Three UG scientists in the exact sciences and social sciences and humanities have been awarded a Vici grant by research financier NWO. They will each receive 1.5 million euros to set up their own line of research over the next five years.
Philosopher and statistician Jan-Willem Romeijn has been awarded the grant to study the use of big data in psychology and psychiatry from the perspective of the philosophy of science. He hopes to make methods that are already being used in laboratories and clinics more reliable.
Physicist Steven Hoekstra wants to gain a deeper understanding of the standard model of physics even better. After all, that still cannot explain how all matter arose from the Big Bang. He wants to do this by strongly cooling molecules and trapping them in electric fields.
Finally, astronomer Karina Caputi will investigate the beginning of the evolution of galaxies with the largest space telescope ever launched: the James Webb Space Telescope.
22 Vicis
In this round, 22 Vicis were awarded. Earlier, the awards for the technical and health sciences had already been announced. UG medical scientists Marcel van Vugt and Gerard Koppelmans were awarded grants for their research into the division of cancer cells and the early detection of asthma, respectively.
A total of 306 applications were submitted, of which 201 (65.7 per cent) were from men and 105 (34.3 per cent) from women. Twenty-four (11.9 per cent) grants went to men and ten (9.5 per cent) to women.