Sandpits and scoping projects

In February we held two sandpit events focusing on 'Transforming Food Supply Chains for a Sustainable Future' and 'Measuring the Ground Truth'. These were attended by ~70 people from across the fields of Physics and AgriFood including attendees and speakers from DEFRA, STFC, BBSRC, GFS, InnovateUK, industry and academia. After pitches on proposed projects, and a democratic voting process by sandpit participants, two winning projects were selected for funding - 'Project APROV - Augmented Procurement Visibility - Developing the self organising capability of agricultural procurement systems' and ​'Continuous Ammonia Monitoring for AGriculture - CAMAG'. 

At around the same time we also launched our first call for collaborative scoping projects and have been delighted to be able to fund more than 20 projects, all of which are cross-council or between STFC and industry. You can find out more about all of these projects here. Examples include:

• Use of astronomy image analysis expertise to analyse earth observation data to improve crops and grasslands
• Learning about consumer food decision making via the Zooniverse project which has rallied over 1 million citizen scientists around the world
• Use of STFC technology to assess fruit and vegetable ripeness and quality both in the field and in the supply chain, to check for adulteration of fruit juices, and to monitor ammonia emissions in agriculture
• Use of STFC Facilities to understand arsenic contamination in rice plants, and to improve the microstructural architecture of snacks
• Improving supply chain efficiency and resilience using STFC data science expertise and STFC capabilities in blockchain, Internet of Things and cryogenics

We'll have talks on all of our funded projects at our Annual Meeting on the 28th and 29th June so don't miss this chance to find out more and make the connections that could help you to be one of our next successful award winners. Registration is open now.

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​You can see how our projects fit across our themes in this updated version of our intersections diagram: