Presenter:	Svetlana Berdyugina
Affiliation:	IRSOL / USI
Title:	Solar science in Switzerland
Authors:	Svetlana Berdyugina
Abstract:	The Sun is our home star that provides energy for life on the Earth, impacts the near-Earth space weather and shapes the Earth’s climate. Thus, the Sun, located in the centre of our solar system, is also central to the existence of human society and terrestrial life in general. The Sun is also a reference star for astrophysics, in particular for understanding stellar structure, composition, evolution, and stellar impacts on planet formation, evolution, and habitability. As a vast plasma physics laboratory, the Sun enables us to study plasma and turbulence processes under conditions that are unavailable on Earth. Switzerland has been one of the leading nations in solar physics since the 19th century, when the worldwide-recognized Zurich sunspot number was introduced by Prof. Rudolf Wolf, also known as Wolf number, which still serves a basis for quantifying solar activity and its effects on the terrestrial climate on a multi-century scale. The growing appreciation of the importance of solar physics for astrophysics, fundamental particle and plasma physics, Earth and climate science, and technology protection from space weather has led to strengthening Swiss solar research through new professorships in solar physics and emerging synergetic research groups at various universities. Furthermore, consolidation of solar research in Switzerland has led to the recommendation for Swiss participation in the EST endorsed by the SCNAT Astronomy Community Roadmap (updated in 2024). Using their world-leading expertise, the Swiss EST Consortium aims at contributing to the EST key areas: instrumentation, data center, scientific applications and coordination with other large research infrastructures.
Last update:	06-10-2025