of our interest span the spatial range from regional to global, and extend in time from months to millennia.

»» more details about our research.

Prof. Gruber teaches courses at the BSc and MSc level including Systemanalyse, Praktikum Physik, Biogeochemical Cycles and Climate, Carbon Mitigation, and currently organizes the Term Paper course. Prof. Gruber has also co-authored a text book, Ocean Biogeochemical Dynamics (Sarmiento and Gruber).

»» more details about our teaching.

Contact information

For further information, please don't hesitate to contact us:

Location

We are located in the Chemie Nord (CHN) Building on the main campus of ETH Zurich »» Map of main campus indicating the location of CHN. The E-floor is the entry level floor when one enters CHN from Universitätstrasse.