Fuel from liquid hydrocarbons as we know them, but made completely without the use of fossil resources. This is the goal of a new project partnered by AU researcher, in which the Innovation Fund has just invested DKK 26.7 million.

Azadeh Shahsavar, who is assistant professor in Professor Poul Nissen's group at the Department of Molecular Biology and Genetics, Aarhus University, has received a grant to do research at the University of Copenhagen, where she will study the structure and function of proteins that transport glycine and glutamine in the brain.

Xavier Bofill De Ros is one of the seven talented researchers who will become a Lundbeckfonden fellow in 2022. And the grant that comes with the appointment enables him to establish his own research group and devote himself to research for the next five years at the Department of Molecular Biology and Genetics (MBG).

Most drugs used today have only one mechanism of action and it is both difficult and expensive to manufacture drugs with multiple functions. Researchers at the NNF-funded research center, CEMBID, at Aarhus University have recently found a way to create more stable nanostructures that can assemble biomolecules with different functions, which in combination e.g., can provide more effective cancer medicine.

AU researcher, Associate Professor Brigitte Stadler, and an intercontinental team of researchers, have received a prestigious international grant to study how important parts of the cell, the nucleus and mitochondria, communicate.

A group of PhD students from the Department of Molecular Biology and Genetics has set out to make their department even greener. They have therefore set up a committee called greenMBG, which will come up with proposals for initiatives needed to realise their goals.

Denmark is phasing in a new digital ID system, known as MitID. A student and several researchers from the Department of Computer Science at Aarhus University have carried out an analysis of the new system based on the information that is publicly available. The conclusion is that MitID in many ways is better organized and more secure than NemID, which it replaces.

Kasper Green Larsen is 35 years old and a newly appointed professor at the Department of Computer Science - that makes him one of the youngest professors at Aarhus University. But despite his young age, Kasper Green Larsen has an impressive array of groundbreaking research results and awards behind him and is passionate about making his mark on a field that is more needed than ever.

Exceptionally promising. This is how an Arctic top researcher describes a probe that three engineer students have developed during a bachelor's project in collaboration with the Department of Mechanics and Production and the Department of Biology at Aarhus University. In autumn 2021, the probe passed the ultimate test under extreme Arctic conditions.

With data from Aarhus University, among other places, more than 140 researchers from all over the world have calculated that there must be some 73,300 tree species on Earth, of which around 9,200 are as yet undiscovered. This is 14 per cent higher than previously assumed. The study also suggests that almost one-third of the species are rare.

With a grant of DKK 50 M in the form of a Laureate Research Grant from the Novo Nordisk Foundation, Professor Daan von Aalten moves his research group from the University of Dundee to the Department of Molecular Biology and Genetics, AU, where he has been appointed professor and will be housed in the brand new laboratories in the University City from 1 June 2022.

It was surprising in itself when an international team of researchers from AU and elsewhere discovered communities of microorganisms thriving at temperatures of up to 120°C in the ocean depths off Japan. Now the researchers have an equally surprising idea of how the tiny creatures do it.

Good news for innovative researchers: Working together with the Novo Nordisk Foundation, the five largest universities in Denmark are bringing the successful international SPARK programme to Denmark. The programme offers life science researchers expert knowledge and start-up capital, and readies them to commercialise their research ideas.

The VILLUM FOUNDATION has selected this year's 16 research talents to be part of the Villum Young Investigator programme. Six of this year's researchers are from Natural Sciences.

Despite recent progress in predicting protein and RNA structure, we are still far from being able to design biomolecular structures that rival the complexity found in Nature. A new consortium, COFOLD, funded by the Novo Nordisk Foundation, aims to elucidate the rules of RNA folding in order to design RNA molecules for applications in medicine and synthetic biology.

Around half of the world’s plant species rely on animals to spread their seeds. A new international study has shown that, as a consequence of the biodiversity loss of birds and mammals, these plants’ ability to adapt to climate change has fallen by 60%.

Assistant Professor Jonas Elm (Chemistry) and the upcoming group leader of DANDRITE, Postdoc Taro Kitazawa, will each receive approx. DKK 11 million from the European Research Council, which has just awarded the prestigious Starting Grants for ground-breaking international research projects.

Associate Professor Marianne Glasius has been awarded the 2021 Aerosologist Award for her outstanding contributions to chemical molecular level characterisation of atmospheric aerosols, outreach activities and promotion of Nordic aerosol science.

Aarhus University’s research vessel Aurora is also an excellent communication platform.

A research team at Aarhus University has developed a new molecule that attaches to the surface of SARS-CoV-2 virus particles. This attachment prevents the virus from entering human cells and spreading the infection.

