804 million PLN – that is the total sum of donation available for scientific institutions to build a unique nationwide research infrastructure.
On the 30th of June, 2015, at the conference “Investment in education – investment in the economy,” announced was a competition for projects entered in the list of the Polish Roadmap for Research Infrastructures (PMDIB). PMDIB was announced by the Ministry of Science and Higher Education. On the basis of assessments by expert teams, 53 projects have been selected: 14 representing physical and mathematical sciences, 14 – technical sciences, 11 – earth sciences and biological sciences, 6 – interdisciplinary issues, 6 – medical and agricultural sciences and 2 – social sciences and humanities. There are 23 international projects.
– All of these projects deal with strategic research infrastructure – equipment and facilities of a unique character, a national, European or international scale, and crucial for development of scientific research –emphasizes prof. Włodzisław Duch, Deputy Minister of Science and Higher Education.
PMDIB projects are aimed at preparing individual or networked facilities of a large-scale, modern research infrastructure, as well as fixed or mobile appliances and test equipment. These can also be data banks, telecommunication networks and information systems, and even knowledge resources such as archives or collections and deposits.
– This is another activity in the EU’s new perspective in which science will go hand-in-hand with the economy, promoting our scientists and increasing the competitiveness of our companies. Research conducted by our scientists in collaboration with entrepreneurs set Poland on a long course of social and economic development– said prof. Jan Krzysztof Kurzydłowski, former Director of the National Centre for Research and Development.
PMDIB projects will be implemented in eight areas of science: fundamental research; interdisciplinary research; high quality of life in the society; efficient healthcare and increasing the effectiveness of pro-health measures; increasing the efficiency of production, storage and transmission of energy; development of advanced materials and technologies; development of intelligent systems and infrastructure; sustainable development of natural environment and human environment.
The minimal cost of project implementation should be 30 million PLN and research institutions must obtain at least 10% of the investment from entrepreneurs.
– Encouraging companies to invest money in such projects is a huge challenge for representatives of science. However, the constantly improving cooperation between these two spheres lets us hope that entrepreneurs will treat such investments as an advantageous opportunity. Investors will in fact be able to benefit from the resulting equipment and, eventually, this will lead to the practical application of modern solutions– hoped Dr. Olaf Gajl, Director of the Information Processing Centre – National Research Institute.
The Information Processing Centre – National Research Institute, acting as the Implementing Authority, collects applications and organizes the process of assessment. Full competition documentation is available on the OPI PIB website. Competition for projects within PMDIB (Measure 4.2, Development of Modern Research Infrastructure of the Science Sector) takes place within the Intelligent Development Programme, aimed at increasing innovativeness in the Polish economy through research, with active participation of enterprises.