Severo Ochoa

CLEAN AND SECURE ENERGY
The Energy sector is facing a new worldwide paradigm with 20 % renewables and 20 % decrease of greenhouse emission for 2020. This requires new ways of producing, storing, transporting and stabilizing electricity. The ICMAB undertakes this challenge reinforcing our expertise in smart functional materials research and strategically developing cost-effective upscalable technologies, from materials choice all along the value chain process to proof-of-concept devices. Our roadmap promotes greener and cost-effective technologies strengthening materials growth from chemical methods and highlighting additive manufacturing technologies for large area materials at high performance/low cost.

SMART AND SUSTAINABLE ELECTRONICS
Current needs in big-data handling are demanding new solutions for the dramatic energy consumption of current computing and data storage devices. Power dissipation and miniaturization are fundamental challenges for nanoelectronic circuits. We envisage sustainable and energy-efficiency approaches to electronics by working along two fronts: exploiting dissipation-less storage and information control by electric fields and involving spin-only currents, rather than charge transport. The use of organic materials/molecules in devices will also provide important guidance towards a new-generation of memories. Great perspectives are expected for the development of devices exploiting the charge as well as the spin of the molecules.

SMART NANOMEDICINE
Academia and the innovative industry have directed its interests towards nanomedicine, whose technological breakthrough potentiality is widely acknowledged. It is envisaged that the unique properties of nanomaterials will make a strong impact contributing to solve some of the challenges of Health and Societal Wellbeing. FUNMAT will contribution to Nanomedecine, through improvement of drugs and medicines making them more selective, less toxic, and more efficient. It will also contribute to the advance of medical diagnosis by developing new contrast agents for medical imaging techniques. Further, the use of advanced materials and nanotechnology concepts in synergy with molecular biology will allow the generation of new tools for tissue engineering meaning a giant step for regenerative medicine.

The "Smart Functional Materials for Social Grand Challenges (FUNMAT) Severo Ochoa Project of Excellence involves the following Strategic Priority Actions for the years 2016-2019:

1. Formation of a Scientific Advisory Board
   A Scientific Advisory Board (SAB) formed by 12 international experts was formed. The SAB has visited and evaluated the research lines and the ICMAB performance on November 2016, 2017 and 2018. 
   
   
2. Frontier Interdisciplinary Projects (FIPs)
   The FIP are an internal call of proposals for researchers of the Institute aimed for the development of high-risk exploratory projects of interdisciplinary character to generate cutting-edge research in the application areas of clean & secure energy, smart & sustainable electronics or smart nanomedicine.
   FIP projects aim to reinforce the internal links and scientific critical mass of ICMAB's researchers, and to contribute to strenghen the international leadership of the Institute in the area of functional materials.
   The FIP calls were in 2016, 2017 and 2018. 
   
   
3. Talent attraction and recruiting
4. Mobility actions and training
5. Invigorate the Technology Transfer programme
   One of the main missions of ICMAB is to transfer the knowledge acquired to the society. This is achieved by transferring technology to industries, universities and other research centers, through patents, publications, spin-offs, and by establishing different collaborations with them. 
6. Invigorate the Communication & Outreach programme
   One of the main missions of ICMAB is to encourage scientific vocations and increase the general scientific knowledge of the society. Throughout last year, ICMAB continued to offer public engagement and science education activities. A Communication & Outreach Officer was hired in April 2017 to invigorate the communication program. Its main function is to support the dissemination of the research activity and the impact of the work developed by the ICMAB community. 
7. Invigorate the Project Managing programme
8. Creation of new Committees
   An interesting Severo Ochoa action is the formation of three new committees on Recruiting, Seminars & Training, and Gender Equality. These committees are integrated by members of each research lines and have the support of the Severo Ochoa project managers. In 2017, two other committees were created, the Technology Transfer committee, and the Communication & Outreach committee. These new committees were added to the already existing committees of the Institute: Health & Safety, Computing, Gases and Waste Management 

SOMMa was officially launched in October 2017

SOMMa (www.somma.es/) is the alliance of Severo Ochoa centres and María de Maeztu units to promote Spanish Excellence in research and to enhance its social impact at national and international levels. SOMMa was officially launched in October 2017.

SOMMa brings together 25 Severo Ochoa centres and 16 María de Maeztu units accredited through these excellence awards and aims to:

• Increase the national and international visibility of the SO and MM programme as an “interdisciplinary and interconnedted Spanish research ecosystem of excellence”
• Promote exchange of knowledge, technology and good practices among its members, the international scientific community and key stakeholders. 
• Have a voice in Spanish science policy. 
• Collaborate with other centres and universities to push forward Spanish science.

The ICMAB participates in “Work package 3: Outreach”

The alliance’s starting activities comprised the establishment of its own governance, the launching of the website (somma.es) and the organisation of task forces to address the different objectives.

SOMMa is organized by a Chair, Co-Chair and Project Manager, and by a Steering Committee (SC) in charge of different work packages.

The ICMAB participates in “Work package 3: Outreach”, and helps in the organization of the 100xCiencia meetings.

