Marsden grants support Victoria researchers
Victoria University researchers have achieved yet again in the highly competitive Marsden Fund that funds research excellence in a range of areas.
Successful projects include research into the fate of glaciers as the world warms, a detailed study of the southwest Pacific’s magnetic field over the last 10,000 years that will help date events such as early settlement of New Zealand, and a study of the political, economic and historical conditions surrounding Maori Television’s emergence, organisation and practices.
Victoria researchers received 11 Marsden grants out of 88 grants funded nationwide worth $5.8 million in total. The funding consists of six standard grants and five Fast Start grants for emerging researchers.
Victoria researchers are also Associate Investigators on two grants led by other institutions.
Vice-Chancellor Professor Pat Walsh congratulated the successful researchers.
"The Marsden Fund is a very competitive process so I congratulate our research staff who continue to push the boundaries of knowledge. They can be very proud of themselves.
"It was also pleasing to see that the grants were spread across five faculties at the University," says Professor Walsh.
The Faculty of Science was awarded six grants, with the School of Chemical and Physical Science receiving three of those.
Researchers from the Faculty of Humanities and Social Science received two Marsden grants, out of only four standard grants awarded nationwide.
Grants were also awarded to a researcher from the Faculty of Engineering, as well as a researcher from the Faculty of Architecture and Design, which continued the Faculty’s success from last year when it received Marsden funding for the first time.
The Faculty of Commerce and Administration received one grant.
Of the 11 projects funded, eight include funding for postgraduate students.
"It’s excellent to see how significant grants such as these help the next generation of researchers by funding scholarships and research assistants," says Professor Walsh.
Victoria University recipients of Marsden standard grants
Dr Andrew McGregor, REDD and the new political ecology of forest protection in Indonesia, $870,000
Professor Pablo Etchegoin, Surface Enhanced Raman (SERS) microscopy in the Kretschmann configuration, $830,000
Dr Jo Smith, Onscreen indigeneity: The case of Maori Television, $770,000
Professor Sekhar Bandyopadhyay, Dalits in the history of Partition in eastern India, $659,726
Dr Gillian Turner, Towards an understanding of the geodynamo - filling the southwest Pacific wasteland, $615,000
Associate Professor Sebastian Link, Constraints on SQL data: Foundations for a data-intensive society, $405,000
Victoria University recipients of Marsden Fast Start grants
Dr Brian Anderson, For how long can glaciers keep advancing in a warming world?, $345,000
Dr Leon Gurevitch, World Wide Weta: Digital workshop of the World and New Zealand's cultural economy, $345,000
Dr Taciano Milfont, One eye on the past and one eye on the future: The role of psychological time in tackling environmental issues, $345,000
Dr David Pearce, Attacking the grand challenge of a verifying compiler, $345,000
Dr Mattie Timmer, Protecting-group-free synthesis: Avoiding the unavoidable in organic chemistry, $345,000
Marsden-funded projects involving Victoria University researchers
Dr Joseph Bulbulia is an Associate Investigator on a grant led by Professor Russell Gray from the University of Auckland, The cultural evolution of religion, $775,000
Associate Professor Tim Little is an Associate Investigator on a grant led by Professor David Prior from the University of Otago, Episodic creep at the brittle-ductile transition during the seismic cycle of great earthquakes, $915,000