Zurich - the city
Although being the biggest city in Switzerland, and having an attractive international flair, Zurich is still relatively small and allows students to live and study at the same place.
A number of useful links facilitate the acclimatisation to living in Zurich:
www.zurich-relocation.ch/content/livinginzurich.html
www.unizh.ch/leben/wohnen/index.en.html
www.ethz.ch/prospectives/housing/index_EN
A Ph.D. in Zurich
The University of Zurich and the ETHZ both provide helpful administrative guidelines to their Ph.D. students:
http://www.mnf.unizh.ch/administration/reglemente/promoneu.html
And finally there is a guide available for students to help them through their whole Ph.D. study:
www.aveth.ethz.ch/sg/sg2002.pdf
Language
Although you don't need to know any German for your PhD studies, it might be useful for your daily life to be able to communicate with the locals. A broad variety of language courses is offered at the universites as well as at many other private and public schools.
The Life Science Zurich Graduate School offers a course in a joint project with the Graduate School of Mathematics. Please contact Jessica Bolsinger for more information or to register for a specific course.
Another possibility is to attend a German course at the Language Centre of the ETH and the University of Zurich. Have a look at their program, they offer much more than only German courses!
Also outside the universities many institutions offer different German courses. We have put together a small list for you, however feel free to browse for other courses. You will quickly find out that you are spoilt for choice.
Viel Erfolg!
Health Insurance
If you stay and work in Zurich you will need to have a health insurance. To find out which insurance company offers which kind of service for how much money you can click on one of the two links below.
Comparis: Private comparision of health insurances
Governmental comparision of health insurances
