What will the cities of the future feel like? Will they be cooler, more resilient, more human, or simply bigger, faster, and hotter? According to ETH alumna Estefanía Tapias, no one has the answer. And that uncertainty is exactly what makes cities so fascinating.

In the latest episode of the We Are ETH podcast, host Susan Kish sits down with Estefanía, an architect, urban scientist, and Head of Smart & Digital for WSP in the Middle East, to explore her journey from Colombia to Zurich to Dubai and to understand how she is helping shape the cities of tomorrow in some of the world’s most extreme climates.

From Medellín to Zurich to Dubai: A Journey Shaped by Curiosity

Estefanía’s story began far from the desert skylines she works with today. Growing up in Colombia, she dreamed of becoming an artist. Architecture came next, followed by technology, data, and ultimately cities themselves.

“I’ve always been curious about cities,” she says. “How they evolve in 5, 10, 20 years… no one knows where we will be.”

That curiosity eventually brought her to ETH Zurich, where she completed her PhD under renowned professor Gerhard Schmitt at the Future Cities Laboratory. This pioneering hub blended urban science, technology, climate research, and design long before “smart cities” became a buzzword.

“For me, ETH was the perfect combination,” she recalls. “A visionary professor, a cutting-edge laboratory, and a city, Zurich, that I fell in love with at first sight.”

Those six months for her Master’s thesis turned into eight years. Zurich shaped not just her research but her life as well: “I ended up marrying a Swiss person. My daughter is Swiss. Everything came together very nicely.”

Why Dubai? A Laboratory for Big Ideas

Today, Estefanía works in Dubai, which she describes as similar to what Singapore felt like 15 years ago: a place buzzing with ambition, experimentation, and large-scale technological investment.

“There’s a momentum here,” she explains. “You see it in day-to-day life. They’re pushing innovation everywhere. Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t, but that is simply part of building the future.”

She also points to Saudi Arabia, where entire cities are currently being built from scratch, something that no other region in the modern world is attempting at a comparable scale.

“In my lifetime, I will only have this opportunity once,” she says. “You learn from all the cities that came before, meaning what worked and what did not, and you apply it to a place being built from zero.”

Some projects succeed quietly. Others, such as The Line, have faced challenges. But even the difficult experiments matter.

“They pushed technology forward,” she says. “If it weren’t for these ambitious projects, the software and systems we use for city-building would not have advanced as quickly.”

When Heat Becomes the Challenge and the Teacher

Estefanía’s PhD focused on urban climate and sustainability long before she ever experienced what 45°C heat really feels like. “When I arrived in Dubai, the heat was unbearable. I thought: I cannot do this,” she laughs. “By my second summer, I realised I had adapted.”

Her research helped her recognise something essential:

Cities must adapt as well.

Extreme heat now shapes how cities must be designed, influencing shading, materials, energy systems, and public spaces. Traditional Gulf urbanism provides valuable clues, and technology offers new tools, yet people ultimately remain at the center.

“We need buildings that work with the environment instead of working against it through endless air conditioning,” she says. “There is so much opportunity to rethink how cities respond to heat.”

Why ETH? Vision, People, and a City That “Grew Organically”

When asked why she chose ETH Zurich for her PhD, Estefanía answers without hesitation: “It was the person I would work with, and it was also the city.”

Professor Schmitt’s vision shaped her academically. Zurich shaped her personally and professionally.

“It is modern but not too modern. It is technological but still full of culture. It is clean, safe, close to nature, and still very much a city,” she reflects. “It grew organically. It is still my favourite city in the world.”

Her perfect Zurich moment?

“A coffee by the lake, looking at the mountains full of snow.”

Advice to Young Urbanists: Move Where Cities are Moving

For students who dream of shaping cities, she offers the same advice she once received: “Go where things are happening. Don’t stay comfortable. Live in the places that are changing fast and learn from them.”

Her own path reflects that philosophy, moving from Turin to Zurich to Singapore and eventually to Dubai.

