Keynote Speaker

Education towards a Prosperous Future for All

Richard R. Ernst
Laboratorium für Physikalische Chemie, ETH Zürich
8093 Zürich, Switzerland

Our today's world is in rapid development. Many traditional models of society are becoming soon antiquated. In such a dynamic situation, it is no longer sufficient to memorize, without personal reflection, dictated rules of behavior. Survival in a modern world requires education towards critical reflection for all members of society, irrespective of social class and nationality. We have also to accept that liberal education may itself induce inevitable societal change by questioning unjustified privileges. Only by public education for everybody, we can prevent the formation of dangerous situations with a potentially harmful outcome.

But literacy and scientific and technological knowledge form only part of the contents of adequate education. Equally important is to convey also the basic ethical laws of tolerance and compassion. Students must learn to appreciate, in spite of all negative role models of today, that it is not monetary personal richness that is the ultimate goal of our endeavors, but rather richness of our spirit that may lead to positive contributions for the sake of local and global society, and, in the end, to personal happiness. In this context, we might have to question certain current developments that contradict societal fairness and sustainability, and might unduly deprive future generations.

Curriculum vitae
Richard R. Ernst was full Professor of Physical Chemistry since 1976.
He directed a research group devoted to magnetic resonance spectroscopy was director of the Laboratory of Physical Chemistry at the ETH Zurich until 1998. He contributed to the development of medical magnetic resonance tomo-graphy, and in collaboration with Professor Kurt Wüthrich to the development of the NMR structure determination of biopolymers in solution. In addition, he was president of the Research Council of ETH Zurich and he is presently on the editorial board of 10 scientific journals. He received numerous honours, including the Nobel Prize for Chemistry (1991), the Wolf Prize for Chemistry (1991), the Horwitz Prize (1991), and the Marcel Benoist Prize (1986). He received honorary doctors degrees of ETH Lausanne, Technische Universität Munich, Universität Zurich, University Antwerpen, Babes-Bolyai University, Cluj-Napoca, and University Montpellier. He is a member of the US National Academy of Sciences, of the Royal Academy of Sciences, London, of the Deutsche Akademie Leopoldina, of the Russian Academy of Sciences, of the Korean Academy of Science and Technology, and honorary member of many further societies

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Richard R. Ernst
Born in Winterthur, Switzerland, on August 14, 1933, studied chemistry at Eidgenössische Technische Hochschule (ETH), Zurich. Diploma in 1962, doctor's degree in physical chemistry (nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy) in 1962
After obtaining his doctorate, Ernst worked in the Physical Chemistry Laboratory of ETH Zurich for a short time, then spent five years in the research department of Varian Associates at Palo Alto, California. Returning to ETH to teach physical Chemistry in 1968, he has held a full professorship there since 1976. He retired in 1998 from his professorship, following the legal requirements
He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1991 "for his contribution to the development of the methodology of high resolution nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy"
During the past decades, NMR spectroscopy has become one of the most successful instrumental measuring method available to chemistry. It is used, inter alia, to determine the structure of molecules in solution and to gain insights into the interactions between different kinds of molecules (such as enzyme/substrate, soap molecule/water) and the speed of chemical reactions. While proteins had formerly to be crystallised before their structure could be analysed, this can now be done by NMR spectroscopy in their natural environment
Some first successful NMR experiments were reported as early as 1945, but practical applications only became possible owing to Ernst's cooperation with Weston A. Anderson in 1966, which resulted in a major increase in the sensitivity of the method: Instead of continuously changing the frequency of the radio waves used, the two researchers exposed their samples to short intensive radio-frequency oscillations, measured the signal as a function of the oscillation time, repeated the measurements at short intervals, added the signals up in a computer and transferred them by means of a mathematical operation (Fourier transformation) into an NRM spectrum for evaluation. In so doing, they laid the foundations for modern nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy. Further work added two-, three- and multi-dimensional variants of NMR spectroscopy which made it possible to obtain a more highly differentiated picture larger proteins owing to the use of several oscillation sequences (rather than individual radiofrequency oscillations) and several time variables. In this way, it was possible to determine the three-dimensional structure of organic and inorganic compounds, proteins and other biological macromolecules in solution at a level of accuracy comparable to the results of X-ray crystallography in crystalline preparations
The recent, highly successful applications of NMR to medical imaging, in the form of MRI (Magnetic Resonance Imaging), are also taking advantage of the principles that have been contributed by Ernst and his co-workers
After his retirement, he concentrated more on his interests in improving the relation between science and society. He is advocating a more active role of academics and scientists in shaping our global future. In addition, he developed a fascination for the beauty and depth of Tibetan painting art and for the profound Tibetan Buddhist philosophy

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