Eight Cambridge researchers awarded major European starter grants

cjb250 — Tue, 03 Sep 2019 13:35:55 +0000

̽��ֱ��European Research Council (ERC) Starting Grants have been awarded to 408 researchers from across Europe. ̽��ֱ��awards will help individual researchers to build their own teams and conduct world-leading research across all disciplines, creating an estimated 2,500 jobs for postdoctoral fellows, PhD students and other staff at the host institutions.

̽��ֱ��successful Cambridge researchers are:

Roland Bauerschmidt - Renormalisation, dynamics, and hyperbolic symmetry
Quentin Berthet - Computational Trade-offs and Algorithms in Statistics
Felix Deschler - Twisted Perovskites: Control of Spin and Chirality in Highly-luminescent Metal-halide Perovskites
Lorenzo Di Michele - A DNA NANOtechology toolkit for artificial CELL design
Louise Hirst - Gliding epitaxy for inorganic space-power sheets
Sertac Sehlikoglu - Imaginative Landscapes of Islamist Politics Across the Balkan-to-Bengal Complex
Blake Sherwin - CMB Lensing at Sub-Percent Precision: A New Probe of Cosmology and Fundamental Physics
Margherita Turco - Human Placental Development and the Uterine Microenvironment

Commenting on the awards, Dr Peter Hedges, Head of the ̽��ֱ�� Research Office at the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge, said: “ ̽��ֱ��success of UK researchers, and in particular Cambridge researchers, demonstrates the world-leading position that our country holds in research and innovation. This is a position we have will have to fight hard to maintain in the face of competition from other nations across Europe, the USA and China.

“Six of our successful researchers are non-UK nationals, showing once again that Cambridge has the ability to attract the very best talent from around the world to carry out research at its world class facilities.”

̽��ֱ��ERC-funded research will be carried out in 24 countries, with institutions from Germany (73), the UK (64) and the Netherlands (53) to host the highest number of projects. ̽��ֱ��grants, worth in total €621 million (£560 million), are part of the EU Research and Innovation programme, Horizon 2020.

Carlos Moedas, European Commissioner for Research, Science and Innovation, said: “Researchers need freedom and support to follow their scientific curiosity if we are to find answers to the most difficult challenges of our age and our future. This is the strength of the grants that the EU provides through the European Research Council: an opportunity for outstanding scientists to pursue their most daring ideas.”

President of the ERC, Professor Jean-Pierre Bourguignon, added: “In this year’s ERC Starting Grant competition, early-career researchers of 51 nationalities are among the winners – a record. It reminds us that science knows no borders and that talent is to be found everywhere. It is essential that, for its future successful development, the European Union keeps attracting and supporting outstanding researchers from around the world. At the ERC we are proud to contribute to this goal by supporting some of the most daring creative scientific talent.”

Eight Cambridge researchers are among the latest recipients of European Union awards given to early-career researchers from over 50 countries.

Six of our successful researchers are non-UK nationals, showing once again that Cambridge has the ability to attract the very best talent from around the world to carry out research at its world class facilities

Peter Hedges

Géry PARENT

Naturally-occurring perovskite

Researcher profile: Dr Margherita Turco

Among this year’s successful awardees is Dr Margherita Turco from Cambridge’s Centre for Trophoblast Research (CTR).

Margherita began her career studying the development of embryos in domestic animals during her studies for Veterinary Biotechnology at the ̽��ֱ�� of Bologna, in Italy. During her PhD in Molecular Medicine at the European Institute of Oncology in Milano, she became interested in how early cell lineage decisions are made and began using various stem cells models to address this question.

This led Margherita to come to Cambridge in 2012 to carry out her postdoctoral work on human trophoblast stem cells at the CTR. Her goal is to understand how the human placenta grows and develops during pregnancy.

“ ̽��ֱ��placenta is a remarkable organ that is formed early in pregnancy. It plays the crucial role of nourishing and protecting the baby throughout its development before birth,” she says. However, there is a lot that can go wrong during this period.

“Complications occurring during pregnancy, such as pre-eclampsia, fetal growth restriction, stillbirth, miscarriage and premature birth, are principally due to defective placental function. These conditions, which collectively affect around one in five pregnancies, can pose a risk to both the baby and mother’s health. Understanding early placental development is the key to understanding successful pregnancy.”

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Responsive material could be the ‘golden ticket’ of sensing

sc604 — Wed, 07 Jan 2015 00:00:00 +0000

Researchers from the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge have developed a new self-assembled material, which, by changing its shape, can amplify small variations in temperature and concentration of biomolecules, making them easier to detect. ̽��ֱ��material, which consists of synthetic spheres ‘glued’ together with short strands of DNA, could be used to underpin a new class of biosensors, or form the basis for new drug delivery systems.

̽��ֱ��interplay between the lipid spheres, called giant vesicles, and the strands of DNA produces a unique response when the material is exposed to changes in temperature. Instead of expanding when heated – as is normally the case – the material contracts, a phenomenon known as negative thermal expansion. Details are published today (7 January) in the journal Nature Communications.

In addition to its role as a carrier of genetic information, DNA is also useful for building advanced materials. Short strands of DNA, dubbed ‘sticky ends’, can be customised so that they will only bind to specific complementary sequences. This flexibility allows researchers to use DNA to drive the self-assembly of materials into specific shapes.

Basing self-assembled materials around vesicles – synthetic versions of the soft sacs which envelop living cells – allows for even more flexibility, since the vesicles are so easily deformable. Using short DNA tethers with a cholesterol ‘anchor’ at one end and an exposed sticky DNA sequence at the other, the vesicles can be stuck together. When assembled into a hybrid DNA-lipid network, the DNA tethers can diffuse and rearrange, resulting in massive vesicle shape changes.

Besides negative thermal expansion, the researchers also found that changes in temperature lead to a significant variation in the porosity of the material, which is therefore highly controllable. A similar response is expected by changing the concentration of the DNA tethers, which could also be replaced by other types of ligand-receptor pairs, such as antibodies.

“ ̽��ֱ��characteristics of this material make it suitable for several different applications, ranging from filtration, to the encapsulation and triggered release of drugs, to biosensors,” said Dr Lorenzo Di Michele of the ̽��ֱ��’s Cavendish Laboratory, who led the research. “Having this kind of control over a material is like a ‘golden ticket’ of sensing.”

This research is part of the CAPITALS, a UK-wide programme funded by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC). Cambridge Enterprise, the ̽��ֱ��’s commercialisation arm, is currently looking for commercial partners to help develop this material.

A new responsive material ‘glued’ together with short strands of DNA, and capable of translating thermal and chemical signals into visible physical changes, could underpin a new class of biosensors or drug delivery systems.

Having this kind of control over a material is like a ‘golden ticket’ of sensing

Lorenzo Di Michele

A lipid membrane functionalised with DNA-linkers

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̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge - Lorenzo Di Michele

Eight Cambridge researchers awarded major European starter grants

Responsive material could be the ‘golden ticket’ of sensing