The European Conference on Tribology, known as ECOTRIB, is a biennial conference jointly organized by the tribology societies in Austria, Italy, Slovenia, and Switzerland. Rowena Crockett, Nicholas Spencer, and their colleagues from the Swiss Tribology offered a more than splendid location for the 9th ECOTRIB at the internationally renowned ETH Zurich (Albert Einstein’s locker was a popular photo opportunity) in the summertime (July 28 to 30, 2025).  

Of the 230 participants from 20 nations, the ÖTG was represented by its members Anton Paar GmbH (Kartik Pondicherry), Optimol Instruments Prüftechnik GmbH (Ameneh Schneider), V-Research GmbH (Thomas Wright), AC2T research GmbH (Matthias Freisinger, Surya Kannan Peesapati, Markus Varga), TU Wien (Stefan Eder) and Nicole Dörr. Stefan Eder also held a plenary talk on his research on molecular dynamics as part of the collaboration between AC2T and TU Wien. 

In addition to the wide range of topics typical of tribology, which were presented by a good mix of young and experienced tribologists, talks from the EU project “SSLiP” showed that superlubricity through tribocolloids is on its way to real-world applications. 

We appreciated the numerous networking opportunities and are looking forward to ECOTRIB27 in Slovenia!