Switzerland is the land of Big Ideas, where even the streets have Nobel prizes. At the European particle physics lab known as CERN, the roads through campus bear the names of Einstein, Curie, Bohr, and Heisenberg. Working amid those tributes to giants of the past century, physicists from around the world are trying to make history of their own and…

The relationships between industry and higher education in Switzerland, involving two federal polytechnics and financed directly by the government, are described, including characteristics and intensity of the relationships, training, consultation and other services, exchange agreements, and the issue of patents. The two specific polytechnic…