The Carlsberg Foundation has awarded almost DKK 98 million to basic research at Aarhus University. The humanities and social sciences have been particularly recognised. DKK 24.7 million has been awarded to 25 researchers at the Faculty of Natural Sciences.

The underwater noise around Greenland has just been mapped in a new study, thereby allowing future changes of ambient noise levels to be investigated as the polar ice cap retreats and human activities increase in the Arctic waters.

By using ground-breaking new electronics and data modelling, a team of researchers from Aarhus University has proven that it is possible to carry out very accurate, non-invasive groundwater measurements in previously inaccessible areas.

A course in bio-entrepreneurship was the basis for a new life as an entrepreneur for two biology students from Aarhus. After receiving two financial contributions, they are now a major step closer to creating a successful independent company within sustainable chicken feed.

Researchers from Aarhus University have led a team that has discovered one of the ways legume plants balance nitrogen acquisition from the soil with that from their bacterial symbionts. The work identifies regulation of a key plant hormone, cytokinin, as central to this balance. These new results will aid in developing legumes with improved nitrogen fixation and a possible reduction in the use of fertilisers.

An international team led by researchers from Aarhus University have discovered how plant receptors recognize specific carbohydrate signaling molecules from their bacterial symbionts. This ability enables the plant to select and accommodate nitrogen-fixing bacteria inside their roots. These new results also demonstrate how these receptors can be engineered to recognize signals from symbiotic bacteria and these discoveries are now being tested to engineer the crops of the future with the ability to fix nitrogen for a more sustainable agriculture.

The Independent Research Fund Denmark (IRFD) has awarded DKK 280 million to 55 green research ideas, 15 of which are from Aarhus University. Five projects from the Faculty of Natural Sciences have received a total of DKK 21 million.

Postdoc Laura Stidsholt from the Department of Biology is one of the grant recipients under the Villum International Postdoc talent programme. The DKK 2,468,000 grant will fund her research into how bats use echolocation.

Denmark’s first Biodiversity Council has been set up to advise the government and the Danish Parliament on nature initiatives. The Minister for the Environment, Lea Wermelin, has appointed Professor Signe Normand as chair of the Council and Professor Jens-Christian Svenning as a member of the Council.

Legumes can make agriculture greener, both by carbon fixing, but more specifically because they do not need artificial fertilizers supplying nitrogen, and because their seeds have an advantageous composition of amino acids. A large, European research project focuses on faba beans, which have the potential to become an important part of Danish agriculture.

The modern university is closely intertwined with the surrounding community. This does not mean that the freedom of research is compromised, writes the dean of the Faculty of Natural Sciences, Kristian Pedersen, in his debate post.

Researchers at Aarhus University have elucidated structures of a sugar transport protein that drives transport of sugar in plants. The study provides a comprehensive insight into sugar uptake into plant organs such as flowers, seeds and fruit. Future research can benefit from these discoveries to address challenges like food security through crop improvement.

A large part of the world's population has fragments of neanderthal genes in their DNA. The length of these fragments provides new insight into how human populations have evolved differently in recent history. A Danish-German research team has found fluctuations of 10-20 per cent in the average age of new parents throughout Eurasia over the past 40,000 years.

The Villum Foundation grants DKK 6 million for two interdisciplinary research projects at Aarhus University - more specifically the Department of Computer Science, the Department of Chemistry and the Department of Physics and Astronomy.

A new, unique research centre has been launched. The Novo Nordisk Foundation CO2 Research Center is to be established with a grant of DKK 630 million from the Novo Nordisk Foundation (NNF) and based at Aarhus University. The new centre will ensure cross-disciplinary collaboration to reduce the amount of the greenhouse gas, CO2, in the atmosphere through researching and implementing new technology. The centre will be collaborating with a number of Danish and international partners.

The Faculty of Natural Sciences (Nat) is a good place for daring ideas that can and will change our perception of the world around us. The VILLUM FOUNDATION recently announced the recipients of this year's Villum Experiment grants, and in this round, ten researchers at Nat have received grants totalling DKK 19.7 million to explore, for example, human genetic prehistory over the last 40,000 years and to find out whether sponges sleep.

Researchers from Aarhus University and the Max Planck Institute for Plant Breeding Research in Cologne, Germany have discovered that root commensal bacteria are adapted to their host species, providing them with competitive advantages when applied exogenously and have to invade the existing bacterial community in their native host. This discovery provides clues for how to identify and tailor bacterial inoculants for improving plant growth in a sustainable manner.

