ETH Zürich · Autumn semester 2026
The Zurich Biosecurity Hub runs lectures, a course and a reading group for people who want to work on preventing the worst pandemics.
Most of the work that reduces catastrophic biological risk — screening synthetic DNA orders, disinfecting indoor air, evaluating what AI systems make possible in a lab, writing the governance for any of it — is limited by the number of people doing it rather than by a shortage of open problems. The fellowships and research groups in the field are oversubscribed with qualified applicants. Our programmes exist to get more people to the point where they can compete for those places, and be useful once they are there.
Autumn 2026
Five standalone evening sessions at ETH Zürich. Open to everyone, no prior knowledge assumed.
December 2026
Six days of reading and facilitated discussion for eight to ten participants. Application only.
From early 2027
One paper, read in advance, discussed in person. Runs through the ETH exam session.
A five-part lecture series on global catastrophic biological risk. Each session stands on its own — none builds on another, and none assumes a background in biology. Come to one or come to all five.
01Wed 30 Sep 2026
Preparedness usually assumes nature is the adversary. What changes when a pathogen is engineered on purpose: which capabilities that requires, who plausibly has them, and why deliberate outbreaks sit at the far tail of the risk distribution.
02Mon 12 Oct 2026
Protein design tools and large language models are changing what a small group can do at the bench. What the evidence on uplift actually shows, how frontier models are evaluated for biological capability, and which safeguards exist at the interface between the two fields.
03Wed 28 Oct 2026
Organisms built from mirror-image molecules would be largely invisible to existing immune defences. Why a group of researchers concluded that mirror bacteria should not be built, and what it takes to stop a technology before it exists.
04Wed 11 Nov 2026
Countermeasures that work without knowing which pathogen arrives: respirators and fit testing, indoor air quality, far-UVC. The engineering, the cost, and the open questions — rather than the vaccine-centred picture of preparedness.
05Wed 2 Dec 2026
Prevention, detection and response as layers: nucleic-acid synthesis screening, metagenomic surveillance, the Biological Weapons Convention. Where the layers are thin, and where the work is.
Six days covering the field in sequence: one unit per day, two to three hours of reading on your own, then two hours of facilitated discussion with the group. Small by design — the point is that everyone has read the material and everyone talks.
Applications are not open yet. Write to us to be told when they are, or if a run in early March 2027 would suit you better — we are considering a second date.
A biosecurity paper reading group has been running in Zürich for about a year, organised by doctoral researchers. It resumes after the lecture series and continues through the ETH exam session in late January and February 2027, when nothing else is on.
One paper per session, circulated in advance, discussed in person. Dates and the reading list will be posted here.
Who this is for
Students and doctoral researchers at ETH Zürich, UZH and elsewhere in the region — biology, chemistry, computer science, medicine, engineering — and people already working on policy who want the technical picture. The lectures assume nothing. The course assumes you will do the reading.
We are not trying to fill a lecture hall. We are trying to find the few people who would go on to do this work, and to be useful to them: pointing at fellowships, reading their applications, making introductions. An email is enough to start.
The Zurich Biosecurity Hub is a new initiative building a route into biosecurity work from Switzerland. It teaches the field — engineered pandemics, the intersection of AI and biology, synthesis screening, transmission suppression, and the governance around all of it — and then helps the people who come through those programmes reach the research groups, fellowships and institutions where the work is done.
Switzerland is unusually well placed for this and has no organisation dedicated to it. ETH, EPFL and UZH are among Europe's strongest technical universities; Basel is the continent's largest life-sciences cluster; Geneva hosts much of the international machinery for biosecurity governance, including the WHO and the Biological Weapons Convention. What is missing is the connective work between them.
The Hub is led by Dr. Erik Jentzen, a physician working at Effective Altruism Switzerland (EACH), which hosts the project's administration and finances. The Hub operates under its own name.