European Research Council Funds Cutting-Edge Irish Research into Microplastics and Traumatic Brain Injury

€780 million in grants awarded to emerging talent across Europe

5 September: Two University College Dublin (UCD) researchers are among 494 young scholars to receive European Research Council (ERC) Starting Grants today. The funding - totalling nearly €780 million - is part of the EU Horizon Europe programme and will support the scholars to launch cutting-edge research projects. Seven projects in total will be hosted in Ireland.

Dr Junli Xu, Assistant Professor and Ad Astra Fellow atUCD School of Biosystems and Food Engineering and aUCD Conway Fellow, was awarded €1.5 million for her project ‘Machine Learning Combined with Spectral Imaging for Inferring the Toxicity of Micro- and Nanoplastics’ (Plastox). Dr David MacManus, Assistant Professor atUCDSchool of Mechanical and Materials Engineering, will receive €1.5 million for his project ‘Bridging the sex gap in traumatic brain injury biomechanics’ (brainsex). 

European Commissioner for Innovation, Research, Culture, Education and Youth, Iliana Ivanova, said, “The European Commission is proud to support the curiosity and passion of our early-career talent under our Horizon Europe programme. The new ERC Starting Grants winners aim to deepen our understanding of the world. Their creativity is vital to finding solutions to some of the most pressing societal challenges. In this call, I am happy to see one of the highest shares of female grantees to date, a trend that I hope will continue. Congratulations to all!”

UCD Vice President for Research, Innovation and Impact, Professor Kate Robson Brown said, “Congratulations to Dr Xu and Dr MacManus on receiving coveted ERC grants. Their groundbreaking projects will contribute significantly to their respective fields. UCD is committed to supporting academic career development and ambitious projects at every career stage and we are excited to follow the progress of these promising researchers and their fascinating projects.”

President of the European Research Council, Professor Maria Leptin, said: “Empowering researchers early on in their careers is at the heart of the mission of the ERC. I am particularly pleased to welcome UK researchers back to the ERC. They have been sorely missed over the past years. With fifty grants awarded to researchers based in the UK, this influx is good for the research community overall.”

Successful UCD projects

PlasTox

Tiny plastic particles, known as micro- and nanoplastics (MNPs), are everywhere - in the air we breathe, the water we drink, and the food we eat. A recent (opens in a new window)international conference on Microplastics and Human Health at UCD highlighted that the levels of microplastics in the environment are around 100 times higher than the levels of other chemicals, and that a significant amount of research is still required to establish the exact toxic effects of microplastics on humans. 

PlasTox will investigate how MNPs affect human digestive health. The outcomes of this research have the potential to yield breakthroughs in numerous key applications such as toxicological screening of drugs, safety assurance and environmental hazard monitoring, and to open up a whole new field of research in toxicology.

Principal Investigator (PI) and Leader of the Microplastics Research Group at UCD, Dr Junli Xu, explained, “By using advanced techniques such as machine learning and spectral imaging, we will develop new models that can predict the health impacts of MNPs, potentially transforming how we assess the risks they pose and reducing the need for costly lab experiments. The significance of this work lies in its potential to revolutionise our approach to toxicology, environmental safety, and public health, by offering more accurate and efficient ways to assess the risks associated with MNP exposure.”

Dr Xu continued, “I am thrilled and deeply grateful to be awarded an ERC Starting Grant.  PlasTox provides me with the opportunity to explore highly ambitious and innovative research ideas that are both transformative and impactful, expanding beyond microplastic research into other areas of toxicology. Attaining competencies in the microplastic domain involves environmental science, life science, analytical chemistry, mathematics and data analytics to make substantial progress and anchor this field of research as a standalone activity. The ERC Starting grant provides an optimal solution for such evolution, allowing for the acquisition of essential instruments and the expansion of my research team.”

“I sincerely thank my collaborators, colleagues, and team members for their support, with special gratitude to Professor Aoife Gowen for her mentorship and inspiration. I am also deeply grateful to the SFI-IRC Pathway Programme and the UCD Ad Astra Fellowship for their funding, which has enabled my research independence.” 

Brainsex

Traumatic brain injury (TBI) affects 30 million women globally each year. The highest reported incidence is in people over 75 years old, and while women account for more TBIs than men, they remain underrepresented in the research. Finite element brain models (FEBMs) have played a major role in improving understanding of TBI to date, but they have been developed using male-only data and cannot accurately model female TBI.

Director of(opens in a new window) the BRAIN Lab at UCD, Dr David MacManus, is working to address this problem through the brainsex project. “We currently lack female and geriatric specific computer models. This limits our understanding of TBI biomechanics and the efficacy of protective, diagnostic, and therapeutic technologies for these demographics. This crucial support from the ERC will provide my lab with the necessary resources to embark on frontier research to understand the role sex specific neuroanatomy plays in TBI biomechanics.” 

Dr MacManus and his team will develop the first sex specific computer models of the brain that incorporate sex specific neuroanatomy and material damage properties of brain tissue, its blood vessels and cells. To obtain these damage properties, they will develop new experimental technologies to measure how such tissues and cells become damaged under conditions similar to those experienced during high energy head impacts.

He continued, “Brainsex will revolutionise our understanding of TBI and open a new horizon for biomechanics research focussing on the important role sex plays in the mechanical behaviour of biological tissues. 

“I am very grateful to all of my collaborators, friends, and past and current members of BRAIN Lab for their inspiration and motivation that has contributed to this success. I am particularly grateful to my colleagues in UCD Research and the UCD School of Mechanical and Materials Engineering for their continued support throughout. I would also like to thank Enterprise Ireland for their support through the EI Horizon Europe ERC Support grant. I am excited to begin this new research project and see what discoveries await.”

For further information and a full list of awardees visit the(opens in a new window)European Research Council website.