Two York professors win 10 million euros each for ground breaking research projects

Two University of York academics are set to lead ambitious global research projects after each securing 10 million euros in funding from the European Research Council’s (ERC) highly competitive Synergy Grant scheme.

Professors Rob Marchant (Environment and Geography) and Oliver Craig (Archaeology) received the grants, leading two huge projects. The ERC Synergy Grants fund world-leading teams, tackling some of the toughest and most ambitious scientific questions.

AFRI-CAN project

Via Google Maps

Working across nine mountain regions, AFRI-CAN will explore how East African mountain ecosystems, and the countries who rely on them, can survive and thrive against climate change.

Professor Marchant said:

“Research across the project will showcase how important mountains are for people, for nature and for future sustainability. Insights from the project will help us to navigate through the multiple and linked challenges that lie ahead in the coming decades.”

FORAGER project

FORAGER aims to understand human population dynamics during the Holocene – the current ecological period spanning the last 10,000 years.

By engaging with Indigenous partners and combining archaeological science with climate research, the project will explore how hunter-gatherer communities across the Northern Hemisphere achieved large population growth and social complexity long before farming became the global norm.

Professor Craig said:

“Despite living in similar environments, cross-cultural comparisons between temperate hunter-gatherers from North America, East Asia and Northern Europe are astonishingly rare.”

Set up by the European Union in 2007, the ERC is the leading European funding body for high impact research. It supports researchers of any nationality and age to run projects across Europe. Both AFRI-CAN and FORAGER will also include close collaboration with local communities.

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The ERC Synergy Grants encourage teamwork between researchers, allowing them to combine their expertise, knowledge and resources to push the boundaries of scientific discovery.

Professor Maria Leptin, President of the European Research Council, said:

“Collaboration is at the heart of the ERC Synergy Grants. In our latest round, teams of researchers will join forces to address the most complex scientific problems together – this time, they are more international than ever. Such scientific endeavours are what Europe needs to be at the real forefront.”

Featured images via YouTube