AWARDS 2009
Fifteen projects from galaxy clusters to motor neuron degeneration were selected to receive grants totalling £365,000. These are the first grants awarded under the Britain-Israel Research and Academic Exchange scheme and were chosen for their innovation, strong approach to partnership and their potential to produce results for the benefit of the wider academic world and society at large.
Alphabetical by title
Principal Investigators: Prof Martin Kupiec, Tel Aviv University and Prof David Lydall, Newcastle University
The genome contains all the information required for the cells to function. It is made of DNA and organized in units called chromosomes. Each chromosome ends with a region called telomere. Telomeres protect the ends of the chromosomes and prevents them from eroding. These structures play an important role in cancer and aging. The Lydall and Kupiec groups are interested in understanding how telomeres are maintained. Using a combination of molecular biology, genetic and systematic approaches applied in the simple model organism budding yeast they aim to understand the mechanisms that maintain telomeres.
Principal Investigators: Dr Nir Osherov, Tel Aviv University and Dr Elaine Bignell, Imperial College
The environmental mould fungus Aspergillus fumigatus has developed the ability to cause fatal invasive infections in humans receiving cancer chemotherapy or organ transplants. This happens in around 16% of bone marrow transplant recipients. The researchers will study a newly identified subset of fungal proteins which contain repeated sequences of molecules, potentially capable of promoting rapid alterations in protein structure and therefore masking the fungus from human immune cells and, will eliminate production of these proteins in the fungus in an effort to abolish infectivity of this organism.
Principal Investigators: Prof Dan Levene, Southampton University and Prof Gideon Bohak, Tel Aviv University
Two internationally recognised specialists in the study of late antique Jewish magical texts will join forces to compare Jewish Babylonian incantations from the 5th -8th century CE with slightly later incantation texts from the Cairo Genizah that date from the 9th century onwards.
Principal Investigators: Prof David Elad, Tel Aviv University and Prof Denis J Doorly, Imperial College
Humans in urban areas are exposed to particulate matter and toxic gaseous airborne pollutants, which can damage the nasal respiratory tissue. The researchers will study in laboratory settings the biological changes in the human nasal epithelium in response to provocations of air pollutants by employing sophisticated new methodologies of nasal cell cultures, experimental simulators and computer simulations.
Principal Investigators: Prof Yoel Rephaeli, Tel Aviv University and Prof Joseph Silk, Oxford University
The main objectives of this project are a more realistic description of galaxy clusters (the largest systems in the universe), and improved determination of some of the basic properties of the universe, such as its visible and dark matter contents, and its evolutionary history. A basic aspect of their methodology is to use (as precise cosmological probes) the signatures imprinted on the cosmic microwave background radiation, and gravitational lensing of light from distant galaxies.
Oded Mintakevich
(individual researcher)
Principal Investigators: Prof Eran Hornstein, Weizmann Institute and Prof Elizabeth Fisher, University College London Institute of Neurology
The British-Israeli team is investigating the mechanisms underlying recently-discovered kinds of motor neuron diseases. Motor neuron diseases cause paralysis and later death and their genetics is only starting to be uncovered. The team will focus on highly relevant genes and explore how they cause the disease.
Principal Investigators: Prof Raz Jelinek, Ben Gurion University of the Negev and Prof Sheena E Radford, Leeds University
The research aims to shed light on one of the most urgent and devastating mysteries in modern medicine: what are the causes of amyloid diseases, which include Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease, and others. Using advanced experimental tools developed in their laboratories, the researchers hope to better understand the molecular basis for the ravaging consequences of these diseases. This collaborative study, could lead to development of new drugs and therapeutic avenues for these diseases.
Principal investigators: Prof Arlene D Wilson-Gordon, Bar Ilan University and Prof Ferruccio Renzoni, University College London
The UK-Israeli collaboration aims to exploit quantum mechanics in metrological applications. In the long term this will lead to a new class of devices which, based on concepts developed to understand the microscopic world, will be used in the "macroscopic" world we live in, a specific example being magnetometers to detect the heart beat.
Principal Investigators: Prof Adiel Stern, Weizmann Institute and Prof Nigel Cooper, Cambridge University
This study will search for special types of electronic systems, in which the quantum nature of the electrons is uniquely protected from external interferences. If realized, these systems may be useful for the construction of quantum computers, whose speed of computation is expected to far exceed that of classical ones.
Principal Investigators: Dr Derek K Jones, Cardiff University and Prof Yaniv Assaf, Tel Aviv University
The brain is an interconnected network. Information is created, processed and stored within different regions of the grey matter – and passed between these regions by white matter pathways that act as the ‘wiring’ of the network. The two laboratories have been developing different, but complementary neuroimaging methods to non-invasively quantify the make-up of the white matter pathways. The researchers will combine forces to try and determine what particular aspects of the white matter, and where in the network they lie, best explain differences in performance on a range of psychological tests.
Principal Investigators: Prof Ian Bennion, Aston University and Dr Jacob Scheuer, Tel Aviv University
Cryptography’s thorniest problem is how sender and receiver can securely share the ‘key’ — the string of 1s and 0s — they use to encrypt their messages. The researchers will use ultra-long fiber laser with the sender at one end and the receiver at the other in order to provide significantly longer ranges and higher data-rates.
Principal Investigators: Dr Blanche Schwappach, Manchester University and Dr Maya Schuldiner, Weizmann Institute
All living cells are surrounded by a membrane made of lipids that isolates them from the environment. In addition, eukaryotic cells have inner membranes enclosing their intracellular organelles. This creates sub-cellular compartments which have a unique composition. This project will use comprehensive, high throughput yeast genetic methods to unravel the wiring diagram of how the cell distributes several ions across different compartments.
UK-Tel Hai Research Partnership (funded separately by UJIA)
Principal Investigators: Dr Prudence Wong, Liverpool University and Dr Mordechai Shalom, Tel Hai Academic College
Principal Investigators: Prof Shulamit Ramon, Anglia Ruskin University and Dr Shira Hantman, Tel Hai Academic College
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