Four CSIC scientists receive Consolidator grants from the European Research Council to strengthen their research teams
Four scientists from the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC) have received funding from the European Research Council (ERC) to strengthen their research teams in the latest call of the Consolidator programme. These grants, which comprise an average of around two million euros over a five-year period, will boost their projects on energy, superbacteria, the deep cycle of terrestrial oxygen and microbial communities
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CSIC projects on energy, superbugs
Consolidator Grants are aimed at researchers with between seven and twelve years experience since completing their PhD who want to consolidate their research group. Funding for the 2022 call has been awarded to 321 researchers from 21 countries to promote projects covering all scientific disciplines.
Cristina Vicente, from the Institute of Micro and Nanotechnology (IMN-CSIC), leads the Cooled project, which proposes to develop an innovative technology without the use of batteries that is able to provide electrical power to the internet of things devices (physical device systems that receive and transfer data over wireless networks without human intervention). “The initiative suggests combining infrared radiation coolers and thermoelectric generators, an innovation that could be used in remote areas that are completely disconnected and independent of different environmental conditions,” says Vicente.
The treatments developed in Plas-fighter, a project led by Álvaro San Millán, from the Centro Nacional de Biotecnología (CNB-CSIC), will be able to eliminate bacteria carrying antibiotic-resistant plasmids (extrachromosomal DNA molecules). One of the main advantages of this approach is that these treatments will be highly specific, being able to eliminate only resistant bacteria, but without affecting the other members of the microbial community. “This is relevant given that dysbiosis, i.e. the alteration of the composition of microbial communities, such as those in our intestinal tract, is very often associated with secondary health problems,” says the CSIC researcher.
The aim of the OZ project, led by José Alberto Padrón Navarta, from the Andalusian Institute of Earth Sciences (IACT-CSIC-UGR), is to determine the extent of oxygen recycling at a depth of more than 100 kilometres, its relationship with the water cycle and the oxidation state of primitive arc magmas.