A year full of CONTRASTs

A year has already gone by since CONTRAST started its operations on 1 January 2024! It’s been a busy year with many goings-on and already several results achieved. Here are some of them:

In the first quarter, we worked on building an identity – on finding ourselves, if you like. We set up a website and started filling it with information, and we created a logo. For Christmas, the logo even got dressed up in seasonally appropriate headwear:

Also, we started recruiting people to join us in our research efforts. In this passing year, we’ve welcomed two PhD candidates and two postdocs who will work in different fields, across the workpackages, at CONTRAST institutions from Greece in the south to Norway in the north.  

All the important bodies are now in place. The Steering Committee was set up in the first quarter, and thereafter a Stakeholder Committee and a Scientific Advisory Board were established.

The Stakeholder Committee is made up of ICES, OSPAR, MEDPOL, INFO/RAC, EMODnet, EC/JRC, HELCOM, DG Environment, while the Scientific Advisory Board consists of key experts from institutions in Irland, Italy, Basque Country, Germany, Spain and the EC Joint Research Centre. Their areas of expertise are chemistry, biodiversity, biological effects, modelling, and deep sea ecotoxicology.

Throughout 2024, CONTRAST delivered on its deliverables. Here are some important results :

• A list of priority CECs for chemical analysis and biological effects has been made. The list includes morethan 60 CECs for chemical analysis and a dozen CECs for investigation of mechanisms of toxicity and biological effects. More info on this list will follow soon
• A plan for exploration of CECs in the deep sea has been set up
• In collaboration with TREC, CONTRAST has many sediment samples from across the European seas to analyse for legacy chemicals and CECs, as well as samples for effect-directed analysis (EDA). Click the link to learn more about the TREC expedition within EMBL, a programme which studies the European coastal ecosystems and their response to the environment, from molecules to communities.

Elsewhere too, CONTRAST colleagues have made themselves seen and heard:

• In April, Evgeniy Yakushev (NIVA) presented CONTRAST at the European Geosciences Union (EGU) general assembly 2024
• In May, Steven Brooks (also NIVA) presented the project at SETAC Europe 34th Annual meeting and PRIMO22
• In September, Aourell Mauffret and Nicolas Briant (both from IFREMER) presented CONTRAST at the TREC meeting in Heidelberg, Germany. There were also fruitful discussions on samples analysis and data managementbetween CONTRAST and TREC
• In November, Steven Brooks pitched CONTRAST during the EMODNet Biology webinar, which was hosted by our partner Marina Lipizer from the OGS
• Last, but not least, we congratulate CONTRAST partner Anna Turns on winning 1^st prize in the Global category at the Global AMR Media Awards. Read her award winning BBC article here!
  ‍

No research project is complete without workshops, and CONTRAST held several in 2024. One workshop was organised at the University of Gothenburg’s Marine Research Center in Kristineberg in October, and another was held at NIVA’s offices in Oslo in November. Both workshops focused on harmonising chemical analytics, biological effects methods, and biodiversity assessments, and experts from various scientific fields and from several European countries where brought together to share knowledge and experiences.  
‍

What a year! But stay tuned, for there is more to come in 2025:

Very soon CONTRAST will launch the educational website “A New Formula”. Among the different cool resources on this site will be content for students of different ages, teachers and parents, interactive resources, courses, and more.

ScienceCafé: With the help of our partners from HCMR in Greece, we plan to arrange a first-ever CONTRAST Science Café during our Annual Consortium Meeting Greece, in April/May 2025. More news coming soon!

There will also be lab and fieldwork, seminars, conferences and much more, so make sure you follow CONTRAST on our LinkedIn page to always know the latest.

‍We wish you a HAPPY NEW YEAR full of more CONTRASTs!