Joint Calls for Research Proposals

UC-UNAM Call for Proposals 2023

Climate Resilience and Challenges for Urban and Rural Areas

Alianza MX launched a joint call for research proposals with the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM) in February 2023. Proposal submissions were required to include at least three PIs, including at least two from the UC, and selected projects were eligible for up to USD $50,000 in total funding per year over two years.

Following evaluation of the proposal submissions by a binational review committee, three were selected for funding support. Please see below for details and check back here soon for updates on these exciting new joint research projects.

Toward Sustainable Carbon Negative Bioproduction: Uncovering Thermodynamic Bottlenecks in Essential Metabolic Pathways

Research questions:

How does sustainable food production using CO2 feedstocks affect metabolic constraints in E. coli?

Can cells be engineered to overcome these limitations and address climate-related problems, including efficient carbon fixation and increased efficiency of food production?

Principal Investigators:

José A. Farias-Rico, Center for Genomic Sciences, UNAM

Neema Jamshidi, Radiological Sciences, UC Los Angeles

José Utrilla-Carreri, Center for Genomic Sciences, UNAM

Daniel C. Zielinski, Systems Biology Research Group, UC San Diego

Development of Additives Based on Nanomaterials for the Protection of Historical Buildings from Contaminant Gases and Biodeterioration in Urban Areas

Research questions:

Can nanomaterials mitigate and arrest the degradation of construction materials used in historic buildings by contaminant gases and bacteria?

Principal Investigators:

Dr. Rubén Darío Cadena Nava, Center of Nanoscience & Nanotechnology, UNAM

Dr. Luis Cedeño Caero, Department of Chemical Engineering, UNAM

Dr. Sergio Fuentes Moyado, Center of Nanoscience & Nanotechnology, UNAM

Dr. Ioanna Kakoulli, Dept of Materials Science & Engineering, UCLA

Dr. Francisco Zaera, Dept of Chemistry, UCR

Biogeochemical Responses to Shelf Sea Dynamics in the Yucatan Shelf

Research questions:

How do climate-driven mechanisms of upwelling, nutrient transport, and algal blooms on the northern Yucatan continental shelf affect local fisheries?

Principal Investigators:

Daniele Bianchi, Dept of Atmospheric & Oceanic Sciences, UC Los Angeles

Jorge Alejandro Kurczyn Robledo, Institute of Engineering, UNAM

Nick Nidzieko, Dept of Geography, UC Santa Barbara

Alejandro J. Souza, Center for Research & Advanced Studies (Cinvestav-Mérida)

Joint Calls for Research Proposals

UC-Cinvestav Call for Proposals 2022

Agriculture, Plant Genomics, Marine Sciences, and Health

Alianza MX launched a joint call for research proposals with the Center for Research and Advanced Studies (Cinvestav) in September 2022. Proposal submissions were required to include at least three PIs, including at least two from either Cinvestav or the UC, and selected projects were eligible for up to USD $100,000 in total funding over two years.

Following evaluation of the proposal submissions by a binational review committee, two were selected for funding support. Please see below for details and check back here soon for updates on these exciting new joint research projects.

Ex-vivo and in-vitro spectroscopic studies of ternary copper-prion interactions and its implications in Alzheimer's disease

Principal Investigators:

Dr. R. David Britt, Dept of Chemistry, UC Davis

Dr. Glenn L. Millhauser, Dept of Chemistry & Biochemistry, UC Santa Cruz

Dr. Liliana Quintanar Vera, Dept of Chemistry and Center for Research in Aging, Cinvestav Zacatenco

Dr. José Segovia Vila, Physiology, Dept of Biophysics & Neuroscience, Cinvestav Zacatenco

Looking for clues to today's problem of antibiotic-resistant strains in ancient microbial mats

Principal Investigators:

Dr. Maribel Hernandez-Rosales, Dept of Bioinformatics & Complex Systems, Cinvestav Irapuato

Dr. Gabriela Olmedo-Álvarez, Dept of Molecular Biology & Microbial Ecology, Cinvestav Irapuato

Dr. Adam Olshen, Dept of Epidemiology & Biostatistics, UC San Francisco

Dr. Alejandra Rodríguez-Verdugo, Dept of Ecology & Evolutionary Biology, UC Irvine

Joint Calls for Research Proposals

UC-UNAM Special Call

Binational Collaborative Projects Addressing COVID-19

Alianza MX launched a Special Call in 2020 with support from UC MEXUS, the UC Berkeley Health Initiative of the Americas, and Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM), through its Coordinación de Vinculación y Transferencia Tecnológica (CVTT) and InnovaUNAM. A second round of the call was launched in 2021 to provide additional funding support for a subset of projects from the first round. Research projects were required to promote binational collaboration by including at least one principal investigator from the UC and at least one principal investigator from UNAM.

Phase I: April 2020–October 2021

Phase I of the Special Funding Call received 137 proposals. These included 25 in the biomedical sciences, 32 in health systems, and 59 on the social and economic consequences of the pandemic, while an additional 21 proposals covered multiple topics. Researchers, academics, and students from more than 40 UNAM entities and nine campuses of the University of California participated. A total of 19 projects were selected to each receive USD $5,000 in funding support.

Phase II: October 2021–December 2022

In October 2021, Phase I projects were invited to submit proposals for a second funding stage. From the initial group of 19 projects, 12 submitted proposals for Phase II, with special consideration given to the possibility of licensing technology or establishing new companies that could help secure additional funding. Five projects were selected to each receive USD $25,000 in funding support:

 

YangQuan Chen, UC Merced

Rafael Ángel Barrio Paredes, UNAM Physics Institute

William H. Fenical, UC San Diego

Rachel Mata Essayag, UNAM Department of Chemistry

Lucia Abascal & Jamie Sepulveda, UC San Francisco

Dania Lima Sánchez, UNAM Department of Biomedical Informatics

Claudia Wehrhahn Cortes & Zehang Richard Li, UC Santa Cruz

Luis Vaca Domínguez, UNAM Institute of Cellular Physiology

Manuela Raffatellu, UC San Diego

Araceli Pérez López, UNAM Biomedical Research Unit (FES Iztacala)