Timeline

Bringing together chemists and physicists to thoroughly investigate how electrochemical processes work on the smallest scale. That is the goal of the new Advanced Nano-electrochemistry Institute of the Netherlands, or ANION for short. The consortium receives a Gravitation funding of 23.6 million euros for this purpose. Professor Petra de Jongh from Utrecht University is one of the co-applicants.

There are still a lot of unsolved mysteries in electrochemistry. The ANION scientists will investigate the processes that are important for batteries, electrolysers, and fuel cells.

Read full article here.

On 27 June the Future of Work conference is held in Utrecht. This year's central theme is staff shortages. 

The conference will be held in Dutch. 

Programme
With:

• Anne van der Put (Sociology)

• Chris Janssen (Applied psychology) 

• Maartje de Graaf (Human-Computer Interaction)

• Marguerite van de Berg (Organisational science. Author: 'Werk is geen oplossing')

Registration will soon be open here.

Special chair connects Geosciences and Biology

Utrecht University has appointed Suzanne McGowan as Special Professor of Aquatic Ecosystem Dynamics. Her chair offers a unique combination between the university's faculties of Science and Geosciences. McGowan integrates this with her main affiliation as the Head of Aquatic Ecology at the Netherlands Institute of Ecology (NIOO-KNAW). As a professor, she aims to uncover how water ecosystems have been functioning, and how the major changes on our planet affect this.

More about Aquatic Ecosystem Dynamics

Insights into 'hot topic' in behavioral research

Chimpanzees that are unable to figure out a complex puzzle on their own, are capable of learning the solution from other chimps that were trained to solve it. Utrecht University researcher Edwin van Leeuwen and international colleagues conclude this based on experiments conducted with groups of chimpanzees in Zambia. The study demonstrates, for the first time, that chimpanzees, like humans, can acquire skills from one another that they cannot innovate themselves. In doing so, the study offers new insight into the evolution of culture.

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Many cancer drugs recently approved by the European Medicines Agency (EMA) lack clear proof of added benefit. This is particularly the case for drugs that are granted via special processes, intended to accelerate the approval of promising treatments. A research team from Utrecht University draws this conclusion today in the scientific journal The BMJ. Their study also indicates that almost all oncology drugs, including these fast-tracked drugs, manage to recover their substantial research and development (R&D) costs relatively quickly after approval.

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Although universities are trying their best to attract more female physics students, still only about one in four students is female. This means that women who choose physics often end up in the minority throughout their careers.

On March 22, Utrecht University will host the very first conference in the Netherlands about women working in physics. WomenNetPhysics is a networking event for anyone interested in the role of women in physics, no matter where you are in your career – whether you're a student, academic, or industry professional.

Read more and register for WomenNetPhysics

How do you achieve impact through your research findings? For instance, by publishing a paper in a leading academic journal, or speaking about it at a public event or in the media. But the Data School's Mirko Schäfer and Iris Muis do not find the time to publish as often as they would like. And yet, their research is having significant impact, with their work used in e.g. Austria, Sweden, Finland and Greece.

Iris Muis and Mirko Schäfer, along with associate professor Karin van Es, are the figureheads of the Data School, an education and research platform exploring the impact of digitisation on society. Schäfer is an associate professor at the Science Faculty as well as co-founder of the Data School. Team manager Muis was nominated Responsible AI Leader by Women in AI Netherlands. Schäfer just returned from Finland, where the Data School team worked to raise awareness among scientists and government officials on the ethical aspects of big data projects. They did so with the Data Ethics Decision Aid (DEDA), a toolkit used to help officials by guiding them through each step of the decision-making process.

Find out more!

A project team led by Utrecht University examined how companies can monitor their AI applications. “Artificial intelligence is getting an increasingly important role in organisations, yet there is no structural monitoring of how AI performs its tasks,” project leader Iris Muis reveals. As a result, risks of profiling and discrimination, for example, are growing. “Our solution is a periodic ‘performance review’, just as is the case with human employees.”

Evaluating functioning of AI

“A ‘job interview’ for AI is already common”, Muis says. “There are many tests available to determine whether a particular AI would fit within a company.” But once an AI system is implemented, it is not monitored or evaluated, her research team found. It turned out to be a gap that exists in academic literature as well as in practice. “While the performance of AI systems should be evaluated periodically to check whether they are doing and continue to do what is intended.”

Muis and her team subsequently developed a performance review for AI. “With this set-up, we provide tools for market players and supervisors to evaluate the functioning of AI,” Muis explains.

Read more about the questionnaire for artificial intelligence

On Friday, 19 January, Hajo Reijers held his inaugural lecture in the Academiegebouw of Utrecht University. Since 2019, Reijers has been Professor of Business Process Management & Analytics in the Department of Information and Computing Sciences. In his inaugural lecture, Reijers argues, among other things, that a new scientific discipline is emerging called Process Science. The discipline originates from the analysis of business processes but extends its focus to a much broader range of processes.

Computer scientists have been studying business processes for about thirty years. This has yielded many accomplishments, from workflow management systems to methods for the innovation of business processes. A major recent development in the study of business processes within computer science is process mining. With process mining, it is possible to gain insight into how business processes unfold, based on log files, databases, and other information systems.

Greater impact on science and society

In his inaugural lecture, Reijers argues that a new scientific discipline is emerging: Process Science. Within this discipline, researchers use and extend the methods, tools, and techniques developed for the study of business processes. However, they apply these to analyze a much broader range of processes that also have a greater impact on science and society. "I believe it is time to broaden our view," says Reijers.

Process Science was first defined in a scientific paper in 2021 as the interdisciplinary study of continuous change. A few months ago, a new journal on Process Science was established.

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A large consortium led by Utrecht University has been awarded a 5 million euro Horizon Europe grant. The partners will develop an assessment framework to map the impact of sustainability and climate change education. The number of initiatives in this field has grown enormously, but due to a lack of insight into their quality, there is a great need for impact assessment. The IMP>ACT project has started in January and will run for four years.

Opportunities for education about sustainability and climate are plentiful since the UN's Decade of Education for Sustainable Development. Educational institutions and other organisations have increasingly more options to choose from when it comes to educational methods that seek to raise awareness of climate change and promote sustainable actions. Teachers want only the best for their students, but how do they make the right choice? How do they know if a certain method will indeed build their students’ competence to act, and think differently about climate change

Continue reading about the large European consortium led by Utrecht University.

Photo: Lize Kraan | Summerschool Junior Utrecht University