N
icolas Vandewalle, full professor in the Department of Physics of the Faculty of Science, director of the GRASP laboratory (Group of Research and Applications in Statistical Physics), has been selected by the Francqui Foundation for the position of ‘Francqui Research Professor’ for the next three years (2025-2028).
In practical terms, this position allows the holder to devote themselves almost exclusively to their research by significantly reducing their teaching load during the period concerned. The Francqui Foundation provides financial support of €40,000 per year in the form of compensation to the researcher who takes over the teaching load. A research grant of €5,000 per year is also awarded to the Francqui Research Professor.
"The pursuit of groundbreaking discoveries and the development of innovative solutions often require sustained attention and uninterrupted concentration. A substantial reduction in their teaching duties can enable academics to focus more on their research and thus achieve significant scientific results,‘ emphasises the Francqui Foundation, which has been awarding ’Francqui Research Professorships‘ (or ’Collen-Francqui Research Professorships’ in the biomedical field) for this purpose since 2008.
Professor Nicolas Vandewalle intends to use this mandate to develop groundbreaking research in the field of physics. He explains:
"In fact, I will be devoting the next few years to active matter, a new field of study in physics that is set to revolutionise physics in the 21st century. So it's very exciting! To put it simply, Newton's laws correctly describe the physics of systems composed of particles in reciprocal interactions (the famous action-reaction). However, it is easy to see that in nature (and particularly in living organisms) non-reciprocal interactions exist (e.g. a predator-prey system). The description of these systems must therefore find new laws and new models. This is where I come in with my little robots, in which I can encode non-reciprocal interactions. As I am the only person in Europe who can do this, I am contacted by many research groups who want to collaborate. I am inundated with requests at the moment, so the title of Francqui Research Professor comes at just the right time!'
Every year, the University of Liège's Heritage Foundations award more than 80 prizes and grants to ULiège students and alumni. Several calls have just been launched, so don't hesitate to consult them! (only in French)
SCOPE, dedicated to developing more sustainable IT infrastructure, and ShuttleToBrain, which explores new approaches to improving the delivery of drugs to the brain. Two new IMR projects at ULiège.
Measuring seven metres in diameter and nearly fourteen metres in length, FOCAL 7 will be the CSL’s largest vacuum chamber, and one of the largest in Europe !
