Mikael on innovation and collaboration between CBH and RISE

At the CBH School, we have many environments that work closely with applications and we also see that some of our doctoral students dare to take the step to work with ideas that have sprung from their research work. A few weeks ago, I visited an industrial manufacture of plastic replacement materials based on a renewable materials. It is one of our former doctoral students, Christopher Carrick, who has started the company. They are now collaborating with several large companies that use plastic in their products, and who want to change as an increased environmental awareness is driving the replacement of fossil-based materials.

The journey has gone via KTH and then RISE for upscaling. KTH and RISE have great opportunities to complement each other and yesterday the CBH School participated in a meeting on precisely these opportunities for expanded and in-depth collaborations. This includes an opportunity to further develop research progress made within CBH, using the pilot infrastructure available at RISE. We discussed what a model for this collaboration could look like. Partly inspired by what we have seen work before and partly by looking at other models for making research infrastructure available, for example the national initiative MAX IV in Lund. To enforce this proposal, funding is required, where Vinnova is judged to be the player for which we should present this proposal. Daniel Söderberg at the CBH School is in charge of this question. So feel free to contact him if you have any ideas on how we can work with upscaling our research – or how we can support our doctoral students so that more of them dare to take the step.

Speaking of innovation, do not forget that everyone can nominate a candidate for the KTH Innovation Award. The prize is awarded to people from KTH who, through creativity, grit and courage, have contributed to a better society. The award was founded in 2020 through donations from Spotify's CEO and founder Daniel Ek and KTH professor Mathias Uhlén. The prize money is SEK 500,000. You can also nominate yourself. The nomination is open until April 15.

Nominate your candidate for the KTH Innovation Award

In conclusion, these extraordinary times have required extraordinary patience and no matter how horrible the pandemic has been, it has also taught us some wisdom that we can use once the pandemic is over. I think that, after just over a year with the pandemic, we need some lively activities that are not Zoom-related only. We in CBH management will think about what this might be like over the Easter holidays, but we are happy to accept suggestions as we know that we have many talented employees who know everything from cooking to bird watching.

With this, the CBH School's management wishes you all a nice Easter holiday, with well-filled Easter eggs and sunny days!

Mikael