Grants
DKK 43 million for 7 excellent researchers at SDU
Seven researchers at SDU have each just received a grant from Independent Research Fund Denmark (DFF) to excellent and innovative research projects ranging from solar energy over young people's screen use and well-being to Greenlandic children's living conditions.
The annual grants for Research Project 2 from the Independent Research Fund Denmark have just been awarded, and seven SDU researchers have received grants to pursue their most innovative ideas and promote innovative Danish research.
A total of 52 Danish researchers have received a DFF-Research Project 2 grant at this year's awards.
With a grant of approx. DKK 6 million each, the seven talented SDU researchers will now have the opportunity to unfold their own best ideas within their field. A DFF-Research Project 2.
A DFF Research Project2 typically runs for up to 4.5 years and is carried out by several researchers (including postdoc candidates and PhD students).
More about the researchers and their projects
Anders Lyhne Christensen, professor at The Maersk Mc-Kinney Moller Institute
Swarms of intelligent drones have many applications, for example in search and rescue. But at present, the interaction between humans and drones is complicated.
This is where leading researchers from the University of Southern Denmark and Aalborg University, together with experts from Virginia Tech in the USA and the Danish drone company Robotto, can make a diffirence. They all have an ambitious goal to make this interaction much easier and more intuitive.
They plan to develop new methods for planning and managing drone missions that are easy to use. The project has the potential to create groundbreaking improvements in drone technology and strengthen Denmark's position as a leading player in this exciting and rapidly growing field.
Morten Madsen, professor at Mads Clausen Institute
The green transition requires large amounts of solar energy, and there is a great need today for better utilization of available space for large-scale photovoltaic systems. One way to accommodate this is to develop partially transparent solar cells that can be integrated directly into windows, greenhouses and fields, without changing the original function of the area.
The project aims to exploit the best of organic and oxide thin films for the development of flexible and lightweight hybrid solar cells that has a high transparency in an adjustable part of the visible area of the light spectrum.
The project combines two research groups that are experts in organic solar cells and functional oxides with three international project partners to push the boundaries of transparent solar cell performance beyond what is possible today.
Christina Viskum Lytken Larsen, professor at National Institute of Public Health
In Greenland, a third of all children have experienced some degree of difficult upbringing, such as growing up with violence or alcohol problems in their childhood home or having experienced sexual assault.
Based on research, it is known that difficult upbringing conditions not only affect the child's well-being, but have consequences throughout life, including by increasing the risk of vulnerability, poor physical and mental health and premature death. Even though many children have experienced difficult upbringing conditions, there is currently no research showing how children between the ages of 0-18 feel at a national level.
The aim of the project is to investigate the health and well-being of children and young people in Greenland. The project will thus be the first project to give us knowledge about how children and young people feel in Greenland, as well as about which living conditions affect their health and well-being.
Anders Grøntved, professor at Department of Sports Science and Clinical Biomechanics
In a world where digital screens have become an indispensable part of our daily lives, concerns about their impact on our health and behavior have received increased attention. Especially among young adults, the issue of the impact of screen use has become particularly relevant, also in view of this age group's burden of poor mental health, sleep disturbances and inactivity.
This research project aims to investigate how the restriction of screen use affects the behaviour of young adults, physiological stress and mental health in a randomised controlled study.
The knowledge we gather from the study will not only shed light on the impact of screen use on health and behavior but will also give us insight into how digital media affects social physical interactions among young adults. The project will inform future guidelines for digital screen use.
Søren Harnow Klausen, professor at Department of Design, Media and Educational Science
Many, not least young, people are increasingly living their lives online or moving freely between virtual and physical spaces. But online activities and virtual reality are still considered by many, including young people themselves, to be less good or healthy than life in the "real" world.
The project will take an open-minded look at the possibility of a good life in more or less virtual surroundings. I It consists partly of a philosophical investigation of the value and meaning of reality, authenticity, socializing, bodily activity, self-expression and accomplishment. On the other hand, it consists of empirical, interview-based studies of people – e.g. vulnerable people – for whom virtual spaces play a special role.
The project will contribute both to our basic understanding of what it means to live a good life and to future studies and design of virtual surroundings and guidelines.
Nikolaj Elf, professor at Department of Design, Media and Educational Science
Many students do not succeed in becoming good writers in elementary school. The research project investigates how students' writing identity relates to their writing development.
From previous studies, we know that students' writing development proceeds very differently, and the project therefore examines different student groups. Likewise, we know that students' writing identity is influenced by many factors, of which the project focuses in particular on writing lessons, writing assignments, feedback activities and experiences with writing outside school. The project is organized into four sub-projects, of which the three empirical projects all take a student-centered perspective.
Based on the results of the three sub-projects, a theoretical model for the relationship between writing identity and writing development is developed. The model is intended to be used by teachers, leaders and researchers in their efforts to strengthen all students' writing and participation opportunities in education and society.
Jessica Maren Buchtik Ortner Nielsen, associate professor at The Faculty of Humanities
Michael Rothberg, with his term "the implicated subject", points out that colonization has given The West some advantages that we still enjoy, which is why we still have a moral responsibility for the crimes of the past.
This project examines how German and Italian postcolonial literature and activism draw attention to the two nations' colonial pasts, a past that both countries have been slow to acknowledge. This is not least because other crimes have taken the limelight: In Germany, the memory of the Holocaust and in Italy, the memory of fascism.
We suggest that literature and activism are two complementary ways of rethinking these countries' pasts. Postcolonial literature represents countries' marginalized memory of the colonial past, while activists struggle to change the concrete traces of colonialism in the cityscape. In this way, literature and activism contribute to a discussion of countries' ethical responsibilities today - a discussion that is only slowly getting started in Denmark.
