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Monday, 04 March 2019

Nanoporous graphene awarded third prize of La Vanguardia de la Ciencia award

by Àlex Argemí

Nanoporous graphene earned the third prize just after a test to predict response to immunotherapy drugs against cancer and a research on the origins of autism. ICREA Prof. Aitor Mugarza and Dr César Moreno, from the ICN2 Atomic Manipulation and Spectroscopy Group, led the research published in Science together with DIPC, CiQUS and other ICN2 researchers.

The research on nanoporous graphene has been awarded third prize of the Vanguardia de la Ciencia award. The research was led by ICREA Prof. Aitor Mugarza and Dr César Moreno, both members of the ICN2 Atomic Manipulation and Spectroscopy Group, together with Prof. Diego Peña (CiQUS), and Dr Aran Garcia-Lekue (DIPC). Further in-house collaborators include Dr. Markos Paradinas (Atomic Manipulation and Spectroscopy), Dr. Gustavo Ceballos (Research Support Division) and Dr. Marius V. Costache and ICREA Prof. Sergio O. Valenzuela (Physics and Engineering of Nanodevices Group). The work, which was published in Science, describes the synthesis of a graphene membrane with pores whose size, shape and density can be tuned with atomic precision.

The Vanguardia de la Ciencia award winners are selected through the votes of an advisory committee and La Vanguardia’s readers. The nanoporous graphene has been the most voted by the advisory committee and the third one by the readers, resulting in the final third position. The winners have been oncologist Dr Aleix Prat and immunologist Dr Manel Juan, from Hospital Clínic and IDIBAPS, for developing a test to predict response to immunotherapy drugs against cancer. The second prize has gone to a research on the origins of autism lead by Dr José J. Lucas (Centro de Biología Molecular Severo Ochoa in Madrid) and Dr Raúl Méndez (Institut de Recerca Biomèdica de Barcelona).

The awards ceremony will be held on Thursday 4th April at 19 h in La Pedrera, where the ICN2 researchers will present their work in 15 minutes to a general audience. We would like to congratulate all the winners and thank all the readers who voted in this contest. We invite you to join us in the celebration of this prestigious recognition.