“It is easy to criticise from far away,” she says. “I wanted to come here, experience it, and solve problems instead of just pointing at them.”

Looking Ahead: The Future No One Can Predict

When asked what she is most curious about today, Estefanía lights up: “Future cities. How they evolve. How systems change. I wish I had a machine that took me 10 years forward and then brought me back.”

Until such a machine exists, she is helping build that future herself.

This article is based on We Are ETH, the podcast highlighting ETH Zurich alumni who are shaping science, industry, and society around the world. Listen to the full episode on your favourite platform.

Eine 35-köpfige Delegation der ETH Zürich besuchte Anfang November den Bildungscampus Heilbronn – mit besonderem Fokus auf die dort angesiedelte ETH Zürich Campus Heilbronn gGmbH. Ziel des zweitägigen Besuchs war es, die zukünftigen Wirkungsstätten in Heilbronn kennenzulernen, Partnerschaften zu vertiefen und die dynamische Entwicklungsphase des neuen ETH-Standorts unmittelbar zu erleben.

«Ein herzliches Dankeschön für die grossartige Organisation des abwechslungsreichen und informativen Ausflugs – der Einblick und der Austausch waren für meine Arbeit ausserordentlich bereichernd.» – Henriette Senning, Stab Forschung ETH Zürich

uih!: Urban Innovation Hub

Einen ersten Einblick bot sich der Delegation beim Apéro im Urban Innovation Hub uih!, einem zentralen Treffpunkt für Start-ups, Wissenschaft und innovative Stadtgesellschaft. In lockerer Atmosphäre bot sich hier die Gelegenheit zum Austausch mit dem Fraunhofer Institut, das das uih! in Kooperation mit der Wissensstadt Heilbronn betreibt.

Der Abend klang mit einem gemeinsamen Essen im Restaurant Ratskeller am Heilbronner Marktplatz aus – einem historisch geprägten Ort, der den Gästen aus Zürich einen guten Eindruck in der schwäbischen Küche vermittelte.

Ein intensiver Campus-Tag

Der Donnerstagmorgen begann aktiv: um 08:30 Uhr startete die offizielle Bildungscampus-Tour, die in 1.5 Stunden einen ersten Überblick über das Gelände sowie die zehn Lehrinstitutionen vor Ort bietet.

Im Anschluss folgte eine Reihe von Besichtigungen zentraler Standorte, die für die Entwicklung des ETH-Campus Heilbronn von Bedeutung sind. Folgende Bereiche standen auf dem Programm:

• Räumlichkeiten im „Kleinen Kiesel“, die bis Dezember 2025 vom Team der ETH Zürich Campus Heilbronn gGmbH genutzt werden.
• Zukünftige provisorische Lehrflächen ab Juni 2026, inklusive einer Begrüssung durch die Nachbarn des Ferdinand-Steinbeis-Instituts und der TU München.
• Der „HIP-Turm“, der ab Januar 2026 bis etwa 2030 als wichtiger Standort für Mitarbeitende und Studierende dienen wird.

Diese Stationen boten unserer Delegation einen umfassenden Eindruck davon, wie sich der ETH Zürich Campus Heilbronn räumlich und organisatorisch in den kommenden Jahren entwickeln wird.

Ein besonderes Highlight war die Präsentation von Michele De Lorenzi, Geschäftsführer der ETH Zürich Campus Heilbronn gGmbH, der spannende Einblicke in den bisherigen Aufbau des Standorts vor Ort gab – und sein Team vor Ort persönlich vorstellte.

“Was die Dieter Schwarz Stiftung für Heilbronn tut, ist ein echter Segen für die Stadt und die Region. Als gebürtige Heilbronnerin und ETH-Angestellte in Zürich, ist das Projekt ETH I Heilbronn eine wahre Herzensangelegenheit für mich. Es freut mich, dass ETH I Heilbronn mit einem tollen Team startet (der Grundstein für alles, was kommt) und ich – inklusive meiner Eltern in Heilbronn und anderer Familienmitglieder aus München/Frankfurt – bereits einen guten Draht zu allen habe, und so vor Ort etwas zum Erfolg beitragen kann.” – Nanja Strecker

Gemeinsamer Abschluss auf dem Campus

Das Mittagessen im Campus Garden bot eine letzte Gelegenheit für Gespräche über zukünftige Kooperationsmöglichkeiten und die Rolle des Heilbronner Standorts innerhalb der ETH-Strategie.