Det Fjernstyrede UndervisningsTeleskop (FUT) is a free offer from Aarhus University to the Danish educational community. Pupils will be able to observe during ordinary daytime lectures in Denmark with an Australian based 60 cm telescope with full remote control.

A total of 14 new AIAS-COFUND Marie Sk?odowska-Curie fellows from around the world has been selected in a thorough international, triple peer-review selection process in the spring and summer of 2021. Four of them will be researching areas within Natural Sciences.

In relations to the Annual Party 2021 at Aarhus University, Professor Conny Aerts has been appointed Honorary Doctor at Aarhus University.

On Wednesday, 25 August 2021, a multitude of new students started their studies at Aarhus University, of whom the Faculty of Natural Sciences welcomed more than 800.

Providing clean water and sanitation while still protecting natural environments is one of greatest challenges in modern society, one of the UN Sustainable Development Goals and the background for the Advanced Water Cycle Management Course.

The human body's attempt to eradicate invading viruses can eventually become fatal. With the current Covid-19 pandemic, it is in many cases hyperinflammation and cytokine storm caused by the viral infection that kill patients. Perhaps a deeper understanding of the immune system of fruit flies will enable us to develop strategies that slow down the inflammatory component of the human immune system without reducing the antiviral effect.

A paper from Jørgen Kjems and colleagues published in Nature Communications presents a new method to determine the full-length sequence and isoform variation of a class of RNAs called circular RNAs.

In a joint collaboration, researchers from Aarhus, Cambridge and Warsaw have characterized how the essential mRNA poly(A) tails are synthesized in the budding yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae. The study reveals several mechanisms controlling poly(A) tail lengths and hereby ensuring the robustness of gene expression.

The phenomenon of citizen science is taking an ever more important role in a number of research projects all over the world. Aarhus University has been using the method for several years, and now the formation of an interdisciplinary collaboration will ensure that this growing research and communication field has a more formal position in the research toolbox. The new collaboration will be set up at a workshop on 20 August at Aarhus University.

Researchers have re-examined the last meal of the famous Tollund Man bog body, consumed shortly before he died around 400 BC. The analysis reveals that he likely ate an ordinary Iron Age meal of porridge and fish, consumed 12-24 hours before his death.

Biologists from Aarhus University and the University of Copenhagen have studied the environmental DNA in water samples collected simultaneously by 370 volunteers on two occasions from almost 100 sites along the Danish coast. The combination of citizen science and environmental DNA has provided an effective overview of biodiversity in Danish coastal waters.

Faba beans are an excellent source of food protein, but about 4% of the world’s population are afflicted by favism, which renders them sensitive to the faba bean anti-nutrients vicine and convicine. Now, an international research team has identified the VC1 gene as responsible for the production of these compounds.

There is still so much we don’t know about the earth. One of the blind spots can be found in northeast Greenland, and it is relevant to climate change and the marine environment. An AU-led research project will now generate valuable knowledge about the region by using a new and unique data set collected during a successful expedition.

Congratulations to Associate Professor Ebbe S. Andersen who is awarded the Danish polymer prize, Elastyrenprisen 2021, for being an internationally recognized scientist and a pioneer within biopolymer research, including RNA origami. The award is given by the Danish Academy of Technical Sciences (ATV).

One of the Nordic region's most prestigious research prizes, the Anders Jahre Prize, goes to Professor Poul Nissen from Aarhus University. Poul Nissen is awarded the prize for his research in the transport of proteins in and out of cells. This knowledge is of great importance for understanding diseases such as cancer, cardiovascular disease and psychiatric disorders.

Researchers from Aarhus University and Caltech have developed a method to build much larger, though still nanosize, RNA scaffolds than previously thought possible using RNA origami. The method is based on new software that has been made available online so other researchers can use it to develop biosensors, nanorobots and medicine – including vaccines, for example.

This summer, Aarhus University will welcome Professor Anja-Verena Mudring when she joins the Department of Chemistry. Professor Mudring is one of the world's top researchers in the field of materials research. She is one of the leaders in materials development for energy conversion, and she has made a particularly prominent impression in the field of ionic liquids, which may help sustainable technologies for green energy in the future.

Why spend time wading through streams and rivers to catch insects and other small animals with finely meshed nets, when all you need is their DNA in a water sample to check the biodiversity in the watercourse? Using this method, which is called environmental DNA (eDNA), researchers from Aarhus University have detected 212 different species of invertebrates in five Danish watercourses. Twelve of these are entirely new species, never detected in Denmark before.

Every year, the Aarhus University Research Foundation awards PhD prizes to five young researchers with extraordinary talent. The five award recipients have all made a name for themselves, both with their results and with the way they have communicated the results.

