RESEARCH CONDITIONS. Sambio Core Facilities had reason to celebrate at the end of last week, when it was announced that all the national infrastructures in which the platforms participate will continue to receive support from the Swedish Research Council (VR). Core Facilities at the University of Gothenburg participates in four of the eleven infrastructure initiatives awarded grants by VR.
“We were extremely happy and proud after receiving notification from VR on Thursday,” comments Elisabet Carlsohn, head of department for Sambio Core Facilities, which along with the Laboratory for Experimental Biomedicine (EBM), constitutes Core Facilities at the University of Gothenburg.
Investments in research infrastructure are extremely important in creating the best conditions for research of the highest scientific quality. They enable us to have the specific expertise and infrastructure environments needed for collaboration and support research in a way that is usually not possible at a single university. As researchers, we gain access to high-quality infrastructures that make available the best methods, advanced equipment and – most important – the technological expertise.”
Included in four out of eleven
Four units within Sambio Core Facilities are part of the national infrastructures: Center for Cellular Imaging (CCI), Proteomics, Bioinformatics and Biobank. Sambio’s platforms are involved in four research infrastructures of national interest: National Bioinformatics Infrastructure Sweden (NBIS), Biobank Sweden (BIS), National Infrastructure in Biological Mass Spectrometry (BioMS) and National Infrastructure for Microscopy in Life Sciences (NMI). Both the Bioinformatics and Biobank infrastructures are based at Uppsala University, mass spectrometry is based at Lund University and the microscopy infrastructure is based at the Royal Institute of Technology.
Own niche
Julia Fernandez-Rodriguez is the director of CCI, which has a special niche within the national microscopy infrastructure: correlative multimodal imaging (CMI) in 3D.
“This is a method combining two or more imaging technologies, which offers the best features of the technologies used. CMI is well suited to address the complex issues that arise in biological and biomedical research because it can provide a comprehensive and complementary knowledge of several parameters, including structural, molecular, dynamic and chemical information,” says Fernandez-Rodriguez.
SEK 700 million in the call for proposals
The Swedish Research Council received 27 applications in response to the call for proposals for research infrastructure of national interest. Eleven of these were granted, and Sambio Core Facilities is a co-applicant in four of them. Within the call, about SEK 700 million will be distributed for the 2020–2024 period, but the division of funds is not yet been determined.
A national infrastructure in which the University of Gothenburg was a co-applicant did not receive a call grant. That application concerned a new infrastructure called SWECCLIM, which involves streamlining and coordinating the use of large animals in research. The University of Gothenburg’s part of the application concerned module 5, which is about the 3R principles – replacing, refining and reducing animal experiments – and training.
TEXT: ELIN LINDSTRÖM