Fazit

Der Besuch der Delegation aus Zürich war ein weiterer wichtiger Meilenstein für den Aufbau der ETH-Präsenz in Heilbronn. Die Gespräche, Einblicke und gemeinsamen Erlebnisse haben den Grundstein für eine noch engere Zusammenarbeit gelegt und die Vorfreude auf die kommenden Etappen der Campusentwicklung gestärkt.

Sehen Sie sich alle schönen Fotos von der Besichtigung des ETH Zürich Campus Heilbronn an.

I joined ETH Zurich as project director for the Plant4Value project following three of my professional passions: collaboration, sustainability and food. This project represents more than just a research endeavour; it is a collaborative effort to address one of the most pressing challenges of our time: the sustainable transformation of our food systems.

While the scientific community agrees on the environmental and health benefits of a more plant-based diet and production system, the transition is fraught with challenges. We face economic dependencies which entail high barriers for farmers seeking to change, limited consumer demand for new alternatives, and an often polarized public discourse. These are the major obstacles and systemic barriers we seek to overcome by an evidence-based, collaborative and solution-focused approach.

Unlocking change through collaboration

ETH’s commitment to combining rigorous scientific inquiry with practical, real-world application is the foundation of our project.

I believe that successful transformation is rooted in collaborative, interdisciplinary work and partnerships. We recognise and heed to the complexity of the food system by including diverse stakeholders across the entire value chain. Plant4Value operates on a transdisciplinary model, bringing together 24 partners, including farmers, food processors, retailers, and policymakers. We are not just studying the problem; we are working with the people which all are essential to co-creating the pathways to a more resilient food future.

Project director Daniela Hoffmann and scientific project director Lukas Fesenfeld are leading and coordinating the transciplinary project, which entails collaboration across the entire food value chain. Photo Credits: Philippe Grob

Piloting real-world solutions

For me, a distinctive part of Plant4Value is our commitment to experimental evaluation for evidence-based change. Over the next five years, we will be piloting and testing a range of innovative levers:

• Farmer Support: Using an experimental budget and/or site-specific consulting to de-risk the shift toward more plant-based food production.
• Technological Innovation: Real-world testing of novel technologies to create new economic value in plant-based food value chains.
• Demand Generation: Implementing choice-architectural and market-based interventions to better understand market potential, adoption and substitution rates.

Our core mission at ETH Zurich is to systematically evaluate the social, economic, and environmental impacts of these interventions. This evidence base is critical for providing policymakers and stakeholders with the data they need to enact effective, efficient, and scalable strategies for a more sustainable food system.

While our focus is Switzerland, the insights generated have global relevance. Every nation food system stakeholder from nation states, to farmers, to multinational companies is seeking pathways to a resilient food future. Plant4Value offers a systematic model for how science, policy, and practice can overcome inertia and foster plant-based value chains.

This transdisciplinary project is funded by the Mercator Switzerland Foundation, the Seedling Foundation, and the Minerva Foundation. It is hosted by the Albert Einstein School of Public Policy at ETH Zurich, in collaboration with the World Food System Center at ETH Zurich. Read more about the project here: https://einstein-school.ethz.ch/en/forschung/forschungsprojekte/Plant4Value.html

This summer, check out some the interesting and inspiring journeys of ETH Zurich students who stepped outside the classroom and into innovation ecosystems around the world through ETH Studios.

From collaborating with Bloomberg in New York to exploring machine learning in the Swiss Alps, investigating extraterrestrial life with NASA, and reflecting on Europe’s tech future, these student-authored stories offer a unique glimpse into how ETH talent is shaping global conversations.

