AEA Seed grants to progress primary industries research

The University of Queensland has been awarded more than $1.5 million as part of Australia’s Economic Accelerator Seed Grants to progress research and technologies to benefit the primary industries.

Eight UQ-led projects were awarded funding in Tranche Two of the Seed Grants to support collaboration with industry partners.

The projects address National Reconstruction Fund priority areas to add value to the resources, agriculture, forestry and fisheries sectors.

Successful projects from UQ include:

• Dr Jitka Kochanek - A Spinifex-based Nanomaterials Platform for Climate-ready Crops and Mine-Site Restoration in partnership with Bulugudu Ltd and Cotton Seed Distributors Ltd
• Dr Jingwei Hou - Converting raw mineral materials to highly efficient lighting and display devices in partnership with SkiteLight Ltd Co
• Dr Hangil Park - Improving flotation beneficiation of minerals in partnership with Global Lithium Resources Ltd
• Dr Hannah Siddle – Proof of concept cattle tick vaccine trial for commercial adoption in partnership with Australian Agricultural Company Ltd
• Associate Professor Paul Ebert – Toward a rapid antibody test (RAT) for phosphine resistant insect pests of stored grain in partnership with Queensland Department of Agriculture and Fisheries
• Dr Rachel Stephenson – Single-shot anti-fertility vaccine in pigs in partnership with Brandon Biocatalyst
• Dr Juliana Segura-Salazar – Ore-sand: a circular economy solution to reduce mineral wastes and produce alternative construction materials in partnership with Newcrest Mining Ltd and Aurecon Australasia Pty Ltd
• Dr Fang You – Developing scaling-up process to produce haloalkaliphilic bacteria inoculum for industry-deployment to treat alkaline wastes from refining alumina in partnership with Rio Tinto Services Ltd

The AEA Seed Grants program is part of the governments $1.6 billion investment into Australian university research commercialisation.