A team of researchers led by Professor Adam Izdebski from the Faculty of “Artes Liberales” at the University of Warsaw has received a prestigious ERC Synergy Grant from the European Research Council (ERC).
ERC Synergy Grants are among the most financially substantial grants offered by the ERC. This is only the second time Polish scientists have received such a grant; the first was awarded in 2020.
The implementation of the EUROpest project: A Novel Understanding of Pandemic Disease in Preindustrial Europe (1300-1800): Combining History, Machine Learning and Natural Sciences will last six years, starting in the midle of next year. It will involve dozens of researchers from ten scientific institutions in Europe and the United States. This entire consortium is coordinated by the University of Warsaw. The project has been awarded with almost €10 million.
The team will explore why the same pandemic wave causes great havoc in one place yet barely impacts another and what factors make it impossible to predict outcomes based solely on the pathogen.
“The main objective of our project is to find the answer to the question of why the same pathogens, depending on the context, bring about different biological, ecological, social, economic and cultural effects. We want to address this issue by studying more than 50 different epidemics in European history, from the Black Death to the age of industrialisation, over some 500 years, looking at them from possible angles, including climate, genetics, ecology, as well as the unusual topics such as church rituals (did they sing or not?) or the types of hats worn,” says Professor Adam Izdebski from the Faculty of “Artes Liberales” at the University of Warsaw.
Research will also focus on reconstructing everyday life conditions, including clothing, housing, diet, health, and demographic structure, as well as people’s knowledge and beliefs about diseases, the impact of trade routes, and political and religious contexts. The Institute of Geography and Spatial Organization of the Polish Academy of Sciences will conduct paleological field studies in Lithuania, Ukraine, and Poland, with additional support from a team led by economic and demographic historian Professor Piotr Guzowski from the University of Bialystok.
The researchers will employ methods like archaeogenetics to analyze victims’ remains, identifying bacteria and viruses present at the time of death. Ecological and climatic data will further enrich this historical and biological analysis.
ERC Synergy Grants support interdisciplinary projects requiring collaboration between multiple research teams, providing funding to groups of 2–4 principal investigators and their teams. This year, 57 groups will share €571 million for projects addressing complex scientific issues across various disciplines, with institutions from 24 countries participating.
The ERC, established in 2007, awards grants for groundbreaking research within the European Union and associated countries. The ERC budget exceeds €16 billion and is part of the Horizon Europe program, overseen by a Scientific Council appointed by the European Commission.
Source:
Nauka w Polsce
University of Warsaw
ERC
