The Route Materials – made in Holland is actively participating in composing a National Research Agenda Materials – made in Holland, with input from all stakeholders at universities, NWO institutes, TTOs, Universities of Applied Sciences and the Dutch Materials Industry. To complete the National Agenda it is important to include an estimate of the impact of materials research on the national economy (gross domestic product), earning capacity and the number of jobs it creates. We intend to outsource this study to Roland Berger Company. By including the results of the Roland Berger study the National Agenda will significantly gain in strength and relevance. This will benefit the entire materials research community in the Netherlands. The Report will also help materials researchers in the Netherlands to form consortia on well-targeted topics in order to apply for grants from the NWA.

Youths’ involvement in organized crime is worrisome, as it not only disrupts a healthy development, but also aggravates youths’ criminal behavior, and makes it harder to return to living a crime-free life. Social ties play an import role in the way youths get and stay involved in organized crime, that is why interventions are needed that target the youth, but also the youth’s social environment. We examine hotspots and mechanisms underlying organized crime involvement and use the knowledge gained to improve and implement intervention strategies. This way, the proposed project directly contributes to effectively decreasing youths’ involvement in organized crime.

Nanoplastics (NP), i.e. plastic particles < 1µm, were detected only recently in the marine environment raising the question if NPs could be a major part of ocean plastic pollution. In this project, we applied a novel technique that is based on vapourising and ionising a sample (sea water) containing NPs and detecting molecular plastic fragments by mass spectrometry (Thermal Desorption – Proton Transfer Reaction – Mass Spectrometry: TD-PTR-MS).

Fossil fuel use, land use change and cement production have perturbed the global carbon cycle and have led to the accumulation of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. This has two major consequences, namely global warming and ocean acidification (?the other CO2 problem?). Sea surface water pH has decreased already by 0.1 unit since pre-industrial time, and based on atmospheric CO2 scenarios, it is projected to further decline by 0.0015-0.002 unit per year over the coming century. However, observations on the Washington coast and in the North Sea (Rijkswaterstaat monitoring) show stronger decreases of 0.045 and 0.02 unit per year, respectively. The North Sea is apparently acidifying 10 times faster than global ocean model predictions. Here we propose a detailed investigation of the spatial and temporal patterns of pH in the North Sea at a basin-wide scale using the high quality methodology in use by the international CO2 research community. This will generate the needed data to see whether the acidification of the North Sea is indeed occurring at such high pace. In addition, we will also elucidate the biogeochemical mechanisms governing the pH in North Sea waters, in particular the balance between production and respiration and the generation of alkalinity. As part of this investigation, we will apply a recently developed modelling technique to attribute pH changes to changing environmental parameters.

Ocean plastic pollution is an environmental problem of increasing magnitude, yet the total amount of plastic in the marine realm is much lower than expected. On land, some fungi can break down plastics, but the ability of marine fungi to degrade plastic has not been investigated. Using a novel approach, I isolated a marine fungus and showed that it utilizes plastic for growth and energy gain, and I hypothesize that this ability is more widespread among marine fungi. I aim at confirming our hypothesis by investigating fungi in mangroves, which are hot spot marine ecosystems for marine fungi.