How a small travel grant led to a significant international collaboration

 It all started when two Australian researchers got a small travel grant to visit the Nordic Center for Earth Evolution at the Department of Biology.

While visiting in 2016, Dr. Will Bennett from the Environmental Futures Research Institute, Griffith University, realized that he and Professor Donald Canfield shared a common interest in trace metal geochemistry.

Now, they have been awarded a AU$ 327,000 Australian Research Council Discovery Project grant to continue the collaboration (DKK 1,554,000).

“This grant will facilitate strong links between Griffith and SDU researchers into the future,” he said.

The grant is for the project “Unravelling vanadium biogeochemistry in modern marine sediments to trace ancient oxygen,” and the project team will also include Professor Enzo Lombi from the University of South Australia.

This project will make use of the Australian Synchrotron, a landmark piece of scientific infrastructure, to investigate the details of vanadium enrichment in modern marine sediments, with the ultimate goal of applying this knowledge to better understand how oxygen evolved during Earth's history.

“The most important thing to note is that this successful collaboration may never have occurred if I was not provided the opportunity to travel to SDU and meet with the researchers there - a small initial investment has now resulted in the development of a significant international collaboration that will lead to exciting research outcomes," said Bennett.