PRIMA - Enhancement of Marine Research Infrastructures (EMBRC –IT)

ITA | ENG

Project
“PRIMA - Enhancement of Marine Research Infrastructures (EMBRC –IT)”, lasting 32 months, aims to create the most important hub for scientific and technological research in marine biology in Europe. The existing research infrastructures will be upgraded through the acquisition of new instrumentation and innovative facilities that will allow analyses and investigations that are currently impossible to perform in the marine environment. High-tech vessels will enable the exploration of marine resources even in deep-sea environments, in particular in the Tyrrhenian Sea and in the seas of Southern Italy. The upgrade of existing facilities and the implementation of new ones across the country, for example in the Middle Adriatic Sea, in Sicily and Calabria, will open new avenues for scientific research in marine biotechnology and bioinformatics devoted to marine genomes.

Financial Resources
The project was funded with 15.285.760,68 euro by the NOP Research and Innovation 2014-2020 under the action “Enhancement of Research Infrastructures” which supports projects aimed at the upgrading of 18 research infrastructures identified as priorities by the Ministry of University and Research in the PNIR 2014-2020, covering one or more ESFRI (European Strategy Forum on Research Infrastructures) Areas and having a significant impact on the trajectories of the National Smart Specialization Strategy included in the “Smart and Sustainable Industry, Energy and Environment” Area.

Impact on the Territory
The beneficiary of the funding is Stazione Zoologica Anton Dohrn, National Institute of Marine Biology, Ecology and Biotechnology, which, through its lines of research, is involved in three European Infrastructures (ERIC) in the framework of the ESFRI Roadmap, as well as being the Coordinator of the Italian Node of EMBRC (European Marine Biology Resource Centre), which supports excellent research in the field of Blue Biotechnologies and marine biodiversity in Europe. The project will help Italy to increase its competitiveness in the marine biotechnology sector, reducing the gap in the development of patents from research on marine organisms and genomes, thus paving the way for an ecologically sustainable use of marine resources. Moreover, the transfer of technology and knowledge derived from this project, as well as the use of selected microorganisms to restore polluted marine sites, represent an advanced tool in the remediation of sites of national interest and in environmental remediation.

Further information (in Italian):

Sito della Stazione Zoologica Anton Dohrn – Pagina dedicata all’infrastruttura

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26/04/2021