IceLab applied to the Kempe foundations for funding of nine postdoctoral fellows to launch novel multidisciplinary projects and collaborations between departments at Umeå University and The Swedish University for Agricultural Sciences, SLU. The application was successful, Kempe awarded three postdoctoral fellowships to launch the programme.This means funding for a two-year fellowship and 70,000 SEK for running costs and recruitment for each fellowship.
IceLab then invited teams of two or more researchers to submit their multidisciplinary project proposals. They received 17 applications, representing 21 departments across Umeå University and SLU. These were ranked by two reviewers outside of IceLab. The top three projects that will be funded and from June 15 is open for applications from postdoc candidates are:
1. Modelling strategies for long-term suppression of COVID-19 in Sweden
The project aspires to generate new insights of underlying determinants and patterns of super-spreading and clustering of Covid-19. It will make use of epidemiological and computational scientific approaches in combination with various types of epidemiological and socio-economic data. The ultimate goal is to use these insights for developing new strategies enabling suppression of the virus, while avoiding harmful effects on the economy.
This project will be led by Joacim Rocklöv (epidemiology and public health), working with Åke Brännström (mathematics), Martin Rosvall (physics), Henrik Sjödin (epidemiology and public health), Kenneth Bodin (Algoryx Simulator), Anders Johansson (clinical bacteriology), and Annelis Wilder-Smith (emerging infectious disease).
2. New targets for future antimicrobials
Bacterial infections with the associated increase of antibiotic resistance is an emerging global threat. Well-recognized clinical problems that contribute to this development are chronic infections. These infections are often resilient to treatment regimens that add to antibiotic overuse due to long term treatments, which is a driver for the rapid development of bacterial resistance. The goal of this project is to identify bacterial determinants that can be explored as targets for new antimicrobials by revealing bacterial mechanisms and/ or determinants that are critical for maintenance of infection in humans. Transcriptome data of clinically emerging bacteria obtained from patients with severe infections will be combined with data from experimentally validated in vitro gene expression analyses of various human pathogens exposed to infection relevant environmental conditions.
This project will be led by Maria Fällman and Kemal Avican (molecular infection biology), Martin Rosvall (physics) and Johan Normark (clinical infection biology).
3. Climate impact on the inland water carbon cycle
Inland waters (lakes, streams, rivers) play an important role in the global carbon cycle by emitting carbon to the atmosphere and burying carbon in sediments. Still, fundamental knowledge gaps exist because inland waters are generally studied in isolation, ignoring that carbon fluxes of inland waters are intimately linked in larger hydrological networks. This implies that current knowledge cannot adequately capture that changes in one process or system through a series of complex interactions trigger changes in other processes and systems. This project will assess climate impacts on carbon emission, burial and export from whole networks of inland waters.
This project will be led by Jan Karlsson (ecology and environmental science, CIRC), Martin Rosvall (physics), Lina Polvi Sjöberg (ecology and environmental science), and Hjalmar Laudon (forest ecology and management).
The deadline for postdoctoral applications is August 31.
Read more about the fellowship call and the application process
If you have questions, contact Gabrielle Beans at IceLab, gabrielle.beans@umu.se.