A research group at Aarhus University has found a way to transform a naturally occurring substance class that is toxic for both bacteria and mammals so that it is only toxic for bacteria, including antibiotic-resistant bacteria. This means that polyether ionophores, as the substances are called, could be candidates for the antibiotics of the future.

A new partnership between Skrydstrup Group (iNANO & Dept. of Chemistry, Aarhus University), Vestas, Olin, and the Danish Technological Institute collides industry and research to support circularity of wind turbine blades. The CETEC project paves the way for manufacturing new blades using materials from old turbine blades, thereby creating fully recyclable wind turbines.

Chemically synthesized short DNA sequences are extremely important ingredients with countless uses in research laboratories, hospitals and in industry, like in the method for identifying COVID-19. Phosporamidites are necessary building blocks in the production of DNA sequences, but they are unstable, and break quickly. PhD Alexander Sandahl (Professor Kurt Gothelf's group) has, in collaboration with a researcher in Professor Troels Skrydstrup developed a new patented way to quickly and efficiently manufacture the unstable building blocks immediately before they are to be used and thus streamline DNA production.

Professor of biology Signe Normand from Aarhus University is one of the five recipients of the Elite Research Prize for 2021. There are also Elite Research travel grants for two PhD students from the Department of Computer Science and Department of Bioscience. The awards will be presented at an event at the Ministry of Higher Education and Science on 10 August.

Andreas Sommerfeldt, PhD in chemistry and nanotechnology from Department of Chemistry and iNano at Aarhus University has won the PhD Cup final. The competition was broadcast on the Danish television channel DR 2 on Friday 30 April.

Professor Birgit Schiøtt has been reappointed as the head of the Department of Chemistry on a three-year contract starting when her current five-year contract expires at the end of this year.

Four early career researchers at Nat have just received grants from the Lundbeck Foundation as part of their postdoc programmes. The grants will provide two or three years of work within health science research for the recipients.

Postdoc Andrii Bugai from the Department of Molecular Biology and Genetics at Aarhus University receives the highly prestigious Marie Sk?odowska-Curie Individual Fellowship to study how our genome is regulated at the level of RNA turnover.

Nanomaterials have become indispensable for modern life, and our lives increasingly depend on nanomaterials with defined structures and properties. A chemistry professor has received a VILLUM Investigator grant of almost DKK 40 million for an upcoming project that will challenge borders so that even more powerful tools to synthesise nanomaterials can be made available.

A new, national pioneer center for artificial intelligence research is expected to open at the end of 2021.

From 1 June 2021, Associate Professor and Head of Department Erik Østergaard Jensen has been reappointed for another three years as head of the Department of Molecular Biology and Genetics (MBG) - a position he has had since 2004.

Again this year, Aarhus University is seeing an increase in the numbers applying via quota 2, and at Natural Sciences, applications are stable in relation to first-priority applications.

In two new scientific articles, two geologists from Aarhus University have demonstrated that strontium from agricultural lime runs off from upper soil layers and influences strontium isotope values in the surrounding area. According to the researchers, this means that a number of hypotheses about the origins of prehistoric people will need to be revised. This includes the hypothesis that the majority of the 48 Viking Age bodies found in graves near Trelleborg were foreign. According to new analyses, they may very well be indigenous to West Zealand.

Jørgen Kjems from iNANO and the Department of Molecular Biology at AU and the AU spinout company, OMIICS, are partners in a new consortium, PRIME, that will seek to develop biological nano-implants - based on naturally occurring signaling pathways - that can help patients with epilepsy.

For the first time ever, the Novo Nordisk Foundation has granted project funding earmarked specifically for basic research within the natural and technical sciences. Six researchers at the Faculty of Natural Sciences have received grants totalling more than DKK 17.5 million.

Glycine can stimulate or inhibit neurons in the brain, thereby controlling complex functions. Unraveling the three-dimensional structure of the glycine transporter, researchers have now come a big step closer to understanding the regulation of glycine in the brain.

Following a grant from the National Committee for Research Infrastructures (NUFI) of DKK 25 million, an Aarhus research group headed by Professor Bo Brummerstedt can now study defects and disorder in crystals in a completely new way. This is using the DanMAX beamline at Lund, which, with its intense radiation can reveal the tiniest details inside materials that very often determine their properties.

The bats' echolocation is more advanced than previously thought. Bats muffle their screams almost to a whisper when hunting, so echoes from trees and buildings do not drown out echoes from the prey. This is revealed by an international research team led by Aarhus University using miniature computers that they have put on the backs of wild bats.

