The future: interdisciplinary research, international activity, a strategic horizon • On the goals and activities of the Liaison Office, which bridges between Technion researchers and non-Technion bodies seeking to support scientific and technological research
"It's hard to imagine what the applied research at the Technion would have looked like without the European aid," says Professor Finny Gurfil from the Faculty of Aeronautics and Space Engineering (more details in the blue frame on p. 10). "Useful research requires a lot of money, and the European Union's framework programs are a very significant source of funding in this context."
Professor Gurfil knows what he is talking about - he has already participated in four projects related to the framework programs, which encourage and finance research and development in a wide variety of fields. In the case of Professor Gurfil, these are projects related to "Galileo" - the European answer to the American GPS system.
"Working with Europe involves endless bureaucracy, and most of us - the researchers - do not understand building a budget, establishing relationships with industries in Europe, and all the logistics involved in working with the European Union. The Liaison Office at the Technion allows us to overcome all these hurdles, partly through the use of external consultants who specialize in the relevant fields."
The Technion leads
The Liaison Office was established in January 1999 by Alex Gordon, who has been its head ever since. "We join hands with all the other units in the Technion and the Technion," says Gordon. "The initial goal was to deal with issues that until then had not been dealt with by any existing unit, and to reinvent ourselves time and time again as entrepreneurs and providers of various services adapted to the needs of researchers. Over time, the office focused on promoting the pre-competitive phase of technology transfer, while assisting in the mobilization of strategic funding sources for technical research in Israel and abroad. This is currently the focus of our activity."
"They are essentially our public relations, of the researchers," says Professor Gurfil, "and their professionalism is definitely reflected in the results - in the fact that the Technion is a leading body in Israel in receiving funding from the European framework programs."
International team
The Liaison Office people are an incredibly international bunch. Gordon himself, formerly the consul of Israel in Warsaw, speaks Polish, English and Hebrew; Mark Davison, born in England, has been living in Israel for the past decade with his Israeli wife; David Shamtov, who did his master's degree in Sweden, is married to a Swedish Jewess who immigrated to Israel, and speaks English, Hebrew and Swedish; Jacky Laban studied painting at the Academy of Art in Milan and aeronautics and space engineering at the Technion, and he speaks Italian, English and Hebrew; Boris Hershkowitz came from Romania as a Doctor of Biotechnology, he developed a plant-based schnitzel at "Zoglovac", and here at the Technion he received an award from the vice president for research for his work in the Liaison Office.
The realization of the technical knowledge
"Our core activity is R&D with an applied horizon - from basic research to application," explains David Shamtov, Gordon's deputy and head of the European desk at the office. "At the Technion, enormous knowledge has been accumulated, some of which is not realized technologically despite the enormous applied potential. We, at the Liaison Office, try to bridge this gap between the researcher and the industry, between an idea and the market, and to realize the same potential.
"The young researchers at the Technion work very hard, and are immersed - and rightly so - in basic research and teaching. They don't have time to think about industrial and other applications, and one of our roles is to help them think along the lines of an applied horizon, tune in to 'external' goals such as the space industry, the pharmaceutical market, etc., and get the funding they need for applied research. One of our main goals is matching the relevant financial instrument with the specific researcher. When it comes to the European Union, there are grants of millions of euros that are basically 'waiting' for researchers to take them and use them. That's why we are constantly working both externally, that is, towards Europe, and internally - by learning what is done at the Technion - to understand how we can connect researchers with industry and other partners."
"Sometimes we are a catalyst for research and collaboration," says Jacob (Jackie) Laban from the international desk in the liaison office. "Sometimes the industry directs the researcher to places he hadn't thought of, and opens up new areas for him. This of course requires us to be vigilant, so that we don't miss opportunities to connect 'external' parties with researchers at the Technion even when the connection seems tenuous at first glance."
50 billion euros
The European framework program that is "running" today is the seventh program, which allocates a total amount of 50 billion euros. For comparison, Israel's state budget is about 60 billion euros. The funding that the Technion obtains from the framework programs is gradually increasing, and in the current program it is approaching 55 million euros.
