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International research collaboration to tackle climate change

28 April 2022
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A picture of the river and Durham Cathedral

We’re supporting the Climate Action #MadeAtUni campaign and are proud to announce that we have six new research collaborations with the University of Notre Dame, USA, to help tackle pressing global issues such as climate change and how we can improve the use of solar energy.

The #MadeAtUni campaign shows how UK universities are creating bold, innovative, and lasting changes to the world around us on a local, national and global scale.

The Notre Dame - Durham University Seedcorn Fund

Launched in November 2021, the Notre Dame – Durham University Seedcorn Fund, is part of a strategic commitment made by both institutions in a Memorandum of Understanding signed in 2019. The agreement is to deepen and broaden research collaboration beyond pre-existing, successful collaborations in fields such as Theology and Anthropology.

Beyond research collaboration, our students now have the opportunity to spend a year at Notre Dame following the signing of a student exchange agreement in 2021. Our first cohort is currently in the USA and we look forward to welcoming Notre Dame’s students to Durham. 

Successful proposals 

The Notre Dame – Durham Seedcorn Fund was open to applications in all disciplines though prioritised proposals in the areas of, Climate Change, Solar Energy, and Tropical Disease.

Six research projects across three of our four faculties - Arts and Humanities, Social Science and Health and Science – were selected for funding under the inaugural ND-DU Seedcorn Fund.

They will be looking into:

  • The long-term resilience of Arctic herd herbivores and their terrestrial habitats to climate change.
  • Gathering evidence on enhanced chemical weathering as a geoengineering strategy to enhance atmospheric carbon dioxide sequestration.
  • The circumpolar Arctic to better encompass and understand impacts across a range of representative forest (deciduous and evergreen needleleaf) and tundra.
  • Improving ways to collect solar energy using high-fidelity radiative transfer modelling.
  • How architectural technologies of the past can contribute to creating energy efficient and climate-enhancing structures of the future.
  • The first-movement form in the nineteenth-century violin concerto

Each award is worth up to £20,000 and projects will run anytime between May 2022 and May 2024.

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