Newsletter 5

Earth and Life Sciences News

IPY and visit of Dutch crown prince and princess to Antarctica Headline news: Willem-Alexander and Maxima visited Antarctica to generate support for Dutch polar research. From 5-7 March 2009 the International Polar Year will be formally concluded in Middelburg. A symposium will be held on 5 March and the public event Polar Experience on 6 and 7 March.

TOP subsidies This year a new type of subsidy will be launched by ALW, the so-called TOP subsidy. This subsidy is worth a maximum of 720,000 Euro and is intended for established research groups. The deadline for preliminary proposals is 1 May 2009. Further information about this subsidy will soon be available on the ALW website.

Darwin Year The year 2009 is the year of Charles Darwin. Many activities have been organised such as exhibitions and lectures. NWO-ALW is also actively involved in some of these.

Evaluation Darwin Centre The Darwin Centre for Biogeology was founded in 2004 with funding from ALW. The partnership located at Utrecht University has been evaluated. Following the evaluation committee's positive advice, ALW has decided to release the 3.5 million Euro reserved for the second period (2009-2011) of the Darwin Centre.

Personnel news ALW office The following have recently left the ALW office: - Suzy Ronokaryo, secretariat - Carmen van Meerkerk, application management New staff at ALW are: - Jennifer Grant, policy officer Sea and Coastal Research programme - Arwen Messersmid, secretariat - Madelon Boersma, secretariat

Grants awarded In the Open programme 13 of the 41 proposals submitted were funded, see overview. Investment Subsidy Medium: 5 out of 19 applications were approved, for a total of 1.6 million Euro, see overview. Ergo: for the current project Introgression of crop(trans-)genes into wild relatives, an additional 50,000 Euro has been made available for the purchase of SNP arrays. Programme news Sea and Coastal Research A budget has been made available for the subsidiary programme North Sea, and two government departments are interested in funding the work. This will soon result in a new call. A budget has been made available for the interactive website. This will allow the appointment of an extra editor who will maintain weblogs about the 9 Wadden Sea projects that received funding in 2008. Furthermore, the Underwater Sound and Biology Symposium will take place on March 17, 2009.
Brain and cognition: new call Preproposals can be submitted for a call within the programme Brain and cognition, an integrated approach. For this call a maximum of 6 million Euro is available. Submitting a preproposal is a mandatory part of this call.
Biodiversity: special edition of the magazine Landschap (Landscape) At the concluding symposium for the NWO Stimulation Programme Biodiversity the special edition Biodiversity was presented to the financiers of the programme: LNV, VROM and the ALW Divisional Board. The special edition provides an overview of the results from the programme and was produced in partnership with the magazine Landschap. Copies of the special edition can be requested at smiet@nwo.nl (available on a first come first served basis).
Deadlines 3 March: closing date Vidi 6 March: closing date Eurosynbio 6 March: closing date EuroEEFG (ecology, ecotoxicology, ecogenomics) 31 March: closing date preproposals Vici 1 April: closing date Rubicon 1 May: closing date MEERVOUD 18 May: closing date preproposals North Sea 3 June: closing date Brain and Cognition Click here for further information about the deadlines.

Press releases

Suppression indigenous species As a result of global warming, exotic plant and animal species are now establishing in the Netherlands. These can suppress the indigenous species. Vici researcher Wim van der Putten has published an article about this in Nature after research in the Millingerwaard.

Climate change reduces the nutritional value of algae Under the influence of climate change micro-algae are growing faster but their composition is also changing. Consequently their nutritional value for animals is decreasing. As algae are at the base of the food chain, climate change is therefore exerting an influence on underwater life as well, conclude researchers from the Netherlands Institute for Ecology (NIOO) and Universiteit van Amsterdam.