The Liaison Office is also working to mobilize Israeli sources of funding to finance the applied research, among other things through "Magnet", "Magneton" and "Nofer" and "Kamin" (a new program), bi-national industrial R&D and other programs - all programs of the scientist at the main office The TMT Boris Hershkowitz, who coordinates the Israel desk in the Liaison Office, points out that the funding going to the Technion from these programs has tripled in less than ten years - from 10 million NIS in 2002 to 30 million NIS today.
learn to dream
"You have to understand that funding is only one facet," says Gordon. "There are many other aspects here, additional gains, such as the training of postdoctoral students, connections with Europe and the world, the internationalization of the campus, joint academic programs with Europe, and more. We accompany the researchers on all fronts, and encourage them to think big, to think far, to dream - where their research can lead and how it may benefit the industry, the country, humanity. The European programs are megalomaniacal programs, which include a lot of non-scientific components, such as implementation, politics, integration, competition, various socio-economic aspects, such as new jobs and professions, administration and funding, so many researchers lose confidence and decide to give up these opportunities. That is why it is important that we offer them not only logistical assistance but also an overall umbrella, which will lower the level of anxiety and free the researcher, as much as possible, for scientific-technological pursuits.
"We have to think strategically. What do you mean? This means studying the researcher and understanding what he is doing today, but also what he can do tomorrow, how he can develop the technologies of the future. And after we have studied him, we have to convince him that the project, or the collaboration, is worthwhile for him.
"You can say that we do a kind of mediation between the world and the researcher, between different systems of terminologies, needs and definitions. We teach him how to communicate with the industry, with Europe, with any factor that can promote and enrich their research. This mediation must be smart. We also need to keep the researcher from becoming a subcontractor of industry. We must protect his interest as an academic, who is interested in doing basic research, writing articles, training students and paying students and focusing on areas that interest him. And of course, we are committed to maintaining his academic freedom."
see out
"There are researchers with a tendency for innovation and entrepreneurship, and there are others who need to be helped - faculty members with a theoretical tendency, who cannot imagine themselves in such projects," says Mark Davison, who coordinates the basic individual R&D activity in the international desk at the office. "We must give them the opportunity to see outside, see ahead, plan their careers and think in an applied manner at the right time and timing."
Visitors from all over the world make "pilgrimages" to the Technion, but according to the officials of the ministry, the visits are only a means to be leveraged for the benefit of the Technion and its researchers. "Our mission is to identify the right industries and visits that have potential for future cooperation, and initiate visits or take part in them. For this, in-depth intelligence activity is required, which will allow us to locate relevant factors and focus on them. This is an important part of our work - to study the people who come here, to 'hunt' them selectively and no less important, to keep in touch with them, not to let go."
One of the successful examples of leveraging such visits is the relationship with a Spanish institute called Aplus, whose representatives visited the Technion. The Liaison Office staff brought them together with Professors Yachin Cohen and Eyal Shimoni from the Faculty of Biotechnology and Food Engineering, who specialize in innovative ways of food packaging (nano-encapsulation). "We linked the companies Strauss and Poliraz to this matter," says Shamtov, "and a new model, a new process, is created here, which is of interest to the researcher and useful to the industry."
ERC grants: from tens of millions of euros to researchers at the Technion
"ERC - these are the largest grants available to us, and they require relatively little preparatory work," says Dr. Aaron Blank from the Faculty of Chemistry, who won such a grant about three years ago. Dr. Blank is involved in the development of advanced methods of magnetic resonance, the applications of which extend over many fields: medicine, biological research, solar energy, material characterization, and more.
Dr. Blank received an ERC grant of one million and a quarter euros. "This was the first cycle that submitted applications for these grants, and about 3% of the applicants won a grant. There is no doubt that it was worthwhile."
ERC grants are prestigious grants aimed at encouraging leading researchers to research excellence. They are given to promising researchers, who are expected to achieve significant breakthroughs, in two categories - young researchers (Starting Grants) and veteran researchers. The amount of the grant may reach millions of euros. Today, 17 researchers at the Technion benefit from ERC grants totaling approximately 25 million euros.
Professor Ron Kimmel from the Faculty of Computer Science claims that "for us as Israelis, the ERC grant is considered huge, and an exception by two orders of magnitude from what is customary in Israel, but it should be remembered that leading researchers in Europe and the United States enjoy much larger personal grants." It is worth noting that the judging of the proposals in Europe is definitely strict and of high quality. Indeed, the Europeans set up a glorious factory."
Professor Kimmel did his first, second and third degrees in the Faculty of Electrical Engineering at the Technion. He then went on to do a post-doctorate at Berkeley, and spent about a year at Stanford as a visiting professor. The research in the framework of which he won the ERC grant deals with the application of geometric methods in understanding shapes and images. "The grant certainly opens up new research possibilities, but also places limitations. The ERC requires the principal investigator to avoid going on sabbatical in the USA for five years. Vat's salary laws were not designed to deal with such grants, and even impose fines on researchers who were invited to present the results of their research to the world in general, and in Europe in particular, during the summer months."
Professor Kimmel adds that "With and without the grant, I feel lucky to be a faculty member at the Technion. The grant mainly helps doctoral students, the future generation we are training, and for that I am grateful."
