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The University of Zurich (UZH, German: Universität Zürich) is a public research university in Zurich, Switzerland. It is the largest university in Switzerland, with approximately 28,700 enrolled students. UZH was founded in 1833, from the merger of the existing colleges of theology, law, medicine that were founded 1525 with a new faculty of philosophy.

The university has seven schools: Philosophy, Human Medicine, Economic Sciences, Law, Mathematics and Natural Sciences, Theology and Veterinary Medicine; it offers the widest range of subjects and courses of any Swiss higher education institution.

History

1833–2000

The University of Zurich was founded on April 29, 1833, when the existing colleges of theology, the Carolinum founded by Huldrych Zwingli in 1525, law and medicine were merged with a new faculty of Philosophy. It was the first university in Europe to be founded by the state rather than a monarch or church. Its Latin name is reminiscent of the Roman name for the precursor settlement of the city of Zurich, Turicum.

In the university's early years, the 1839 appointment of the German theologian David Friedrich Strauss to its Chair of Theology caused a major controversy, since Strauss argued that the miracles in the Christian New Testament were mythical retellings of normal events as supernatural happenings. Eventually, the authorities offered Strauss a pension before he had a chance to start his duties.

The university allowed women to attend philosophy lectures from 1847. The Faculty of Veterinary Medicine was added in 1901, the second-oldest such faculty in the world. In 1914, the university moved to new premises designed by the architect Karl Moser on Rämistrasse 71.

The university admitted a Russian woman student, Maria Kniazhnina, to audit medicine classes in 1864, but she did not complete the course. Another Russian student, Nadezhda Suslova, audited medicine classes from 1865 and was allowed to become a registered student and graduate as a doctor of medicine in 1867. The first seven women who were awarded medical degrees at the university were known as the Zurich Seven. They were Nadezhda Suslova (Russia), Frances Elizabeth Morgan (England), Louisa Atkins (England), Maria Bokova (Russia), Eliza Walker (Scotland), Susan Dimock (United States), and Marie Vögtlin (Switzerland).

Albert Einstein was awarded his PhD from the philosophical faculty of the university in 1906. In 2022, the original certificate was returned to the university.

2000–present

In 2022, the university ran the first professorship for Gender Medicine in Switzerland. Research included investigations into differences of symptoms of cardiac arrest between men and women.

In 2024, the university announced that they would voluntarily withdraw from THE World University Rankings, stating that the ranking "is not able to reflect the wide range of teaching and research activities undertaken at the university", and that the ranking is "leading universities to concentrate on increasing the number of publications instead of improving the quality of their content". Prior to the announcement, the university regularly ranked in the top 100 universities worldwide.

Campus

The university is scattered all over the city of Zurich. The main campuses are located in the city centre, Irchelpark and Oerlikon. Members of the university can use several libraries, including the ETH-library, and the Zurich Central Library, with over 5 million volumes.

In 1962, the faculty of science proposed to establish the Irchelpark campus on the Strickhofareal. The first stage the construction of the university buildings was begun in 1973, and the campus was inaugurated in 1979. The construction of the second stage lasted from 1978 to 1983. The campus also houses the anthropological museum Anthropologisches Museum, and the cantonal Staatsarchiv Zürich.

Museums

The university included 13 museums: the Anatomical Collection, the Archaeological Collection, the Botanical Museum, the Museum of Wax Moulages, the Science Exploratorium, the Museum of Veterinary History, the Zurich Herbaria, the Museum of Anthropology, the Botanical Garden, the Ethnographic Museum, the Paleontological Museum, the Veterinary Anatomy Collection and the Zoological Museum. The zoological, paleontological, anthropological and botanical museums later merged into the Natural History Museum of the University of Zurich, which opened in 2024. The Institute and Museum for the History of Medicine is also part of the university.

Academics

In the fields of bioscience and finance, there is a close-knit collaboration between the University of Zurich and the ETH (Federal Institute for Technology). Examples for common initiatives between the two institutions include University Medicine Zurich, the Wyss Translational Center Zurich, and Life Science Zurich (LSZ).

Rankings

Shanghai Jiao Tong University Ranking (heavy emphasis on research output – citations, Nobel prizes etc.) Ranked 59th overall as well as 5th and 10th in the subdisclipines Ecology and Human Biological Sciences respectively.

QS World University Rankings (heavy emphasis on peer review) 91st overall and 56th in Medicine globally making it the highest ranked University in Switzerland for Medicine according to QS.

THE World University Rankings 2024 80th overall and ranked 42nd in the subdiscipline business & economics.

The university's Department of Economics is especially strong and was ranked first in the German-speaking area by the Handelsblatt in 2017. In 2009, the faculty of Business Administration was ranked third in the German-speaking area.

Language policy

Bachelor courses are taught in Swiss Standard German ("Hochdeutsch"), but use of English is increasing in many faculties. The only bachelors program taught entirely in English is the "English Language and Literature" program. All Master courses at the Faculty of Science are held in English. Master courses in Economics and Finance are mainly held in English, while the Master of Science in Quantitative Finance is held completely in English.

Student life

The university's Academic Sports Association (ASVZ) offers a wide range of sports facilities to students of the university. The student body is represented through the Verband der Studierenden der Universität Zürich VSUZH which organizes events and is involved in the university administration.

Notable alumni and faculty

Science

• Artur Avila, professor at Institut für Mathematik and Fields Medal
• Christian Beyel Swiss Mathematician
• Brigitta Danuser, Medicine
• Peter Debye, Dutch physicist and chemist

Albert Einstein, theoretical physicist who was awarded his PhD from the University of Zurich in 1905 and was appointed associate professor at the university in 1909

• Ben-Ami Finkelstein, psychiatrist
• Anna Fischer-Dückelmann, one of the first women to receive a medical degree in a German-speaking country
• Natalie Grams, German physician, author and science communicator
• Ravit Helled, planetary scientist, and department of astrophysics and cosmology professor
• Paul Herrling (Ph.D. 1975), Swiss head of corporate research, professor
• Albert Hofmann, Swiss scientist and discoverer of LSD-25
• Max Holzmann, Swiss cardiologist
• Edith Humphrey, Chemist and the first British woman to get a doctorate in chemistry
• Hugo Iltis, Biologist, Biographer of Gregor Mendel
• Gino Isidori, theoretical physicist

Associated institutions

Corpus Córporum, digital library created and maintained by the university's Institute for Greek and Latin Philology.

Swiss National Supercomputing Centre

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