In 1853, a Technical Institute was founded in Lausanne which became later EPUL, the Polytechnic Institute of the University of Lausanne, run by the State of Vaud. It was in 1969 that this Institute became the actual Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (EPFL) in Lausanne. This explains the close links that still exist between the University of Lausanne and especially its Faculty of Sciences and EPFL.

Officially, the Laboratory for Technical Physics of EPUL was created back January 31st 1947 and its Direction attributed to Prof. R. Mercier. Before that date, no Physics Section with Diploma existed at EPUL and all the Basic Sciences (Mathematics, Physics and Chemistry) were taught by the staff of the Faculty of Sciences of the University. It was understood then that the new born laboratory would develop activities at the boundary between fundamental and applied research. Naturally, its staff had to teach physics to the other engineer sections. EPUL was then allowed to create a diploma of "engineer-physicist" by introducing adequate syllabi. In 1947, two collaborators were attached to the Laboratory of Technical Physics: an assistant and a technician in mechanics. Today, after 50 years, this Laboratory has become the Institute of Experimental Physics of EPFL with four full professors, one titular professor, 45 scientific collaborators and 11 technical and administrative staff.

Among the first research activities, piezo-optical properties of crystals, response of systems submitted to ultrasonic radiation and development of Nuclear Magnetic Resonance Instruments are to be mentioned, with a permanent demonstration of a proton NMR signal during the 1955 "Atom for Peace Conference" in Geneva. Also work on surfaces and thin films (optical and transport properties) and vacuum technique developments were undertaken, which turned under the Direction of Professor J.-P. Borel into the physics of "small particles and clusters" in the beginning of the seventies. Further projects were then developped at the Institute, principally in optics, medical engeneering, and phase transitions. The Institute co-organized with the University Claude Bernard in Lyon the first and second ISSPIC conferences in the field of inorganic clusters and small particles. The ninth ISSPIC conference will again be organized in Lausanne in 1998 after Berlin, Chicago, Kobe, Copenhagen etc...

Today, the central research effort at the Institute is nanoscale physics, with activities in clusters, surfaces, ultra-thin films and nanostructured materials.