New paper in Nature Physics: A collaboration in the “Center for Complex Quantum Systems” at Aarhus University has successfully observed the formation of a quasiparticle.

Postdoc Thibaud Dieudonné from the Department of Molecular Biology and Genetics at Aarhus University receives the highly prestigious Marie Sk?odowska-Curie Individual Fellowship to study how a human lipid transporter is linked to a rare inherited liver disease.

Associate Professor Frans Mulder is heading a new consortium, BOUNDLESS, funded by the Interdisciplinary Synergy Programme of the Novo Nordisk Foundation. With the grant the consortium will study how membrane-less organelles control key biological processes.

After seven years of intense research, a research group from Aarhus University has succeeded - through an interdisciplinary collaboration - in understanding why a very extended structure is important for an essential protein from the human immune system. The new results offer new opportunities for adjusting the activity of the immune system both up and down. Stimulation is interesting in relation to cancer treatment, while inhibition of the immune system is used in treatment of autoimmune diseases.

In a recently published scientific article, a research group led by the Stellar Astrophysics Centre at Aarhus University describes a very special exoplanet system. Two exoplanets run "backwards" around their star, and scientists' studies suggest that they originally orbited the other, more common way around.

As quantum technology makes its inroad, we need to be able to use new materials to capture and tame the promising new opportunities offered by the technology. This means we must be able to examine the interior of exotic quantum materials, and so far this has proved rather difficult. A research team with Danish participation has now found a method.

The Lundbeck Foundation is giving the DANDRITE neuroscience centre at Aarhus University funding to spend on research up to 2028. The funds worth DKK 75 M (EUR 10 M) will primarily be spent on recruitment of five new DANDRITE group leaders to head individual neuroscience research programmes.

Ten years ago, researchers at Aarhus University, Denmark, reported the discovery of centimeter-long cable bacteria, that live by conducting an electric current from one end to the other. Now the researchers document that a few cells operate with extremely high oxygen consumption while the rest of the cells process food and grow without oxygen. An outstanding way of life.

Two research projects at the Faculty of Natural Sciences, have received a total of DKK 61.6 million for research equipment and facilities to support their work on green development.

A scientific article published in Nature in 2016 has been the subject of criticism from peers for a number of years, and it has given rise to an important case for the university's Research Practice Committee. The matter has been mentioned several times in the newspaper Berlingske and most recently in other media. The media coverage could give the impression that the management at the faculty has passively looked on and not dealt with the matter. This is certainly not correct and there is still an ongoing proces. The following is an outline of how the department management team and the dean have dealt with the criticism that followed in the wake of the article in Nature entitled: Exploring the quantum speed limit with computer games.

The Ministry of Higher Education and Science has just granted almost DKK 37 million to a targeted effort to unravel the importance of the ongoing climate change in the Arctic environment, how quickly the changes take place and how they affect the rest of the planet. The project brings all the Arctic stakeholders of the Danish Realm together in one network.

Although the protein ITIH4 is found in large amounts in the blood, its function has so far been unknown. By combining many different techniques, researchers from Aarhus University have discovered that ITIH4 inhibits proteases in the innate immune system via an unknown mechanism. The research results have just been published in the prestigious scientific journal Science Advances.

Professor Jens-Christian Svenning conducts research into the dynamics of biodiversity and ecosystems to reveal the factors that shape, threaten and safeguard biological diversity on Earth. He has received the prestigious Villum Kann Rasmussen Annual Award of DKK 5 million for his work.

With a grant of DKK 15 million (EUR 2M) from the Green Development and Demonstration Programme (GUDP) - a programme under the Ministry of Food, Agriculture and Fisheries of Denmark - Danish researchers and breeders will develop new faba bean cultivars for use as a locally grown alternative to imported soy protein.

Since 2011 the Young Investigator-programme from the VILLUM Foundation has supported the carriers of young and ambitious researchers. This year two new promising talents has received a grant amounting to approx. 14 mio. DKK.

Associate Professor Magnus Kjærgaard participates in a new consortium, BOUNDLESS, headed by Associate Professor Frans Mulder and funded by the Interdisciplinary Synergy Programme of the Novo Nordisk Foundation. With the grant of DKK 14.4 M, the consortium will study how membrane-less organelles control key biological processes.

Professor Peter Jørgensen, Department of Mathematics, has been awarded a DNRF Chair from the Danish National Research Foundation, which is just the second overall since the instrument was launched in 2020, and the first awarded to Natural Science.

Professor Lars Arge, Department of Computer Science, passed away 23 December 2020 at the age of just 53.