Here’s your curated summer reading list, straight from the ETH Ambassadors Blog:

1. SQL, LLMs, Bagels and Skyscrapers – A Journey of 5 ETH Students in NYC

By Maša Nešić, Maurice Hanisch, Eric Nothum, Vinícius Mohr, and Carlo Teufel

What happens when five ETH students step into the heart of the financial world for a 3-day tech challenge at Bloomberg’s New York office? A lot of learning, a lot of inspiration and just enough time for a bagel break. In their own words, “We meticulously worked on the project, exploring our team’s dynamics and attempting to put everyone’s skills to best use.”

Read the story

2. Bridging Innovation and Inspiration – TECH 2025 Heilbronn

By Giancarla Salzarulo

As part of the ETH delegation to TECH 2025 in Heilbronn, Giancarla reflects on the power of global dialogue, the challenges of scaling innovation in Europe, and why being part of ETH means more than just studying. She emphasizes, “I arrived with curiosity and left with inspiration. Being part of ETH Zurich’s story continues to be one of the greatest privileges of my life.”

Read the story

3. Mayhem in New York

By Noè Canevascini

What started as a spontaneous interview turned into a full-blown mentorship adventure in New York City. Noè’s story captures the unpredictability and opportunity that ETH Studio experiences can spark. He says, “Despite the challenges, this experience reinforced my love for tackling new opportunities and mentoring others.”

Read the story

4. Machine Learning Meets Geology: My Internship at SLF Davos

By Paulina Körner

At ETH Studio Davos, Paulina blended AI with earth sciences to explore how computer vision can detect borehole fractures, a step toward smarter, safer geotechnical work. She shares, “One of the highlights of my internship was the people I had the chance to work with. The team at SLF was made up of researchers and professionals from all over the world, each bringing a unique perspective to their work.”

Read the story

5. Learning About Extraterrestrial Life Detection at NASA JPL

By Marco Trentini and Adrian Fuhrer

How do you detect life on a moon of Saturn? During their seven-month stay at the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Adrian and Marco focused on developing instruments that can be used to detect life forms on other planets, particularly Enceladus, a moon of Saturn. Their work in the Chemical Analysis and Life Detection Lab aimed to understand and utilize the chemical processes involved in detecting life on other planets!

Read the story

ETH Studios

ETH Studios are global innovation outposts where ETH students tackle real-world challenges alongside companies, researchers, and startups. Whether in New York, Heilbronn, Davos, or at the experimental StudioX, students gain entrepreneurial and interdisciplinary experience while contributing to sustainable and tech-driven solutions.

Contact Francesca Caggiula at eth-studios@ethz.ch if you are interested in more information on and about the ETH Studios.

Happy reading!

My name is Remo Gisi. I graduated in theoretical computer science and distributed systems at ETH Zürich in 2012. In 2016, I co-founded the ETH spinoff company Tastelab.

Tastelab works in the intersection of food and science where we do a wide variety of projects from high-end caterings and restaurant projects to art collaborations and consulting work.

Our recent project “Cook the Science” is a collaboration initiated by Prof. Dr. Thomas Michaels, an ETH professor specialising in soft and living matter. (www.ethz.ch/cookthescience)

Designed as a free public lecture series, Cook the Science invites chefs and culinary experts to ETH to talk about their area of expertise. Each one-hour lecture features an ETH professor and a chef and focuses on one specific topic that is relevant in cooking every day. Be it caramelisation or gelation, fermentation or crystallisation: Complex chemical and biological processes build the basics for the most mundane cooking processes.

To the Cook the Science audience, one thing is immediately apparent: cooking is always applied science. Every time we are in our kitchen, we “do” physics, chemistry, biology. In our kitchen, we all have a “lab” at home, even if we don’t necessarily know it!

The context of cooking is one that we all know and can relate to. It makes scientific insights understandable and easy to apply, and once it makes our food tastier and our recipes succeed more easily, there can be no doubt that science is very relevant indeed.

