The steering committee of the FRAM Centre has decided to distribute funding to keep junior scientist in the FRAM team and in addition support some smaller research projects in the area of chemical mixtures, risk assessment and management strategies.
Money does no good if it is not used. The FRAM Centre now distributes money to keep young researchers close and to strengthen the funding of a number of small projects.
- We decided it was crucial for FRAM to support our junior scientists, to keep them in and around FRAM, and to secure their academic careers until the end of FRAM. In addition, we are happy to support some spin-off projects and open up the possibility to support the work of master students doing projects relevant for FRAM in Gothenburg or with some of our partners in our case study areas, says Åsa Arrhenius, the FRAM Centre Coordinator.
One example of the funded projects is “Toxic chemicals in recycled plastic pellets” that aims to assess the overall toxic load from the diverse multi-component chemical cocktails present in recycled plastics. From FRAM and the University of Gothenburg, Thomas Backhaus and Bethanie Carney Almroth are collaborating with Sara Brosché from IPEN (International Pollutants Elimination Network). The research will potentially enable regulatory action, e.g. the setting of realistic limits for inclusion of recycled plastics in new products, or support efforts to ban use of specific substances or groups of chemicals in consumer goods. This work adds to established collaborations with the analytical chemists at the UFZ in Leipzig and will support our international work. In particular, it will shed light on the chemical aspect of plastic pollution.
Another example of the funded project is a survey in Sweden on the willingness to pay to reduce the risk of asthma from chemical products led by FRAM researcher Daniel Slunge. This survey will be implemented in several other countries as well and is part of an OECD project analysing costs and benefits of chemicals regulation, the SACAME project.
This is the full list of the newly funded spin-off projects: