Some context for this good news: ERC, the European Research Council, is an instrument of the European Commission which, as our readers already know, aims to fund the best creative researchers conducting pioneering and cutting-edge research.
Just a few days ago, the first ERC grants were awarded under Horizon Europe, the European Union's new framework programme for research and innovation, which covers the period 2021-2027 with total funding of EUR 95.5 billion including EUR 5.4 billion earmarked for the Next Generation EU recovery plan).
It is the largest transnational research and innovation programme in the world and has selected 313 projects to conduct pioneering research in all scientific disciplines in 2022. The winners represent 42 nationalities and will carry out their projects at universities and research centres in 24 EU Member States. They include 11 Italians.
"Finding new solutions in the fields of energy, health or digital technologies is only possible if we manage to attract and retain scientific talent"
said European Commissioner for Innovation, Mariya Gabriel.
. Sara Bagherifard, con ArcHIDep, e a Massimo Tavoni, con EUNICE, vanno i 2 ERC consolidator Grant 2022. Le ricerche sono state selezionate tra le oltre 2mila proposte ricevute da ERC (un grande risultato per il nostro Ateneo, considerando che quest’anno solo il 11,8% dei progetti presentati hanno ottenuto il finanziamento). Oltre a questi due progetti, ad oggi in totale sono 48 i grant ERC ottenuti da ricercatori del Politecnico di Milano.
Massimo Tavoni's, Massimo Tavoni’s, Professor of Climate Change Economics at the Department of Management Engineering and Director of RFF-CMCC, European Institute on Economics and the Environment , has the goal of reducing the uncertainties involved in confronting climate change.
His research covers energy and climate economics, and specifically the modelling of international climate policies (see also Il Corriere). With the EUNICE project, Tavoni is tackling the problem of uncertainties in climate stabilisation pathways and the current climate-energy-economy models for identifying the scenarios. The main objective is to convert these model-generated 'maps of the future' into indications that help define resilient, robust and reliable policies to counter climate change.
Through the unique combination of computer and behavioural science, EUNICE is developing a method that is also relevant to other areas of research involving high-risk environmental, social and technological assessments (Find out more at this link).
Sara Bagherifarda senior researcher in the Department of Mechanics, has numerous scientific publications and several awards to her name, for a wide range of research activities, including numerical and experimental approaches to design, manufacture and characterising multifunctional materials for emerging engineering applications. Her scientific interests cover impact surface treatments, surface coatings, nanomaterials and additive manufacturing. The results of her studies and research are multidisciplinary and can be implemented in the most diverse sectors, such as the aerospace, automotive, rail and biomedical industries.
With the ArcHIDep projectBagherifard intends to deploy a revolutionary solid state deposition system in order to obtain heterogeneous materials with architecture structured on three levels of scale: micro, meso and macro. ArcHIDep will make it possible to develop a framework, which does not currently exist, for designing and building components which are capable of overcoming the limitations associated with the current inability to combine conflicting properties (Links for further information).
