News

ERC Starting Grants: three million euros for two researchers at the University of Graz

Two researchers from the University of Graz have secured prestigious and generously funded grants from the EU. Starting Grants from the European Research Council (ERC), each worth 1.5 million euros, have been awarded to the human geographer Heide Bruckner and the social scientist Silvana Weiss.

Austria’s emissions rose in 2025: University of Graz researchers analyse the causes

The Environment Agency Austria has today published the figures for the country’s greenhouse gas emissions in 2025. While emissions fell sharply year on year from 2022 to 2024, they rose again by just under 0.7 per cent in 2025. Researchers at the University of Graz have analysed how much of this increase was due to structural changes in the economy and how much was attributable to external factors over which there is little control. “In 2025, the colder winter compared with 2024 increased emissions by 0.81 per cent, while the weak economy reduced them by 0.38 per cent. If we factor out these influences, we find an underlying increase of 0.26 per cent compared with the previous year,” reports economist Karl Steininger. “This clearly means that Austria is not on track to meet its climate targets, which require a substantial reduction in emissions by 2030.”

Ecosystems in a changing climate: exploring nature in the Gesäuse National Park

Electrifying: Researchers film the first moments on the way from light to electricity

Physicists at the University of Graz (Austria), in collaboration with colleagues from Marburg University and Forschungszentrum Jülich (Germany), have achieved a scientific breakthrough. For the first time, the generation of electrical energy from light has been filmed and described theoretically. This work is of far-reaching significance, not least for optimising sustainable energy production from photovoltaics. This is because it provides fundamental building blocks for understanding the physical processes that take place, for example, in organic solar cells. The paper was published in the journal Physical Review X, one of the world’s most prestigious physics journals.

University of Graz: Working together to make Styria a sustainable centre of learning

Round table calls for sustainable funding for the 2028–2030 performance agreement period between the five Styrian universities and the federal government.

How can we teach using YouTube and AI? The University of Graz is strengthening media education in schools

A journey through the blood vessels using VR headsets brings biology lessons to life. An interactive quiz brings physics to life. The YouTube video explains the First World War. Whilst mobile phones are increasingly being banned from the classroom, social media platforms, apps and AI are playing an ever-greater role in knowledge transfer at school. But how can teaching with media be made even more effective? What are the challenges in media-based teaching? At the University of Graz, researchers are discussing these issues at a conference being held in Austria for the first time.

Jurassic Sounds: Biologist reconstructs insect songs from 165 million years ago

It was apparently not just the roars of the dinosaurs that made up the soundscape of the animal world during the Jurassic period. Crickets and grasshoppers communicated through a variety of songs and high-pitched sounds, as Thorin Jonsson from the Institute of Biology at the University of Graz discovered together with colleagues from the universities of Lincoln, Bristol (UK), Beijing (China) and Tempe (USA). The findings on what are so far the oldest traces of sound on Earth have just been published in the journal PNAS.

EU funding boosts international exchange between universities

The University of Graz is further expanding its international study opportunities through the European university alliance Arqus and is taking the lead in two key projects. In future, students will benefit from even more joint degree programmes and from simplified recognition of academic achievements through the Joint European Degree Label.