Two researchers at Trinity have each received €3.4 million between them in funding from the European Research Council.
Trinity researchers Dr Aidan McDonald and Dr Lydia Lynch were among six researchers at Irish universities who were awarded a total of €9 million by the Horizon 2020’s European Research Council (ERC).
Lynch, who is currently working at Harvard University and will move to Trinity next summer, was awarded €1.8 million for her project on the targeting of cell and adipocyte crosstalk for control of metabolism and body weight. The project will attempt to find new ways to manipulate a person’s own immune system to prevent and treat obesity and type 2 diabetes. In a press release, Lynch emphasised the importance of this funding for her research: “Rather than struggling to set up a lab at the beginning, this will allow us to move forward quicker, build a great team to carry out the research and get stuck in”.
The funding should allow Lynch to recruit five new researchers to work alongside her in Trinity. Expressing her hope that she can now develop world class research facilities in Trinity, Lynch added: “It also means I can contribute to high impact science in Ireland, which means a lot to me. Dublin is a great place for science, particularly immunology”.
McDonald, assistant professor of inorganic chemistry at Trinity, was awarded €1.5 million for his project, which will investigate the conversion of hydrocarbons into high commodity chemicals, pharmaceuticals and materials by analysis of chemical bonds. In a press release, McDonald said the grant would “it will accelerate our investigations towards a fundamental understanding of hydrocarbon activation, a process that is presently performed at great (unsustainable) energetic, financial and environmental cost.” The grant, McDonald hopes, will allow him to hire five new researchers, and provide further support to the PhD students currently working with him.
The Horizon 2020 awards are awarded to researchers early in their careers, with the hope of developing and promoting their research across a range of fields. This year, 291 researchers from across Europe were selected for the grant. There are currently 58 researchers across Irish universities now receiving funding through the ERC.
Four other researchers in Ireland also received funding, one each from University College Dublin (UCD), the National University of Ireland Galway (NUIG), Dublin Institute of Technology (DIT) and University College Cork (UCC).
