Marie Curie IRG

What are Marie Curie International Reintegration Grants (IRGs)?

The GlobalChangeBiology project is supported by the Seventh Framework Programme (FP7) of the European Union (EU). FP7 bundles all research-related EU initiatives and includes so-called Marie Curie Actions aimed to strengthen the human potential in research and technology in Europe. Specifically, the present project is funded by a Marie Curie IRG, which offers financial support for professional reintegration to European researchers that have carried out research outside Europe. The researcher (Dr. Luigi Ponti) applied for IRG funding in liaison with a reintegration host organisation located in Europe (ENEA), and the GlobalChangeBiology research proposals was selected in an open competition through transparent, independent peer review. Of the 281 IRGs awarded so far in Europe, eight fund projects that take place in Italy, and GlobalChangeBiology is the only Italian IRG dealing with global environmental issues (figures valid on 16 June 2009; please, see updated info at http://cordis.europa.eu/fp7/projects_en.html).

Implementation of the project

The implementation of the project involves scientific collaboration between ENEA’s “Lotta alla Desertificazione” Group (BIOTEC-DES) and the Gutierrez Laboratory at the University of California Berkeley (UC Berkeley), and in the process is expected to foster the professional integration of Dr. Ponti into ENEA. Interaction between the collaborating institutions and the conceptual flow of the work are illustrated in Figure 1. The duration of the project is 48 months (1 November 2008 to 31 October 2012).

Fig. 1. Organization chart (left) and conceptual representation of the innovation process (right) in the proposed project.

People

Andrew Paul Gutierrez is Professor of Ecosystem Science at UC Berkeley. His lab investigates plant-herbivore-natural enemy interactions as driven by edaphic and weather factors using physiologically based tritrophic models. The models are based on extensive field and laboratory data. The models are used to assess the theory and practice of biological control, to solve practical problems in pest management and crop production and protection (IPM), and to explore economic and theoretical issues. The models are currently being used to assess the effects of global warming on tritrophic systems.

Luigi Ponti received an IRG from the EU following his postdoctoral tenure at the UC Berkeley, during which he worked for two years in the Gutierrez Laboratory. He is also a member of CASAS (Center for the Analysis of Sustainable Agricultural Systems, http://cnr.berkeley.edu/casas/) and his expertise includes agroecology from the analysis to the design of sustainable agricultural systems.

The BIOTEC-DES group at ENEA has already succeeded in solving many complex issues related to the analysis of climate and desertification in agriculture, and therefore has all the infrastructures, facilities, and expertise required for this project. The following is a brief review of the BIOTEC-DES personnel:

Massimo Iannetta is the lead researcher of BIOTEC-DES. His main field of interest is the application of new technologies to the evaluation and monitoring of natural resources, with special reference to desertification. Nicola Colonna is a researcher with a PhD in agricultural science who specialises in drought and salt stress on plants, water quality assessment and water use. Patrizia Galeffi is a senior scientist with a PhD in molecular biology who focuses on functional genomics, transcriptomics and studies on the expression of genes related to drought stress in plants. Ludovica Giordano is a researcher with a PhD in environmental engineering with a primary interest in environmental monitoring via satellite/airborne RS and GIS. Patrizia Menegoni is a researcher with a PhD in botanical science and focuses on the analysis of vegetation dynamics, landscape ecology, and coastal zone management. Gabriele Schino is a researcher with a PhD in biology and focuses on satellite RS of natural resources and land use change.

Additional Remote Sensing and GIS expertise is brought to the project by Markus Neteler, a geographer with a long experience in the field of GIS modeling and remote sensing. He currently works at Fondazione Edmund Mach (Trento, http://gis.fem-environment.eu/) and is in the board of Directors of the Open Source Geospatial Foundation (http://www.osgeo.org/). He is the leading developer of GRASS (http://grass.osgeo.org/), a cutting edge open source GIS software that will be used as the GIS platform for GlobalChangeBiology. Dr. Neteler will make sure the project fully benefits form the open innovation model, which is recognized as key to increase knowledge sharing in Europe in the future.