U. Mayor signs research agreements with three top 70 universities in international rankings
05-11-2020
05-11-2020
Our house of studies established framework agreements with the universities Princeton (USA), Heidelberg (Germany) and Queensland (Australia), which will allow the exchange of academics and students, apply for funds together and create collaboration networks.
Taking a further step in its internationalization plan, the Universidad Mayor completed the signing of three agreements with major world study houses, located in the top 70 of various academic rankings, such as the Times Higher Education.
It’s about, Princeton University (United States), Heidelberg University (Germany) and the University of Queensland (Australia), with whom structured framework agreements were established on the basis of specific projects with the GEMA Center, Genomics, Ecology and Environment, and with the Center for Integrative Biology (CIB).
The director of GEMA, Dr. Sebastian Abades, explained that the agreement with the Princeton University arose as a result of the work on ecology of extreme environments carried out with teachers and students. Thus, a NASA project stands out to initiate collaborative activities through a doctoral student in 2018, and subsequent initiatives for joint application to extramural funds in the United States.
In the case of the University of Heidelberg, Sebastián Abades explained that the research that gave rise to institutional agreements is also framed in the ecology of extreme environments, although in this case with a focus on instrumentalization for monitoring climate variables.
“One of the key activities that we will carry out will be the installation of a meteorological station in the Arica region, which will not only complement the microbial ecology studies that we carry out in the Atacama Desert, but will also allow us to participate in the monitoring network that COS researchers from Heidelberg carry out in the north of the country”, explained the director of the GEMA Center.
For the manager, these agreements "are not only important as part of the internationalization plan of our Center, but are part of a strategy to connect doctoral students who are linked to our unit, both in Integrative Ecology and in Integrative Genomics , giving them the opportunity to work in frontier research, with relevant universities worldwide, to enrich their academic and personal training ”.
CIB opens to Australia
For her part, in August 2019, the researcher at the Center for Integrative Biology (CIB), Paola Murgas, traveled to Australia to visit Dr. Trent Woodruff's laboratory, where Dr. Eduardo Albornoz works as a senior postdoc of the University of Queensland.
"There I trained in various tip techniques and presented the work of our group and we decided to collaborate," says Murgas, who comments: "The theme of both laboratories focuses on demonstrating that inflammatory processes that occur during life induce development of neurodegeneration during aging and have a fundamental role in diseases such as Parkinson's ".
Thus, after the academic's trip to Australia, Eduardo Albornoz visited to the CIB, generating the idea of establish an agreement between both universities.
Dr. Murgas commented that this agreement, which is about to be signed, "implies the possibility of contacting and collaborating with important scientists in various areas; accessing cutting-edge technology and positioning the Universidad Mayor, as it has been until now , within the best research universities in Chile ".
"Over time we want Chilean students from our PhD in Neurobiology, and perhaps also undergraduate students, to travel to Australia to work and to obtain their degree with double affiliation," she emphasized.
Meanwhile, Dr. Albornoz, from the U. of Queensland, stressed that "the agreement with the U. Mayor opens endless opportunities to apply for joint funds, publications and eventually the exchange of students and academics."
Finally, the Vice Chancellor for Research, Dr. Patricio Manque, appreciated that "these agreements come to enhance the intense international collaboration that the research carried out at our university has, which includes the permanent exchange of academics and doctoral students with the best Universities of the world ”.
