Researchers Receive Villum Experiment Grant 2025

Technical University of Denmark

16 researchers from DTU have received an Experiment grant from the Villum Foundation to realise their innovative research ideas.

The 16 grant recipients

  • Professor Brian Seger, DTU Physics, receives the grant for the project 'CO2 electrolysis to pharmaceuticals'.
  • Postdoc Colleen Varaidzo Manyumwa, DTU Biosustain, receives the grant for the project 'PlastiXterminator: Next-Gen Synergistic Enzyme Complexes for Microplastic Degradation'.
  • Postdoc Emil Hovad, DTU Compute, receives the grant for the project 'Scientific machine learning for advancing the understanding of the 4D microstructural evolution in metals (SciML4D)'.
  • Researcher Gaoneng Dong, DTU Electro, receives the grant for the project 'Unlocking silicon's hidden power: on-chip phase transitions enabled by a new nanocavity'.
  • Postdoc Innokentiy Zhdanov, DTU Electro, receives the grant for the project 'Room temperature integrated light-squeezing single-photon detectors for quantum systems'.
  • Professor Jakob Birkedal Wagner, DTU Nanolab, receives the grant for the project 'Sub-Ångström 3D Mapping of Single Impurities in Crystals via Scanning Transmission Electron Microscopy'.
  • Researcher Nefeli Effrosyni Novak, DTU Chemical Engineering, receives the grant for the project 'Can the two-state theory of water revolutionize aqueous solutions?'.
  • Senior Researcher Nikolas Angelou, DTU Wind, receives the grant for the project 'Laser-based unmanned aircraft system for wind sensing'.
  • Postdoc Riccardo Ragona, DTU Physics, receives the grant for the project 'PAMS; Looking at fusion plasmas with new eyes'.
  • Senior Researcher Shima Kadkhodazadeh, DTU Nanolab, receives the grant for the project 'Live Band Nanoscopy: Mapping electronic bands in working photoelectrochemical devices'.
  • Professor Wei Yan, DTU Chemistry, receives the grant for the project 'Tackling the Forever Problem: Thermodynamic Solutions to PFAS Pollution'.
  • Researcher Weihua Tian, DTU Bioengineering, receives the grant for the project 'Engineering an extracellular vesicles-based transfection method for challenging-to-transfect cells'.
  • Professor Wenjing Zhang, DTU Sustain, receives the grant for the project 'PlasUp: Rekindle Plastic Waste Upcycling by Microwave Reactor with High-Entropy Catalyst'.
  • Postdoc Xavier Zambrana Puyalto, DTU Physics, receives the grant for the project 'Van der Waals meta-crystal for valleytronics'.
  • Researcher Yong Liu, DTU Electro, receives the grant for the project 'Watt-class Optical Beam Steering on Silicon Photonics'.
  • Postdoc Zhenghao Liu, DTU Physics, receives the grant for the project 'Feedforward-enabled synthetic dimension photonics'.
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