CORDIScovery – unearthing the hottest topics in EU science, research and innovation CORDIScovery

22 March is United Nations World Water Day, so this episode of CORDIScovery is on water: its quality and security of supply. We will travel from the high Himalayas, and delve into the secret lives of freshwater snails to explore water cycles and the latest techniques for monitoring pollution.

 

Walter Immerzeel, professor of Mountain Hydrology at Utrecht University, led the CAT project, which looked at the interface between climate change, glaciology and hydrology.

 

Research scientist at the Institute for Sustainable Agriculture of the Spanish National Research Council, José A. Gómez combines a Background in agronomy and soil science. He helped coordinate the SHui project which bridged the gap between research findings and on-the-ground innovations in China and Europe.

 

Didier Neuzeret is the CEO of ViewPoint, a French company that has been involved in environmental research and animal behaviour analysis for 30 years. ViewPoint hosted ToxMate, which video-tracked the behaviours of certain invertebrates to check pollution levels in wastewater.

New technologies, existing technologies applied to new challenges, understanding the role of cross-cultural influences in eyewitnesses’ examinations; all ways in which EU projects are helping to make evidence more accessible. This episode of CORDIScovery investigates.

Rape is a global scourge. Millions of unsolved rape cases fail in the absence of evidence found. Current technical barriers to the identification and analysis of sperm traces are one key reason. The Themis project has developed a new technique that can find traces which would be missed by conventional methods and analyses them more quickly and effectively.

What happens when you take green screens, gaming technology, lidar and other cutting-edge imaging techniques and apply them to evidence long buried? The Dig-For-Arch project has developed ways these tools can clarify crime scenes that might currently be hard to interpret.

Our globalised world means cultures are interrelating more than ever – what happens when eyewitnesses give evidence in cross-cultural contexts? How do we unravel information through a cultural filter? The WEIRD WITNESSES project has some interesting findings to share.

This episode of CORDIScovery features three guests who are ideally placed to tell us about the latest advances that are helping to refine criminal investigations. Their projects have all been supported by the EU’s Horizon 2020 programme.

Annelies Vredeveldt is an associate professor at the Faculty of Law at VU Amsterdam. She investigates psychology in the courtroom, from how eyewitnesses remember crimes to detecting lies in suspects’ statements.

Dante Abate is an associate researcher at the Cyprus Institute. His various areas of interest include the application of digital and non-destructive technologies for the identification and documentation of historic crime scenes.

Benjamin Corgier is currently the research and development director at AXO Science, a biotech company specialising in molecular biology and innovative technologies for forensics.

Enthusiasts, people with hobbies, with spare time or concerned about their environment – you and me: all of us are potential collectors of data and information that can add a dimension to research projects. How can participation empower volunteers? And what’s the benefit for scientists? Listen on to find out!

Xavier Basagaña is associate research professor at the Barcelona Institute for Global Health. Basagaña’s CitieS-Health project was interested in evaluating the health impacts of urban living. The project set out to encourage collaboration between researchers and volunteers, to generate solid, unbiased scientific evidence.

Professor of Environmental History at the University of Stavanger in Norway, Finn Arne Jørgensen is the coordinator of the EnviroCitizen project. The team wanted to understand the ways in which citizen science projects can be used to cultivate new ways of thinking and acting in all aspects of life, to promote environmental, rather than national, citizenship.

Kris Vanherle is a transport policy researcher, working at Transport & Mobility Leuven, a spin-off of the University of Leuven, Belgium. Vanherle was the coordinator of WeCount, which wanted to give people the tools they needed to monitor traffic, and to co-design solutions to tackle a variety of road transport challenges.

Perform a magic trick for a member of the crow family and it will show how startled it is by the unexpected. Crows are known for being the Einsteins of the avian world, but what about the animals that feed us, clothe us, entertain us – what is the nature of their intelligence? Will our growing realisation that animals may be experiencing the world around them in ways that would surprise us, reframe our understanding of animal welfare? Tune in for some ideas.

Jonathan Birch is an associate professor at the London School of Economics’ Centre for Philosophy of Natural and Social Science. In 2021, the review he led into the sentience of invertebrates resulted in the amendment of the British government’s Animal Welfare Bill to include octopuses, crabs and lobsters.

Associate professor at the University of Leuven’s Animal and Human Health Engineering Unit, Tomas Norton leads research on sustainable precision livestock farming and is particularly interested in the interface between animal health, welfare and productivity.

Nicola Clayton is a fellow of the Royal Society and professor of Comparative Cognition in the Department of Psychology at the University of Cambridge. Nicola is particularly interested in the processes of thinking with and without words, comparing the cognitive capacities of corvids, cephalopods and children.

Wearables have become ‘must have’ fashion – how can we make assistive technology as desirable? The most sophisticated device is useless if it is uncomfortable or unattractive. This episode, we are looking at the interface between design and engineering, and how the next generation of smart textiles could make assistive tech invisible.

Today’s episode brings together guests from EU-supported projects working on user-focused design, the metallisation and conductivity of fabric and graphene antennas embedded in textiles which could help people with Alzheimer’s.

Professor of Health Design and Human Factors at Coventry University, Louise Moody brought her background in psychology and user centric approach to design to the Maturolife project.

Andrew Cobley is a Professor of Electrochemical Deposition and leads the Functional Materials and Chemistry Group at Coventry University. His expertise in the electrochemical metallisation of non-conductive materials was behind the production of Maturolife prototypes.

Elif Ozden Yenigun is a Senior Lecturer in Textiles at the Royal College of Art. Her research concentrates on molecular materials design and innovative approaches to textile manufacturing, which she explored in her GFSMART project.

Recycling targets across the EU have been increased, the aim is now 55 % by weight from 2025, and 65 % for packaging waste. The target climbs every 5 years after that. Can we reach that goal? Repurposing, repairing, recycling – our three guests are doing their bit to get there.

Tim Gent is the managing director of https://recresco.com/ (Recresco), the British glass recycling company behind the OMR project. The company is using X-ray fluorescence, shape recognition and machine learning to make recycling more efficient. Tim’s interest is in how to make the circular economy more of a reality.

The commercial managing director of the Spanish company, Plastic Repair Systems, https://www.plasticrepair.eu/en/prs-appoints-alfredo-neila-co-chief-executive-officer/ (Alfredo Neila) worked on the PRS project, which repairs industrial plastic objects, such as crates and pallets, making repair more financially viable than throwing them away.

Pablo Martínez is one of the brains behind http://www.smartmushroom.eu/project/ (Smartmushroom) which has come up with a new way of treating the waste produced by the mushroom growing sector, transforming it from environmentally challenging by-product to valuable resource.