Over € 100 million awarded for 37 projects in Gravitation programme

Six research teams of top scientists from various Dutch universities have received funding in the NWO programme Gravitation (Zwaartkracht) to jointly set up excellent scientific research programmes in the coming years. Each team receives € 18.8 million, which makes the total funding € 112.8 million. Altogether there were 37 applications submitted. The grants are funded by the Ministry of Education, Culture and Science. NWO selected the research groups on behalf of the Ministry.

The awarded grants concern research in the area of regenerative medicine that makes use of the regenerative capability of the body to heal damaged or diseased tissues and organs, quantum computers and quantum networks, the construction of an artificial biological cell, research based on the Greco-Roman world, research into the origin, development and characteristics of sustainable cooperation, and the development of miniature organs on microchips for specific diseases.

Aim of the Gravitation programme is bringing the best researchers in a discipline or in several disciplines together and to facilitate excellence and the international position of research in the Netherlands. With the grants, the researchers will be able to do top-level university research for a period of ten years and collaborate at the highest scientific level.