EU Commissioner for Research, Innovation and Science meets successful Irish innovators in Dublin

- Commissioner Máire Geoghegan-Quinn highlights “diversity of scientific expertise” on Irish soil

Thursday, September 22^nd: EU Commissioner for Research, Innovation and Science, Máire Geoghegan-Quinn, was in Dublin’s Science Gallery today to meet with some of Ireland’s successful scientific researchers to have recently secured prestigious EU funding.

Based in Trinity College Dublin, University College Dublin, Dublin City University, Waterford Institute of Technology and NUI Maynooth, the researchers are among 480 talented researchers across Europe to have been selected this month for an European Research Council (ERC) ‘Starting Grant’. This scheme comprises an investment of €670 million over the next five years to fund cutting-edge research activity in life sciences, social sciences and humanities, and physical sciences and engineering.

Welcoming their respective achievements, Commissioner Geoghegan-Quinn said "European Research Council grants are highly coveted in the research community, especially amongst younger researchers who often struggle to find funding. The diversity and quality of these winners based in Ireland is very encouraging, and their research will contribute to our drive to make Europe more innovative and therefore more competitive."

Pictured today (Thursday, September 22^nd 2011) at Dublin’s Science Gallery were (left-right), John Nolan (Waterford Institute of Technology); Director General of Science Foundation Ireland, John Travers; Seán O’Riain (NUI Maynooth); EU Commissioner for Research, Innovation and Science, Máire Geoghegan-Quinn; Jennifer Claire McElwain (University College Dublin); Carola Schulzke (Trinity College Dublin); and Eoin Casey (University College Dublin).

The six successful Irish-based researchers are:

John Michael Nolan (Waterford Institute of Technology) Enrichment of macular pigment, and its impact on vision and blindness (Life Sciences)
Eoin Casey (University College Dublin): Analysis of Biofilm Mediated Fouling of Nanofiltration Membranes (Physical Sciences & Engineering)
Paolo Guasoni (Dublin City University): Market Frictions in Mathematical Finance (Physical Sciences & Engineering)
Jennifer Claire McElwain (University College Dublin): Atmospheric oxygen as a driver of plant evolution over the past 400 million years (Physical Sciences & Engineering)
Seán O’Riain (NUI Maynooth): New Deals in the New Economy (Social Sciences & Humanities)
Carola Schulzke (Trinity College Dublin): Synthesis of mono-dithiolene molybdenum complexes and their evaluation as potential drugs for the treatment of human isolated sulfite oxidase deficiency (Life Sciences)