Grants for our researchers – Opus and Sonata competitions
Thanks to the funding of additional research projects in the OPUS 25, PRELUDIUM 22, MAESTRO 15 and SONATA BIS 13 competitions, the number of laureates in these competitions increased from 452 to 774 researchers.
This was made possible by the Ministry of Science and Higher Education increasing the budget of the National Science Centre by PLN 200 million in 2024.
Thanks to the additional pool, grants will go to 11 of our researchers.
Below are the scientists whose projects were shortlisted for the Opus 25 and Sonata Bis 13 competitions.
dr Joanna Maria Giel from the Faculty of Social Sciences (assistant professor at the Research Workshop on the History of Philosophy in Silesia, at the Institute of Philosophy), who for the project ‘Reinhold Lewin vs. Martin Luther’s writings on Jews. Context – Analysis – Reception’ will receive PLN 186,660.
Dr Reinhold Lewin (1888-1943) was a Jewish scholar and rabbi associated with Silesia, a graduate of the Jewish Theological Seminary in Breslau and a graduate in philosophy and history at the University of Breslau. With his dissertation Luthers Stellung zu den Juden (1911), written at the University of Wrocław, Lewin is regarded as the first thorough researcher of the topic Luther and the Jews.
– The issue of Luther’s anti-Judaism is an important research problem, which has been addressed more than once and, as such, is virtually unresolved. My research project contributes to the debate ‘anti-Judaism’ versus ‘Lutheranism’ regionally – explains our researcher, who plans to write a monograph entitled Reinhold Lewin und Luthers Judenschriften. Kontext – Analyse – Rezeption, in which she intends to show Lewin’s theses, their regional context and supra-regional relevance and, by reference to other treatises, would like to present the broader debate on Luther’s anti-Judaism.
dr hab. Marta Osypińska from the Faculty of Historical and Pedagogical Sciences, who for the project ‘SERENGETI REFUGIUM. Factors of recent human evolution: behaviour, seasonality, human-animal interactions, technology and environment variability in Middle Stone Age’ will receive PLN 1,680,702.
The area of the African Great Rift, and adjacent East African savannahs such as the Serengeti Plain, despite losing its status as the cradle of humankind today, is still considered the motherland of our species. Optimal environmental conditions there allowed humans to survive during periods of dramatic climatic crises.The special skill our species developed in Africa – the ability to adapt to very different environmental conditions – was one of the foundations of our evolutionary success.
– In cooperation with Tanzanian scientists from the University of Dar es-Salam, we plan to initiate Polish archaeological research in Tanzania, says the researcher. – The excavations (3 research seasons) will be conducted at the Loiyangalani site in the southern Serengeti – the largest protected area of our globe. They are expected to provide new data on the basis of human behavioural plasticity in the Palaeolithic era. It is hoped that they can make a serious contribution to the state of knowledge about the behavioural, cognitive and adaptive traits of humans during their successful expansion out of Africa.
The main outcome will be the acquisition, using state-of-the-art methods, of new archaeological and archaeozoological data from the East African area. The verification of the existing dating of the site will make it possible to determine how long the Serengeti was a ‘mother camp’ for Homo sapiens, providing optimal conditions for life and the last stage of evolution. The scientific tasks carried out within the framework of the project include the precise determination of the site’s chronology based on different, analytical methods in the current variants (OSL singlegrain, AMS C14, ESR), the assessment of the impact of animal migration on the lifestyle of people in the region based on newly applied archaeozoological research, the creation of modern topographic imaging based on GIS analyses, the testing of different analytical methods in Archaeological Science.
The research initiated as a result of the project is to inaugurate a completely new research direction in Polish archaeology. It has so far concentrated (with great success) only in NE Africa. The area of East Africa, mainly Tanzania, has been, so to speak, scientifically marginalised after the era of great palaeoanthropological discoveries in the 20th century. Only a few Late Pleistocene sites are currently being researched there, with new data coming mainly from South Africa, Morocco and Algeria. – By carrying out the project, we want to reintroduce the scientific data from the Rift Valley into the debate about the behavioural evolution of our species and its unique characteristics, which are fundamental even today – emphasises the scientist. – This is a unique opportunity to undertake research in a scientifically prestigious region, the data from which will allow Polish archaeology to appear even more strongly in the global scientific discourse.
dr hab. Marcin Szafran from the Faculty of Biotechnology (Department of Molecular Microbiology) will receive PLN 2 059 480 for the project ‘Exploring molecular mechanisms controlling ParB-dependent chromosome rearrangements in Streptomyces’.
– Our research interests focus on soil bacteria of the genus Streptomyces, known more widely as producers of more than half of the known antibiotics of natural origin – says prof Szafran. – For us, the genus Streptomyces is of particular interest because many molecular processes, including the organisation of the chromosome itself in the form of a linear DNA molecule, as well as mechanisms for reorganising its structure, resemble those occurring in the nucleus of cellular organisms in higher organisms.
Today, we know that global rearrangement of the Streptomyces chromosome structure is an inducer of antibiotic production by these bacteria, as well as a mechanism to protect DNA from damage. – However, we do not understand what this process looks like at the molecular level.
The project aims to gain a closer understanding of the potential molecular mechanisms responsible for chromosome remodelling. – We hope that our results will translate in the future into an understanding of how chromosome structure affects the activity of many genes, including genes responsible for antibiotic production.
On the ranking list of proposals recommended for funding under the Sonata Bis 13 competition is dr Sławomir Potocki from the Department of Chemistry, who for the project ‘Unusual Chaperonins of Pathogenic Mycobacteria: Correlation between Coordination Chemistry, Structure, Dynamics and Biology’ will receive PLN 2,538,820.
The main objective of the project is to understand the interaction and biological role of copper (and other divalent metal ions such as zinc, nickel or cobalt) in relation to important virulence factors: the unusual mycobacterial chaperonins of the GroEL family.
– In order to overcome drug-resistant mycobacterial infections (e.g. tuberculosis), more detailed knowledge of the chemical aspects and biology of the bacterial cell, especially resistance mechanisms, is needed – explains our researcher. – In the project, we will try to combine the advantages of in vitro and in vivo approaches – says dr Sławomir Potocki.
The scientist is currently completing his research team.
Read more about the grants on the website and here.
Gratulujemy!
Complied by Katarzyna Górowicz-Maćkiewicz
