Falling Walls
The Falling Walls Science Summit (previously Falling Walls Conference) is an annual science event in Berlin, Germany, which takes place between 7 and 9 November and coincides with the anniversary of the Fall of the Berlin Wall.[1] Guided by the question "Which are the next walls to fall in science and society?" the Science Summit aims to showcase scientific breakthroughs, foster a dialogue between science and general public and connect global leaders from science, business, and media to develop solutions for the greatest challenges of our time. Originally being a one-day conference, the summit has expanded and now includes three days: Falling Walls Pitches on 7 November (pitches from up-and-coming scientists, science start-ups, and science engagers), Falling Walls Circle on 8 November (round table debates between global leaders from science, politics, and business) and Falling Walls Breakthrough Day on 9 November (keynotes of the Falling Walls Science Breakthrough of the Year laureates and renowned international speakers).
Notable speakers
    
    2017
    
- Alexander Betts, University of Oxford
 - Sarah Chayes, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
 - Esther Duflo, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT)
 - Dennis Lo, Chinese University of Hong Kong
 - W.E. Moerner, Stanford University
 - Jian-Wei Pan, University of Science and Technology of China
 - Edgar Pieterse, University of Cape Town
 - Jürgen Schmidhuber, Swiss AI Lab
 - Christina Smolke, Stanford University
 
2016
    
- Quarraisha Abdool Karim, CAPRISA, Durban
 - Kevin Bales, University of Nottingham
 - Neil Gershenfeld, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
 - Rob Knight, University of California, San Diego
 - Lim Chuan Poh, A*STAR, Singapore
 - Randolph Nesse, Arizona State University
 - Peter Neumann, King's College London
 - Hélène Rey, London Business School
 - Katherine Richardson, University of Copenhagen
 - Eyal Weizman, Goldsmiths, University of London
 
2015
    
- June Andrews, University of Stirling, UK
 - Bruce A. Beutler, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, USA
 - Emmanuelle Charpentier, Max Planck Institute for Infection Biology, Germany
 - Ottmar Edenhofer, Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, Germany
 - Nilüfer Göle, École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales, France
 - Demis Hassabis, Google DeepMind, London, UK
 - Dirk Helbing, ETH Zurich, Switzerland
 - Naila Kabeer, London School of Economics and Political Science, UK
 - Wolfgang Ketterle, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, USA
 - Nina Kraus, Northwestern University, USA
 - Joanne Liu, Médecins Sans Frontières, Switzerland
 - Saskia Sassen, Columbia University, New York City
 - Brian Schmidt, Australian National University
 - Jackie Yi-Ru Ying, Institute of Bioengineering and Nanotechnology, Singapore
 - Jean-Pierre Bourguignon, President, European Research Council (Session Host)
 - Rush D. Holt, CEO, American Association for the Advancement of Science (Session Host)
 - Johanna Wanka, German Federal Minister of Education and Research (Official Opening)
 
2014
    
- David Chipperfield, David Chipperfield Architects
 - Karl Deisseroth, Stanford University, USA
 - Stefan Hell, Max Planck Institute for Biophysical Chemistry, Germany
 - Lisa Kaltenegger, Cornell University, USA
 - Christof Koch, Allen Institute for Brain Science, USA
 - Nathan S. Lewis, California Institute of Technology, USA
 - Mariana Mazzucato, University of Sussex, UK
 - Svante Pääbo, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Germany
 - Alan Rusbridger, Former Editor-in-Chief of The Guardian, UK
 - Thierry Zomahoun, African Institute for Mathematical Sciences (AIMS), South Africa
 - Anton Zeilinger, University of Vienna, Austria
 - Diane Griffin, vice-president of the United States National Academy of Sciences (Session Host)
 - Angela Merkel, Chancellor of the Federal Republic of Germany (Official Opening)
 - Sir Paul Nurse, President of the Royal Society, UK (Session Host)
 - Rupert Stadler, CEO, AUDI AG, Germany (Dinner speech)
 - Philippe Taquet, President of the French Academy of Sciences (Session Host)
 - Lev Zelenyi, Vice President of the Russian Academy of Sciences (Session Host)
 
2013
    
- Jagdish N. Bhagwati, Columbia University, USA
 - Olafur Eliasson, artist
 - Jill Farrant, University of Cape Town, South Africa
 - Stephen Friend, President Sage Bionetworks, USA
 - Anita Goel, CEO Nanobiosym, USA
 - Rolf-Dieter Heuer, CERN, Switzerland
 - Jules A. Hoffmann, Université de Strasbourg, France
 - Robert P. Kirshner, Harvard University, USA
 - Daniel G. Nocera, Harvard University, USA
 - Onora O'Neill, Baroness O'Neill of Bengarve, University of Cambridge, UK
 - Mark Pagel, University of Reading, UK
 - Dan Shechtman, Technion – Israel Institute of Technology, Israel
 - Salil Shetty, Secretary General Amnesty International, UK
 - Luc Steels, Universitat Pompeu Fabra Barcelona, Spain
 - Ai Weiwei, artist
 
2012
    
- David Awschalom, University of California, Santa Barbara
 - Monique Breteler, Harvard School of Public Health in Boston
 - Michael Bruter, London School of Economics
 - Philip Campbell, Nature Publishing Group
 - Awa Marie Coll-Seck, Senegal's Health Minister
 - David Harel, The Weizmann Institute of Science, Israel
 - Michel D. Kazatchkine, UN Special Envoy for HIV/Aids in Eastern Europe and Central Asia
 - Alan I. Leshner, AAAS and Science
 - Daniel Libeskind, Architect
 - Helga Nowotny, European Research Council (ERC), Vienna
 - Ina Schieferdecker, Fraunhofer FOKUS/Technische Universität Berlin
 - Hal Varian, Google Inc.
 - Daniel Zajfman, Weizmann Institute of Science, Israel
 
2011
    
- Anastasia Ailamaki, École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne
 - Nick Barton, Institute of Science and Technology, Austria
 - Aaron Ciechanover, Technion
 - Robert Darnton, Harvard University
 - Ingrid Daubechies, Duke University
 - Robert E. Horn, Stanford University
 - Wang Hui, Tsinghua University, Beijing
 - Mary Kaldor, London School of Economics
 - Ferenc Krausz, Max Planck Institute for Quantum Optics Munich
 - Angela Merkel, Chancellor of the Federal Republic of Germany
 - Helga Nowotny, European Research Council (ERC), Vienna
 - Kõji Omi, The Science and Technology in Society (STS) forum Kyoto
 - Annette Schavan, German Federal Minister of Education and Research
 - Dennis J. Snower, the Kiel Institute for the World Economy
 - Cédric Villani, Université de Lyon
 - Stewart Wallis, nef (the new economics foundation), London
 
2010
    
- Dalton Conley, Sociologist
 - Frederick Cooper, historian
 - Helmut Dosch, Physicist
 - Olafur Eliasson, artist
 - Doug Guthrie, Dean of The George Washington University School of Business
 - Olga Holtz, mathematician
 - Reinhard Hüttl, President at acatech
 - Thomas Lengauer, Director at the Max Planck Institute for Informatics
 - Yves Leterme, Prime Minister of Belgium
 - Karl Ulrich Mayer, President of the Leibniz Association
 - Jürgen Mlynek, President of the Helmholtz Association
 - Annette Schavan, professor, German Federal Minister of Education and Research
 - Sabine Schmidtke, professor, Center for Advanced Judaic Studies, University of Pennsylvania
 - Christian Wulff, President of Germany
 
References
    
- "FALLING WALLS CONFERENCE". European Research Council. Retrieved 4 July 2022.
 
- Central Science: More Falling Walls
 - Cern Document Server: Falling Walls
 - Scientific American: How science helped bring down the Berlin Wall
 - Scientific American: Walls to fall: 6 ideas at the intellectual frontier, from business models based on selflessness to glasses -free 3-D TV
 - Physicsworld.com: Breaking down walls in science
 - REGIERUNGonline: Rede von Bundeskanzlerin Merkel auf der Konferenz "Falling Walls"
 - Tagesspiegel: Die Leute wollen Cola classic
 - Tagesspiegel: Kontakt mit der Zukunft
 - WISSENSlogs: Falling Walls
 - Welt der Physik: Falling Walls 2009 – von Menschen und Mauern
 - Handelsblatt: Zukunftskonferenz in Berlin: Was die Wissenschaft verspricht
 - Die Welt: Mauerfall auch in der Forschung angemahnt
 - Berliner Morgenpost: Auch in der Forschung sollen Mauern fallen
 - Berliner Zeitung: Der Traum vom besseren Leben, as well published in Frankfurter Rundschau: Der Traum vom besseren Leben
 - BerliNews: Einstei'n bitte
 - After the U.S. Election, What's Next for Science?
 - No more walls
 - Falling Walls Lab comes to Manchester