Marta Fajardo wins Tremplin Mariano Gago award for NanoXIMAGES project
Considering the year of the Portugal-France Season 2022 and with the support of the French Ministry of Europe and Foreign Affairs, the French Ministry of Culture, the Camões Institute – Institute of Cooperation and Language and the Office of Cultural Strategy, Planning and Evaluation (GEPAC), the Ministry of Higher Education, Research and Innovation of France (MESRI) and the French Academy of Sciences awarded four Prix Tremplin Mariano Gago awards. The total prize amount of 84 000 Euro was shared among four scientific collaborations.
IPFN researcher Marta Fajardo and IRAMIS-CEA researcher Hamed Merdji, with the NanoXIMAGES project, are one of the winning pairs. The project proposed has practical application in the area of nanotechnologies, aiming to prove that it is possible to reconstruct an X-ray image of an object through a process with incoherent light. This technique has strong applicability in the areas of medicine and biology.
Marta Fajardo also leads a project funded by the European Innovation Council, NanoXCAN, from which NanoXIMAGES now derives. “This is a simpler project, in which we see the absorption contrast (what is opaque and what is not) depending on the colour with which we are lighting, the wavelength of the X-rays and try to prove this new concept of incoherent imaging by diffraction”, she explains.
Strengthening bilateral research cooperation between two French-Portuguese teams and promoting their continuation and expansion within a 2-year research project is the main goal of these awards. The selection criteria are based on the quality of the preliminary results of the collaboration and scientific excellence of the project, the quality of the candidates and laboratories involved, the added value to be provided through bilateral collaboration, and future collaboration prospects.
The projects were selected by an international jury coordinated by MESRI, the French Academy of Sciences and the Lisbon Academy of Sciences, composed of French and Portuguese scientists. The official award ceremony will take place on June 21, 2022, at the Grand Hall of the French Academy of Sciences.
