School of Natural Sciences awarded multi-million € funding through Science Foundation Ireland (SFI) Centre
October 2014
 |
| Minister for Skills, Research and Innovation Damien English TD (left; holding a piece of Irish ore), Director General of Science Foundation Ireland Professor Mark Ferguson, (right) and Deputy Director of iCRAG Professor Balz Kamber (centre) at the SFI centers announcement. |
SFI has announced 6-year funding for 5 research centres in areas of national economic importance. The School of Natural Sciences at TCD is proud to be a significant partner in one of the centres - iCRAG, the Irish Centre for Research in Applied Geosciences. iCRAG is a multi-university hub-and-spoke centre administered by University College Dublin. Two of the spokes, Raw Materials and Ground Water are led by TCD PI's Balz Kamber (Geology) and Laurence Gill (Civil Engineering).
Several researchers from the School of Natural Sciences (McClenaghan, Nicholas, Chew, C. Coxon, Rocha, Goodhue, Kamber) will conduct industry-collaboration research into a variety of questions such as: sediment provenance, continental rifting history, ore pathway finders, pyrite detection, groundwater discharge and quality, and high-tech metal recovery. The Centre will boost infrastructure and technical support in the School's expanding geochemical laboratory facilities and add to the growing number of the School's postdoctoral and postgraduate community. The research will further strengthen our ties with TCD alumni working as industry leaders across the globe.