British scientists are “on the moon” to be back in the horizon of the EU flagship scientific research program after a year Brexit Rental, with new data revealing, they have received around 500 million pounds sterling of subsidies since the start of the school year.
While the EU secretly establishes strategies for the seven-year financing cycle in 2027, the United Kingdom hopes that its success in the first 12 months which returned to Horizon will leave it in pole position with Germany and France to dominate European science, despite Brexit.
With projects ranging from research to develop brain catheters inspired by wasps to create aviation fuel from yeast and greenhouse gas, the United Kingdom has been catapulted at the top of the UE beneficiaries league in number of subsidies. And, in fifth position behind Germany, Spain, the Netherlands and France, it seems ready to resume its global place in the next 12 months.
EU data shows that nearly 3,000 subsidies were granted to British scientific projects in 2024, the first year of membership in the Post-Brexit partner of the United Kingdom after a three-year break caused by a row of Brexit on Northern Ireland.
“I am absolutely on the moon that we are back in the program officially,” said Ferdinando Rodriguez y Baena, professor of medical robotics Imperial College London.
He recently completed a research project supported by a 15 -year -old horizon inspired by a conversation he had with the famous zoologist Julian Vincent about the wonderful capacity of the wasp to penetrate the hard bark to lay eggs. Rodriguez decided to try to reinvent this for neurosurgery tiny skull catheter To penetrate the skull and deliver drugs or ablations to brain tumors.
Take stock after the first year in the Horizon program of 80 billion pounds Sterling, Professor Sir John Aston, the pro-vice-masncelier for research at University of Cambridgesaid he hoped that the embargo “will never happen again”.
“It is really good that we are back inside the tent,” he said, adding that this showed the world the commitment of the United Kingdom to be a “scientific superpower” with world-class research. “This is really competitive funding, and (it shows) that people who get this funding do a really impressive job.”
Rodriguez was one of those who met the European Commerce Commissioner, Maroš Šefčovič, during a visit to Imperial on Wednesday to highlight the scientific collaboration relaunched with the EU.
“Everyone is delighted,” said Rodriguez. “Everyone uses this opportunity to start thinking with a European hat on how to take advantage of these opportunities and reach out to colleagues from continental Europe, etc.
Its 11 million euros (9.4 million pounds sterling) EDEN2020 search Developing the cranial catheter was drawn by a subsidy of 8 million euros for a consortium led by the Imperial but involving a hospital and two universities in Italy as well as universities in Germany and the Netherlands.
The isolation of the United Kingdom was a “double blow” to science, said Rodriguez because he had stopped requesting funding and also collaboration with European partners had weakened. Although “the academic world is porous” and the exchange of ideas continued, there was “nothing like joint financing to cement a relationship,” he said.
Prof Carsten Welsch, chief of the Science Accelerator at University of Liverpoolwas one of the many who implored the government and the EU to allow the United Kingdom in the Horizon program. The break cost him his role as leadership in a prestigious Marie Curie network on new plasma accelerators.
Now Welsch said the United Kingdom was back in the game and a main participant in the new 10 million euros project to help optimize compact search infrastructure based on the plasma accelerator. “We have gone from the maintenance of the presence to conduct progress,” he said.
The EU develops its strategy for the seven -year -old financing program, FP10, which will start in 2027. “All this is very secret, but it is in full swing and it is important that we position ourselves positively,” said Welsch.
In 2024, 2,911 subsidies worth 574.7 million euros were granted to the United Kingdom, which had the largest number of beneficiaries of one of the 19 non-elevated members of the program and the third in value in only 12 months.
The University of Oxford was the best beneficiary, receiving 42 million euros, followed by Cambridge at 39.3 million euros, and University College in London and Imperial with around 28 million euros. The universities of Warwick and Edinburgh received more than 13 million euros each while other organizations, such as the Royal Veterinary College, received smaller subsidies of around € 275,000. The Met Office received € 1.22 million.
New calls to finance the space and the opening of the industry at the end of May with virtual reality calls later this year, which Rodriguez is impatiently expected.
The freezing of scientists based in the United Kingdom “has completely badged” projects, said Dr. Rodrigo Ledesma-Amaro, a bio-engineer at Imperial, which manages eight active research programs with EU subsidies.
It would have been “catastrophic” if the United Kingdom had not been authorized to enter the program, according to Ledesma-Amaro. “We could not have started new collaborations.
The eight Ledesma-AMaro subsidies at the sustainable food research center, including a project entitled “Solar Spoon”: this uses the energy of the sun to generate hydrogen, which can then be treated using bacteria to generate proteins that can be used for food, he explained. Another is centered on the delay in “yeast death” to develop biotechnological processes around fermented foods, while another aims to create aviation fuel from yeast.
In Cambridge, Aston underlined the sustainable research of fuel, led by Professor Erwin Reisner, aimed at converting solar energy and renewable electricity and greenhouse gases into sustainable fuel and chemicals.
Reisner met Nick Thomas-Symonds, the British Minister for EU relations last month to show the propagation of Horizon projects in Cambridge, which also includes research on iridescent plant colors and information theory in AI.
“(Horizon) really makes a difference, not only in the academic sense, but it is the technologies that will solve some of the big problems in the world,” said Aston.
Cambridge is one of the most funded universities in the United Kingdom, but said Aston, being interspersed again with European universities and private research outfits was vital. “We are incredibly lucky to be at a university where we have incredible expertise at university, but we certainly do not have any expertise,” he said.