• In 2017, the 100xCiencia.2 meeting was held in Alicante, and its topic was “Co-creating value in scientific research”.
• In 2018, the 100xCiencia.3 meeting was held in Madrid (CNIO) and the topic was "Bridging science and society"
• In 2019, 100xCiencia.4 meeting is in Donostia/San Sebastián (BCBL) "Tendiendo puentes entre ciencia y sociedad" 

The ICMAB Communication & Outreach Officer, Anna May Masnou, is also part of the SOMMa Editorial Board, which is in charge of the website and of the press releases of the SOMMa network. 

ICMAB articles on the SOMMa website:

Paper farming for thermoelectrics: breakthrough to recycle waste heat into electricity

• The device is composed of bacterial-produced cellulose with small amounts of carbon nanotubes
• The production method and recyclability of the components make this a sustainable and environmentally friendly product
• The device could be used to generate electricity in wearables, medical and sports applications, and as an intelligent thermal insulator

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Towards calcium-based batteries

The development of a rechargeable battery technology using light electropositive metal anodes would bring in a breakthrough in energy density. For divalent charge carriers (M2+), the number of ions that must react to achieve a certain electrochemical capacity is diminished by two when compared to Li+. This would allow for the design of higher energy density batteries.

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Superconductors to improve energy efficiency

The Superconducting Materials and Large Scale Nanostructures (SUMAN) group has participated in the EU-funded project EUROTAPES, whose main goal is to develop superconducting tapes to improve energy efficiency in Europe. The project, which counts with the participation of excellent researchers in the field, and the involvement of leading global companies and universities, has produced 600 meters of superconducting tape with an innovative method that reduces superconductor production cost, simplifies the architecture of these materials, and improves their capacity in high magnetic fields at various temperature scales.

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A step closer to future calcium batteries

A group of researchers of the Institute of Materials Science of Barcelona (ICMAB – CSIC) has made a discovery that could entail the replacement in the future of the currently omnipresent Lithium–ion batteries. From mobiles to laptops, drills to hedge trimmers, or electric bicycles and cars, these batteries are used in countless devices, small and large. Now, building on top of their previous discoveries in this field, the research group of M. Rosa Palacín has proven the feasibility of electrochemically extracting calcium from a calcium containing oxide. 

READ MORE

Documents from the SOMMa network:

• SOMMa Position Paper: Actions required to safeguard science competitiveness

News at the ICMAB website about SOMMa:

2017:

• Launch of the “Alliance of Severo Ochoa Centres and Maria de Maeztu Units of Excellence” (October 2017)
• ICMAB at the 100xCiencia.2 Meeting of Excellence in Research: Co-creating value in scientific research (November 2017)

2018:

• The Severo Ochoa Centres and Maria de Maeztu Units Alliance (#SOMMa) aims at promoting Spanish excellence science, and preserving its competitiveness (March 2018)
• The industry with the Spanish research (May 2018)
• SOMMa in the press: "Respiro para la ciencia" (May 2018)
• CNIO, 15 NOV: #100xCiencia.3 Meeting: Bridging Science and Society (October 2018)
• #CienciaenelParlamento will join scientists and politicians in Madrid for the first time (November 2018)
• #100xCiencia3 meeting: Society must be more involved in science. And vice versa (November 2018)

2019:

• DTIC-UPF, 8 April 2019: Open Science Day SOMM Alliance (March 2019)
• The meeting of the SOMMa members at the Ministry highlights the impact of this excellence programme (September 2019)
• The SOMMa Alliance holds its first meeting on gender equality policies (October 2019)
• Donostia, 22-23 Nov 2019: SOMMa 100xCiencia.4 Meeting: Building bridges between Science and Society (October 2019)

SOMMa in the press:

2017:

• 25 centros de excelencia 'Severo Ochoa' y 16 unidades de investigación 'María de Maeztu' se unen para tener voz política (El Periódico, 18/10/2017)

• La élite de la ciencia española se queja del ahogo de las leyes (El País, 03/11/2017)

2018:

• Científicos piden que se deduzca el 100% del IVA de la investigación pública (La Vanguardia, 12/03/2018)

• SOMMa in the press: Respiro para la ciencia: una enmienda a ley de Presupuestos desencalla la paralización de los centros. (La Vanguardia, 28/05/2018)

2019:

• “Estamos matando la ciencia en la universidad y los organismos de investigación” (El País, 01/02/2019) 
• El Gobierno aprueba medidas que mejoran el trabajo de los científicos (La Vanguardia, 08/02/2019)
• ¡Queremos inventar nosotros, por favor! (El País, 29/03/2019)
• Los partidos apuestan por aumentar el presupuesto para ciencia al 2 % del PIB (La Vanguardia, 01/04/2019)
• Los políticos prometen lo imposible en ciencia (El Pais, 19/04/2019)
• Científicos de élite denuncian su precariedad pese a las medidas de urgencia del Gobierno (El País, 31/10/2019)
• El sector científico reclama un Pacto de Estado por la Ciencia "gobierne quien gobierne" (EuropaPress, 11/11/2019)