LIVINGPORE, the project for the development of which Carlos Martí-Gastaldo has obtained a Consolidator Grant, consists of developing innovative strategies to programme the structural response of porous MOF (Metal-Organic Framework) materials. These materials offer infinite possibilities thanks to their capacity to incorporate new and very diverse properties through the capture of molecules in their pores. Due to their multiple variations and endless possibilities, MOFs are known in materials science as the “chemical lego” and have long been applied in the capture of CO2 and other gases, encapsulation of smart drugs or hydrogen storage, among other applications.

Carlos Martí-Gastaldo proposes a change in the conception of MOFs in LIVINGPORE: "We are looking for unique porous materials capable of providing structural and functional responses that are closer to biological systems, applicable to the pharmaceutical industry, biocatalysis or protein encapsulation, for example", explains the scientist. “If we stop thinking of MOFs as passive or rigid systems and start to perceive them as programmable and flexible materials, we will be able to consider the development of a system that allows us to separate and conveniently transform the molecules that are housed inside their pores; and if we manage to encapsulate and stabilise proteins while modifying their activity, then we would be talking about a very important chemical control”, adds the researcher. "Our aim is to employ new experimental and computational methodologies that allow us to programme and control, in all its chemical complexity, this aspect of porous materials", he concludes.

Martí-Gastaldo is the main promoter of the startup Porous Materials in Action (PMA), a spin-off of the Universitat de València dedicated to the development and commercialisation of MOF products, processes and services for their application in different fields, such as gas storage for green fuels, catalysis, pollutant capture, water or environmental purification, among others.

After achieving a Royal Society University Research Fellowship that allowed him to start his independent career at the University of Liverpool, in 2014 Martí-Gastaldo returned to Spain as a 'Ramón y Cajal' researcher at ICMol. In addition to leading the FUNIMAT research group (ICMol), Martí-Gastaldo is one of the two coordinators of the Institute's strategic line of molecular biomaterials design at the academic institution's Parc Científic. In 2016, he already obtained another 1.5 million in ERC funding for a first MOF-related project. His ERC Starting Grant (Chem-fs-MOF), which ends in December this year, has helped overcome the stability problems that limited the application of this type of material.

PHOTOFLUX, climate and vegetation

Shari Van Wittenberghe, who has now been awarded a Starting Grant of €1.5 million, completed her PhD studies in Bioscience Engineering at the University of Antwerp, Belgium, in 2014. She carried out her thesis in collaboration with the Earth Observation Laboratory (LEO) of the Image Processing Laboratory (IPL) at the Universitat de València, also at the Parc Científic.

Throughout her career she has worked on the vegetation study by passive monitoring of Chlorophyll fluorescence, through a Marie Skłodowska-Curie grant. During her postdoctoral stage she has focused her studies on monitoring plant photosynthesis from their spectral response. Since then, she has participated in several national and international projects related to the scientific activities for the preparation of the European Space Agency (ESA) FLEX (FLuorescence Explorer) mission.

Her PHOTOFLUX project pursues an interdisciplinary experimental approach to quantify carbon absorption by describing the processes of the use and dissipation of solar energy absorbed by plants. PHOTOFLUX aims to quantitatively assess the productivity and condition of vegetation under different climatic conditions globally.