Facts and figures

Budget

PSI's annual budget of 2010 amounts to CHF 329.2 million, divided up as follows (in millions of Swiss Francs):

Expenditure
Operational	260.1	79.0 %
Investments	69.1	21.0 %
Total	329.2	100 %
Division of funds
Financial contribution from the Confederation	241.7	73.4 %
Third-party funds	87.5	26.6 %
Provenance of third-party income
Private sector	30.4	42.0 %
Funds from the Confederation to support research	21.5	29.6 %
EU programmes	5.3	7.3 %
Other income	15.3	21.1 %
Total		100 %

The 2010 budget is distributed between the Paul Scherrer Institute's research areas as follows:

Employment

At the end of 2010, employment at PSI corresponded to 1400 full-time equivalent staff positions, of which 481 were occupied by scientists, not including the PhD students employed by the Institute. A further 726 positions were occupied by technicians and engineers, a relatively large number, reflecting the importance of technical staff for the successful operation of a large laboratory with its variety of scientific facilities. 91 positions were held by administrative staff. Of the total staff, 23.4% were women and 44% were non-Swiss citizens.

Teaching and postgraduate support

In 2010, more than 300 postgraduate students were working on their doctoral research projects at PSI. 197 were employed on a regular basis by PSI. Most of these young researchers had previously undertaken undergraduate studies in physics, chemistry or engineering, mainly at ETH in Zurich or EPFL Lausanne, at the Universities of Zurich or Bern, or in other countries. However, PSI's researchers were not just engaged in the further education of students on-site at Villigen. More than 80 PSI scientists hold a lecturing post at a Swiss university or technical university, and are therefore also teaching the researchers of tomorrow directly in the lecture theatre. This involvement at universities was unpaid, thus generating a double benefit for the universities, as they can offer their students access to state-of-the-art research at large facilities not available at any university. At the same time, the universities are also able to provide their teaching at a lower cost.

Research and publications

PSI is the largest publicly funded energy research centre in Switzerland. It carries out research and development on new energy technologies, in the area of renewable energies as well as in nuclear energy and combustion research. Industry in generally, and the energy industry in particular, make a significant contribution to the research projects in energy technology. Researchers at PSI produce about 950 ISI publications each year.

Knowledge and technology transfer

PSI has successfully transferred its detector development from the fundamental physics research stage into practical application. Former PSI employees established in 2006 the spin-off company Dectris AG for this purpose and both the turnover and workforce of the company have almost tripled since then. As a result, Dectris AG acquired new premises in Baden AG two years later in order to provide enough space to fulfil its contracts. PSI receives correspondingly more licence fees, which it is investing in new research projects in the field of detector research for physics and medicine.

User laboratory and international network

PSI makes significant contributions as a national user laboratory to researchers from both the universities and industry. About CHF 60 million go towards the operation, maintenance and ongoing development of the large research facilities, as well as the supervision and support of researchers from Swiss universities. The Institute supported more than 2000 scientists at its large facilities in 2010.

The success of a user facility is reflected in the interest of the scientific community in performing experiments at that facility and in the number of publications generated which are based on experiments carried out at it.

In 2010, around 600 articles based on experiments at PSI's large scale facilities are published in scientific journals, and approximately 5000 visits to PSI take place of scientists from around the world who come to perform experiments at one of the facilities. Most users of neutrons or synchrotron light come to PSI from Switzerland or member countries of the European Union. The Swiss scientists are evenly distributed between PSI itself and other centres. Most of the external researchers come from ETH Zurich, but scientists also come from EPF Lausanne, the Swiss universities and the Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Testing and Research, Empa. In the case of muon experiments, an extraordinarily high percentage of users come from overseas. One reason for this is certainly the fact that PSI is the only institute in the world operating a facility for experiments with slow muons.

Statistics for the year 2010
PSI Facility	Swiss Light Source SLS	Spallation Neutron Source SINQ	Swiss Muon Source SμS	Laboratory for Particle Physics LTP	Total
Number of user visits	3221	945	392	550	5108
Number of experiments	1085	483	187	4	1759

Proton therapy – immediate benefit for the society

Some sections of society benefit directly and immediately from out-patient proton therapy at the Institute. In 2010, PSI registered more than 5000 visits from cancer patients. A success rate of more than 98% puts PSI at the very forefront internationally in regard to the successful irradiation of melanoma of the eye. In 2010, more than one third of the patients with deep-seated tumours were children and teenagers. Many of these patients were infants, who received their treatment under anaesthetic. The success and social relevance of these projects persuaded the Canton of Aargau to promise in 2008 that it would give a subsidy of 20 million CHF to PSI towards the further development of proton therapy. These funds will be used for the development of a new kind of irradiation station and for the enlargement of the technical infrastructure for the patient preparation for therapy. This means that even more Swiss cancer patients will be able to benefit from this innovative treatment in the future.