Recipients of UCL Cities Partnerships Programme Funds 2020/21

29 April 2021

The Cities Partnerships Programme's second round of funding has awarded 15 projects funds for activity in Paris, Rome and Stockholm

Stitch pic of Paris, Rome and Stockholm images

In this year’s UCL Cities Partnerships Programme Funds, 15 projects were awarded funding to support UCL’s academic activity with partners based in the city-regions of Rome, Paris and Stockholm.

The funding call is led by the programme's three academic directors – the Academic Director for Rome, Professor Florian Mussgnug, the Academic Director for Paris, Professor Claire Colomb and the Academic Director for Stockholm, Dr Catalina Turcu – and are supported by its board of senior academics and UCL Global Engagement (GE).

The successful projects span a diverse range of research areas, from tuberculosis prevention and vaccine development to sign languages and smart cities.

Many of the recipients are early- and mid-career researchers who hope the funds will help pave the way to further external funding grants. One such researcher, Dr Sudax Murdan (Life Sciences) who received funding to collaborate with colleagues at Université Paris-Saclay, said: “The funds received are enabling us to conduct our first joint experiment! We hope to put the preliminary results in our next grant application, such as to the EU for a Doctoral Training Network, to show that we can work together productively.”

Another of the recipients, Dr Francesco Aletta (Bartlett) who was awarded funding to collaborate with colleagues at Roma Tre University, said: “I am very excited for this opportunity to bring together expertise in different disciplines, such as soundscape, lighting and heritage, and build on this project to boost future collaborations. In a period where travel and mobility are very limited, the Cities Partnerships Programme adjusted to current circumstances and provided us with resources to support workshops and other activities online. I think this is perfectly aligned with UCL’s current ‘remote, not distant’ philosophy: London and Rome are less distant thanks to this scheme!”

The first round of the Cities Partnerships Programme Funds ran last year, and funded UCL projects with partners in Rome in the form of workshops, seminars, lab tours, lectures, podcast recordings and more.

The Cities Partnerships Programme is UCL's flagship programme for regional engagement in Europe. Beginning in Rome, Paris and Stockholm, the programme supports, funds and promotes academic collaborations in research and education with partners in major cities.

Congratulations to all the 2020/21 recipients of the UCL Cities Partnerships Programme Funds:

Lead UCL applicant	Faculty	Partner city	Title of activity
Dr Yohhei Hamada	Population Health Sciences	Paris	Exploring new paradigms in prevention of tuberculosis and other respiratory illnesses in PLHIV
Dr Sudaxshina Murdan	Life Sciences	Paris	Developing a user-friendly vaccine to prevent Clostridium difficile infection
Professor Adolfo Saiardi	Life Sciences	Paris	The human genetic of inositol phosphates
Professor Jakob Stougaard-Nielsen	Arts & Humanities	Paris	NOUS: Nordic Studies UCL-Sorbonne Research Hub and Summer School
Professor Haim Yacobi	Bartlett	Paris	Cities in the Middle East: the politics of representation and knowledge production in a globalising world
Dr Francesco Aletta	Bartlett	Rome	Influence of soundscapes and lightscapes on cultural heritage perception
Dr James Irving	Medical Sciences	Rome	Antibody-based diagnostics in conformational disease
Dr Michael Short	Bartlett	Rome	Developing an intelligent urban density in the time of COVID
Dr Paul Ayris	Arts & Humanities	Rome; Paris; Stockholm	Focus on Open Science Workshops, delivering Open Science policy, practice and solutions
Dr James Kirkbride	Brain Sciences	Stockholm	UCL-Stockholm training programme in population mental health and pathways to policy impact
Professor Chloe Marshall	Institute of Education	Stockholm	How are sign languages learned as second languages?
Professor Christos Masouros	Engineering Sciences	Stockholm	Integrated sensing and communications for perceptive smart cities
Dr Stanimira Milcheva	Bartlett	Stockholm	Net zero affordable housing – an institutional comparison between Sweden and the UK
Dr Kristine Oleinika	Medical Sciences	Stockholm	Metabolic reprogramming of B-cell functions in immune-mediated pathology
Dr Dimitrios Tsivrikos	Brain Sciences	Stockholm	Could moral philosophy explain inconsistent findings in eco-psychology?

More information

For the latest news about UCL’s international activity, partnerships and opportunities, subscribe to the bimonthly Global Update newsletter.