Grants for wild ideas

VILLUM Experiment has just awarded grants to Danish researchers, who each represent innovative approaches to their research areas, and thus to test their brave and strange technical and scientific research ideas. Associate Professor Alexander Zelikin and Professor Kim Daasbjerg are among the recipients.

Alexander Zelikin and Kim Daasbjerg are among this year's recipients of VILLUM Experiment grants. (Photos: Lars Kruse, AU Photo)
Alexander Zelikin and Kim Daasbjerg are among this year's recipients of VILLUM Experiment grants. (Photos: Lars Kruse, AU Photo)

In VILLUM Experiments the following applies: nothing ventured, nothing gained. The purpose of the program is to find and support very special technical and scientific research projects that challenge the norm and have the potential to change the world and our knowledge of the world.

This is how the VILLUM FOUNDATION explains the background for the grants that have just been awarded to researchers at Danish universities.

At Aarhus University, this year there are grants for a total of nine researchers totaling DKK 17.8 million.

Two of the recipients are researchers at Interdisciplinary Nanoscience Center (iNANO) and Department of Chemistry. They have each received DKK 2 million kroner each and the grant runs for up to two years.

The recipients at iNANO/Department of Chemistry are:

Associate Professor Alexander Zelikin, Department of Chemistry, receives two million kroner for the project "Polymer recycling via monomer reuse".

Professor Kim Daasbjerg, Department of Chemistry, receives two million for the project "Developing a Chemically Self Sustaining Martian Society".

Read more about the grant and about this year's awards on the VILLUM FOUNDATION's website (external link and in Danish only).