The vision of this Fellowship proposal is to provide a unique capacity internationally, where proteins, metabolites and trace elements can be imaged and co-located at the sub-micron scale, under ambient pressure. This is not available using any other technique and will provide significant benefits to researchers in industry and academia studying the fluxes of metabolites, proteins and other biomarkers in tissues and cells. The Fellowship will develop a new emerging world leader and provide training to a team of researchers in this new field. The vision will be achieved by developing a novel toolbox for molecular speciation, to be used alongside ion beam analysis (IBA). The Fellowship will tackle this challenge with three interconnecting work packages, each investigating a different approach to augmenting the molecular speciation that can be provided alongside or with IBA techniques. These approaches can be summarised as follows: 1. Multimodal mass spectrometry and ion beam trace element imaging; 2. Microscale (point) protein and metabolite characterisation alongside ion beam trace element imaging; 3. Multiplexed ion beam imaging of biomolecules and proteins using antibody-lanthanide tags. This will provide a step change in the UK's capability in the characterisation of biological materials. This proposal will enhance the >£10M investment that EPSRC has recently made in renewing the UK National Ion Beam Centre (UKNIBC) contract and investment in associated equipment (EP/P001440/1; EP/I036516/1), ensure continuing provision of cutting-edge capability in the UK and provide enhanced capabilities at the UKNIBC. It will also ensure the primary benefits go to the needs of UK industry and academia and support the development of applications across RCUK priority areas, with significant economic and societal benefits.

Abstracts are not currently available in GtR for all funded research. This is normally because the abstract was not required at the time of proposal submission, but may be because it included sensitive information such as personal details.

The Distributed System of Scientific Collections (DiSSCo) is a pan-European Research Infrastructure (RI) initiative. DiSSCo aims to bring together natural science collections from 175 museums, botanical gardens, universities and research institutes across 23 countries in a distributed infrastructure that makes these collections physically and digitally open and accessible for all forms of research and innovation. DiSSCo RI entered the ESFRI roadmap in 2018 and successfully concluded its Preparatory Phase in early 2023. The RI is now transitioning towards the constitution of its legal entity (an ERIC) and the start of its scaled-up construction (implementation) programme. The primary goal of the DiSSCo Transition Project is to ensure the seamless transition of the DiSSCo RI from its Preparatory Phase to the Construction Phase (expected to start in 2025). In this transition period, the Project will address five objectives building on the outcomes of the Preparatory Phase project: 1) Advance the DiSSCo ERIC process and complete its policy framework, ensuring the smooth early-phase Implementation of DISSCo; 2) Engage & support DiSSCo National Nodes to strengthen national commitments; 3) Advance the development of core e-services to avoid the accumulation of technical debt before the start of the Implementation Phase; 4) Continue international collaboration on standards & best practices needed for the DiSSCo service provision; and 5) Continue supporting DiSSCo RI interim governance bodies and transition them to the DiSSCo ERIC formal governance. The Project’s impact will be measured against the increase in the RI's overall Implementation Readiness Level (IRL). More specifically, we will monitor its impact towards reaching the required level of maturity in four of the five dimensions of the IRL that can benefit from further developments. These include the organisational, financial, technological and data readiness levels.