Increasing awareness of knowledge security at NWO-I

Open if possible and protected if necessary

NWO-I possesses important scientific knowledge and information that its employees should deal with carefully. Recently, NWO-I started an internal campaign to make all employees aware that their behaviour can contribute to greater knowledge security. Special guidelines apply to the protection of the “crown jewels”; knowledge that has a distinct value. What are those guidelines and how do they impact the work of a researcher? Senior policy officer Miriam Roelofs tells about it.

Three NWO Institutes among recipients of funding for scientific infrastructure

On 9 May 2023, NWO announced that it is investing more than 22.7 million euros in projects from seven national consortia for innovative scientific infrastructure. Three of those consortia are led by NWO Institutes, namely AMOLF, Nikhef and DIFFER. The awards are part of the research programme Research Infrastructure (RI): national consortia (formerly known as NWO Investment Grant Large). With this investment, NWO will strengthen the scientific infrastructure that Dutch knowledge institutions make available to the research community. The investments will be used for the development of high-grade equipment, data collections and software.

Highlight NSCR: knowledge helps to prevent the step towards prostitution

Human traffickers use various tactics to get women (and sometimes men) into the sex industry and keep them there. Researchers from the Netherlands Institute for the Study of Crime and Law Enforcement (NSCR) and the Open Universiteit analysed 50 court rulings that sentenced somebody for this form of human trafficking. They ascertained which tactics human traffickers use to get the victim to work for them. This analysis revealed that the traffickers are guilty of misusing the vulnerable position of victims, and of facilitating, misleading, controlling, threatening, using physical violence and giving instructions. Knowledge about the tactics used can help to prevent vulnerable people from ending up in prostitution.

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NWO looks back on successful Pride Event

On Monday 8 May, a successful Pride event for entire NWO organisation, including the NWO Institutes, was held at SRON in Leiden. The LGBTI+* event had a very good turn-up with over 40 participants, welcomed by SRON's institute's manager Annemieke Beers and CWI's HR manager and organizer Léon Ouwerkerk. Four strong speakers carried the meeting: Ilse Aben (SRON), Tana Joseph (NAIEC and UvA), Russell Shipman (SRON), and Marjolein Verkouter (JIVE). Each of them told us about their field of expertise in astronomy, and shared to some extend their personal stories. *LGBTI+ stands for lesbian women, gay men, transgender and intersex people.

Highlight NIOZ: melting Greenland glaciers are changing coastal ecosystem

This century, the shrinking of the Greenland ice cap will change the composition of marine coastal species, from bacteria to fish. The many glaciers flowing from the Greenland ice cap end up in several hundred fjords, where they form reservoirs of freshwater that flow into the Atlantic Ocean. As a result of climate change, the glaciers are receding. Alice Stuart-Lee, a PhD student at the Royal Netherlands Institute for Sea Research (NIOZ), discovered that a fjord with a glacier that terminates in the sea is far richer in nutrients than those with glaciers that terminate on the land. The major changes in the food web will have a negative impact on fishing for halibut and cod, an industry that Greenland strongly depends on.

About NWO-I

NWO-I, the Institutes Organisation of NWO, is an independent foundation belonging to NWO. The following nine institutes are part of NWO-I: AMOLF, ARCNL, ASTRON, CWI, DIFFER, Nikhef, NIOZ, NSCR and SRON. The 48 workgroups in which physics research takes place at Dutch universities and knowledge institutes are also part of NWO-I.

Contact

NWO-I
www.nwo-i.nl
info-nwoi@nwo-i.nl
(030) 600 12 11

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