In my opinion, cooking is the ideal context for science outreach and communication – and the success of the Cook the Science series seems to confirm this! Since its beginnings in fall 2024, each Cook the Science lecture was fully booked. Many of the Cook the Science guests are at ETH for the first time, which is great – and also a frequent source for either amusement or compassion when first-timers are lost in the maze of ETH main building…

In addition to the full auditorium, many thousand YouTube visitors view the Cook the Science lectures online. In a way, this makes Cook the Science one of our most influential projects to date, one where we’re not creating exclusive experiences for the select few but get to share our enthusiasm for science (and cooking!) with thousands of people from many different backgrounds.

Naturally, this is also a great motivation to go on with the Cook the Science journey! The lectures as we know them are scheduled to continue for the next couple of years. Also, we might expand Cook the Science into other formats to reach yet more people!

If you’d like to know about future Cook the Science events, follow Cook the Science on Instagram to hear the latest news and announcements.

And, of course, if you want to stay informed about Tastelab’s other adventures in the domains of cooking and science, follow us on our channels as well! (We are on Instagram and on Facebook, and we do send out Newsletters occasionally.)

I’m looking forward to meeting you at our future projects!

Last September, we had the privilege of being a part of an ETH student team invited to visit Bloomberg for a 3-day challenge in their New York office. Excitement levels were high, and inspiration even higher! Julien Vanegue, Li Ling, and Dennis Roellke gave us the warmest of welcomes to Bloomberg and prepared an exciting challenge for us to work on during our stay. During working hours, we were engaged in lively discussions, coding, and exploration in the field of Text-to-SQL translation using open source (small) Large Language Models. In our free time, we took the opportunity to breathe in the amazing and unique city of New York. Each day, we walked as many steps as our feet could take in an attempt to absorb as much of the culture, architecture, scenery, and food as we could. In addition to the touristic experience, we also had the privilege of getting a peek at the NYC tech scene through a tour organized and guided by the amazing David Becker, co-founder of zkipster. This whole experience is difficult to convey through words, so we prepared a small photo album to give you a glimpse of our journey. We hope you enjoy it!

I am still processing my impressions from a trip to Kyaka II refugee settlement in Southwestern Uganda in January, 2024. The potholed eroded roads are polluted by discarded plastic items that have long served their purpose only to be picked up again by a child. I cannot forget the image of a little girl playing with a broken plastic pistol, pointing it to her temple and pulling the trigger and the “click” that followed again and again as she fired another shot from her gun!

My name is Nicoletta. I am an ETH Alumna, a member of the ETH Circle and on the board of Chance for Childhood (CfC), an international nongovernmental organization (INGO) that focuses on children with disabilities. The experience I would like to share dives into social issues with the hope of fostering understanding on the topics of exclusion and intersectionality.

Understand the system

At Kyaka II, CfC supports children and their families, ensuring safe access to education amidst some of the most challenging circumstances of displacement and trauma.

The refugee settlement is over 80 km² in size and dotted with mud huts inhabited by approximately 130’000 people mostly from the Democratic Republic of the Congo, victims of the dynamic and complex realties of conflicts within Africa’s Great Lakes Region. Surprisingly, there are no gates or fences as refugees are confined to the area by their circumstances.

A needs assessment conducted by CfC in 2019 on educational and safeguarding needs of children in Kyaka II, revealed that 9% of children aged 5-17 had a disability (versus the national average of 7%) but in schools this fell to 2 % indicating a particularly high dropout rate for children with disabilities.

Shifting perspectives on disability

Children with disabilities face additional discrimination due to stigma, violence and lack of appropriate support and this stigma extends to families.

When it comes to disability, we need to go beyond the medical circumstances to consider the social dimension. Disability is a complex experience and not a condition that cannot be changed. By shifting our mindset we discover that society’s mental attitudes, biases and physical barriers are the true impairment.

Disability should hence not be addressed at the individual level only but requires a multi-layered approach involving all stakeholders.

