Alette disputerer
MSc Løbø Viken
Tid og sted er kl. 10:30 i Stort auditorium på Høyteknologisenteret
BTO on Monday
Our BTO contacts, Victoria and Maja, are back at the department this Monday, 12- 16. Please stop by them at Cecilie’s office to discuss how they can facilitate your ideas and ambitions regarding innovation etc. To kick off the new term in a good manner, they promise to serve coffee!
Keep an eye on Energy Lab
Energy Lab is a forum for exchange of information on research results and activities related to renewable energy and energy transition. The Energy Lab hosts weekly informal lunch meetings and larger half-day seminars. These events are free of charge and open to all interested. An overview of scheduled events can be found in the calendar.
Next Tuesday (Jan 8), prof. Martin Fernø (IFT) discusses The role of hydrogen for energy transition – Outlook from UiB, at 12.00–13.00 in The Helland-Hansen room, Geophysical Institute, Allegaten 70. To illustrate the nature of the Energy Lab, last year hydrogen was at focus in the following four lunch presentations: Hydrogen som drivstoff i maritim transport; Hydrogen in Japan; Hydrogen from waste; and Fuel Cells and Hydrogen in Maritime Applications.
Note also that on Jan 15, the topic is how to make synthetic liquid fuels. This is an important research topic also at our department. This event takes place at HVL Campus Kronstad.
Impact course for proposals
When: 10 January 2019, 9:00 – 13:00 @ UiB.
«How to write the impact part of project proposals?» by Sean McCarthy, Hyperion Ltd. With his experience as a researcher and proposal evaluator, he will focus on impact section in order to succeed in research financing. Sean McCarthy is pre-informed about NRC’s new assessment criteria, and prepare his course in conjunction with the latter. The course is internal for UiB researchers. Lunch will be served – no conference fee. Register before the course get fully booked here.
Greetings from EuChemS
Passing on Christmas greetings from EuChemS, the European Chemical Society representing more than 160,000 chemists from more than 40 Member Societies and other chemistry related organisations, with the full newsletter for December to be found here!
Great News III: BIOTEK2021 grant to Nathalie Reuter et al.
Today, The Research Council announced that Prof. Nathalie Reuter and partners got funded from in the BIOTEK2021 call for Centre for Digital Life Norway.
Together with Reuter’s colleages Bengt-Erik Haug, Ruth Brenk and Alexander Lundervold, the team was funded with the project «Towards better computational approaches and responsible innovation strategies in early drug discovery: application to antibiotics and COPD». Centre for Digital Life are expanding their portfolio with five new research projects funded this round within biotechnology (see more info). In collaboration with CBU, Reuter et al. are aiming toward a more responsible and efficient drug development. We are proud of having such successful people working at, and with, the Department of Chemistry.
Great News II: FRIMEDBIO grant to Nathalie Reuter et al.
Prof. Nathalie Reuter and partners have won a grant by The Research Council’s funding scheme for Medicine, Health Sciences and Biology (FRIMEDBIO), for her 
project entitled «Mapping protein-membrane interfaces for a better description of the protein-lipid interactome,» starting in 2019.
Biological membranes are ancient and crucial components in the organisation of life. Not only do they define the boundaries of cells and organelles, but they are stage to numerous molecular interactions. The present project is a multidisciplinary mission to characterize peripheral protein-membrane interfaces and quantify the energetics determinants of interfacial binding to formulate a new model for peripheral membrane binding.
In addition to project leader Nathalie Reuter, the other local chemistry partners are Bengt Erik Haug and Willy Nerdal. All project contributors are warmly congratulated!!
The project is the second granted FRIPRO application this year for Department of Chemistry.
Great News I: FRINATEK grant to Deryn Fogg et al.
Prof. 
Deryn Fogg and partners have won a grant by The Research Council’s funding scheme for independent projects (FRIPRO) for the project: «Water-tolerant catalysis: Boosting chemical biology, medicine, and sustainable chemical manufacturing».
Water-tolerant metal catalysis holds enormous promise for applications in chemical biology, medicine, and sustainable chemical manufacturing. The present project is aimed at developing high-performing, water-tolerant metathesis technologies capable of realizing this promise. A diverse team of experts stand behind the project which unites outstanding experimental and computational strengths in olefin metathesis, in catalyst and ligand design, and in the synthesis of challenging molecular targets that represent highly desirable new drug classes. In addition to the project leader, Prof. Deryn Fogg, local partners are Vidar Jensen, Giovanni Occhipinti, Marco Foscato, Jarl Underhaug and Karl Törnroos. Congratulations to all contributors!
Congratulations, Dr. Rafiq
Foto: Julia Løining
MSc Rafiq Ahmad today successfully defended his thesis titled Thermal and rheological properties of fish feed protein ingredients. The project has been run at Nofima. Although introducing soy protein concentrates to fish feed is desirable from a supply point of view, it does introduce problems to the extrusion process necessary to make feed pellets. Rather than plasticizing the mixture by addition of water, which is energy costly in the subsequent drying step, Refiq has explored the use of other protein additives rich also in free amino acids, to facilitate the extrusion step.
Christmas Party – a great success!
The event of the season, the chemistry Christmas party, was every bit as much of a success this year as it has been the two preceding years.The turn-up of joyous and party-minded chemists, the variety of tasty dishes, the vocal presentations of the Off Ke(y)tones, the shrewdness of the Quizmaster, and not least, the excellent news about projects granted — it all lived up to and surpassed expectations and made this a memorable evening! Special thanks and recognition for excellent services rendered are due to the Nanomodeling and Theoretical chemistry group – Vidar (at the helm and in charge of the toasting), Giovanni, Morten, Christian, Sven, Immanuel, Sondre, Jonas, Fredrik, Leif, and Marco, and fortified by Erwan (for the occasion, master of the welcome drinks).
