Once a year, the Falling Walls Foundation hosts in Berlin a celebration of worldwide Science Breakthroughs of the Year on the day the Berlin Wall fell, 9 November. Since being awarded the Falling Walls Breakthrough of the Year 2023 (Art & Science), Elaine Chew has served on the Art & Science Jury. With jury members Carsten Hucho and Dan Jay, Elaine attends the Breakthrough presentations at the Falling Walls Science Summit.
The European Research Council was well represented at Falling Walls, with several Presidents, present and past, attending the summit. Elaine gathered with other ERC grantees Kathrin Thedieck, Carmelo D’Agostino, Joseph Nelson Siewe Fodjo to meet current ERC President Maria Leptin just before the session on “Academia Under Attack: Action Against Antidemocratic Threats“. See the full FW programme.
This year’s programme featured a special appearance by the Ig Nobel crew led by founder Marc Abrahams with Cornelis Moeliker. The Digital Science group, CEO Daniel Hook and Cat Allman, organiser of Sci Foo, was also spotted at the final day’s Breakthrough of the Year talks.
Lineup of Breakthrough talks this year on Day 4 of the Falling Walls Science Summit (6-9 Nov 2025)
Science Breakthroughs of the Year 2025:
◾ Breaking the Wall of High-Power AI Needs (Lu Fang, Tsinghua)
◾ Breaking the Wall of Invisible Ovulation (Melina Schuh, Max Planck Institute)
◾ Breaking the Wall of Practical Satellite QKD (Jian-Wei Pan, USTC)
◾ Breaking the Wall of War and Its Impact on Children (Myriam Denov, McGill)
◾ Breaking the Wall of Ecological Healing Through Sound (Marco Barotti)
◾ Breaking the Wall of Healthy Aging in Women (Ângela Conçalves, DKFZ)
Other Breakthrough talks by eminent speakers:
◾ Breaking the Wall of RNA Therapeutics (Anastasia Khvorova, UMass)
◾ Breaking the Wall of Traditional Education (Peter Schlosser, ASU)
◾ Breaking the Wall of Carbon Neutral Cities (Zahra Kalantari, KTH)
◾ Breaking the Wall of Life’s Origins (John Sutherland (MRC Lab of Mol Bio)
◾ Breaking the Wall of Mapping the Body (Stephen Quake, Stanford)
◾ Breaking the Wall of Future Cities (Carlo Ratti, MIT)
◾ Breaking the Wall of Our Sun’s Mysteries (Miho Janvier, ESA)
◾ Breaking the Wall of Genetic Barriers (Katalin Karikó, Univ of Szeged)