Partnerships for change

In 2021 CfC launched a programme to tackle the lack of inclusion in education for the most marginalised leaners in the settlement. Today the program is supporting more than 1100 children (aged 5-17) by providing scholastic equipment, learning assistance and training on inclusive education.

This work relies on our partnership with African Women and Youth Action for Development (AWYAD) and teaching assistants from YARID, most of whom are refugees themselves. In our conversation the teachers emphasized the breadth of their work: as educators, mentors and advocates on the importance of education. Their passion was the highlight of my visit.

During the trip to the settlement I was struck by the incredible resilience of children and families living in challenging realities of displacement and exclusion. Their experiences draw attention to the role of society in inclusion and should inspire us to contribute to removing obstacles and working towards a more inclusive and equitable future.

Many scientists are motivated by contributing to the betterment of society. However, scientific research often comes at an environmental cost, mainly concerning energy use and waste. At ETH, most Scope 3 emissions come from labs and equipment. To cut these emissions, ETH is participating in a pilot scheme for LEAF, a laboratory sustainability certification program developed at University College London. 19 labs across ETH received their Bronze, Silver, and Gold LEAF certificates at the end of January 2024. 

“Educating and inspiring people is the most important” says Dr. Miriam Filippi, a senior scientist at the Soft Robotics Lab (D-MAVT). As Sustainability Officer, she steered the group to a Gold-level LEAF certificate through integrating sustainability into everyday lab life. “Your last thought in the middle of an experiment is ‘how will the world be in 10 years?'”, she explains, “and so there is a need to get routines to be sustainable.” Filippi also created the “Green Roboticist” award within the group to motivate members and “make sustainable practices more respected.”  

LEAF actions range from using recycling bins to optimizing equipment energy use and actively reducing plastic waste. A well-organised group may already be implementing many sustainable actions. “It was less work than expected,” says Sabine Diedrich, lab manager at the Lab of Toxicology (D-HEST). Together with PhD student Jasmina Büchel, she steered the group to a Gold LEAF certificate. The online LEAF platform offers tips to get started, but Diedrich stresses the importance of networking and sharing experiences to create momentum and progress on a larger scale.  

Despite best efforts, the reality of scientific research means that some aspects, such as reducing single-use plastic waste, can be difficult to change. “There’s still so much waste,” Büchel laments. Filippi also notes that “connecting good sterility practice to sustainability” can be challenging and is filled with compromises. However, many groups certified in the LEAF pilot reuse ‘single-use’ materials such as plastics and aluminium where possible, and try to opt for reusable alternatives where possible. 

“Labs not yet in LEAF should know that with a little thought, significant reductions of single-use plastic items and electricity can be achieved,” emphasises Elisa Dultz, a senior scientist in the Weis lab (D-BIOL) and member of the ETH/UZH Greenlab group. “You can become part of the community that is interested in change by starting the discussion in your lab and connecting to others”. The ETH GreenLabs program, run by the ETH Sustainability Office and the Greenlab Zürich group, aims to eventually LEAF-review all ETH labs, and work together to build on existing initiatives, ultimately promoting sustainability across all labs.

Coming from an engineering background, my relationship with food was only limited to my plate. In 2018, jumping straight from a civil engineering bachelor’s to a master’s in rural development changed the course of my career, and ‘Food,’ in a literal sense, became the most crucial part of my life.

During my master’s in 2019, a university senior, who had recently attended summer school, introduced me to the World Food System Center. His stories of ‘jumping on fabacean beans in a remote village of Switzerland’ would make me curious about the kind of adventure a summer school could provide. As the most obvious move, I, too, applied for the World Food System Summer School in 2020 but couldn’t join due to COVID-related disruptions.

Finally, in August this year, I landed in the serene village of Rheinau to attend the 10th World Food System Summer School. I was one among a cohort of 25 amazing people from 19 different nationalities, and 17 different academic discipinary backgrounds, brimming with passion and love for food. We hopped onto the trademark old truck to begin our Summer School Journey to understanding food systems in transition!