The University of Rijeka is actively participating in numerous European projects, continuing to achieve outstanding results in securing EU financing for projects in the area of research, innovation, and education, with more than 40 million euros invested in capacity-building investment projects thus fostering the future development of the University. In addition to many currently implemented EU-funded projects (OPUS, Inno2Mare, SECURE, YUFE4Postdocs, NAHV, and Blue-connect), the University of Rijeka is proud hosts of the REVENANT, the only ERC grant in Croatia approved for funding in 2020.
ERC Grant at UNIRI, the only one in Croatia in 2020
The University of Rijeka is proud to be the ‘home’ of the prestigious ERC grant, the only one in Croatia approved for funding in 2020. The five-year research project REVENANT (Revivals of Empire: Nostalgia, Amnesia, Tribulation), based at the Department of Cultural Studies of the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences in Rijeka, seeks to examine contemporary collective memories and legacies of the Habsburg, Ottoman, and Romanov Empires from a capacious, comparative, and interdisciplinary perspective. In collaboration with all relevant scientists at our University, primarily the Centre for Advanced Studies of Southeast Europe (CAS SEE), the project gathers anthropologists, art historians, historians, political scientists, comparative literature researchers, and sociologists. Designed and coordinated by Dr. Jeremy F. Walton from the Max Planck Institute for the Study of Religious and Ethnic Diversity (Göttingen), and with support from Prof. Sarah Czerny, Ph.D., REVENANT constitutes the first comprehensive research project to grapple with these complex, overlapping post-imperial memories and legacies.
Horizon Europe projects
a) North Adriatic Hydrogen Valley (NAHV)
The University of Rijeka, along with its partners, the Faculty of Engineering in Rijeka and the Faculty of Electrical Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, and Naval Architecture of the University of Split, has become a part of the great North Adriatic Hydrogen Valley project. The NAHV project’s high-level objective is the creation of a hydrogen-based economic, social, and industrial ecosystem based on the capacity of the quadruple helix actors. This will drive economic growth, generating new job opportunities in the framework of both the green and digital transitions and, by creating the conditions for wider EU replicability, it will contribute to the creation of a European Hydrogen Economy.
The project kicked off on September 1, 2023, and will last until 31 August 2029. More information is available on UNIRI’s official website and in the European Commission’s press release.
b) Blue-connect
University of Rijeka is one of the institutions participating in this year’s European Researchers’ Night, organized as part of the Horizon Europe project “Reconnect Science with the Blue Society: Blue-connect”, which brings together 9 partner institutions: 4 Croatian universities (in Dubrovnik, Zadar, Rijeka, and Pula), the Institute for Oceanography and Fisheries, the Mediterranean Institute for Life Research, the Institute for Adriatic Cultures and Karst Reclamation, and the Science and Technology Park of the University of Rijeka (STEP-RI).
The main objective of Blue-connect is to reconnect science with society by bringing research and researchers closer to the public and boosting public recognition of science and research education. Activities during the NIGHT, on September 29, will allow all visitors – children, adults, and the elderly – to participate in experiments that will help them understand research and science.
c) YUFE4Postdocs
As a member of the Young Universities for the Future of Europe (YUFE) Alliance, the University of Rijeka also participates in the YUFE4Postdocs (Y4P) programme, an ambitious training programme co-funded by Horizon Europe’s Marie Sklodowska-Curie programme. It aims to train future-proof researchers, building bridges between academia and society. It features a novel evaluation procedure based primarily on qualitative judgment and offers attractive training including interactive stakeholder engagement seminars and a variety of joint transferable skills training sessions.
Detailed information is available in the official Y4P’s leaflet.
d) Strengthening the capacity for excellence of Slovenian and Croatian innovation ecosystems to support the digital and green transitions of maritime regions (INNO2MARE)
The INNO2MARE project, coordinated by the University of Ljubljana, supports the digital and green transitions in western Slovenian and Adriatic Croatian innovation ecosystems and addresses some of the key challenges related to maritime education and training, security, and safety in marine traffic as well as energy conversion and management systems’ efficiency. By gathering 19 organizations from Croatia, Slovenia, and Belgium, the project supports the engagement of citizens in the innovation process and smart skills training and aims to reduce the innovation divide by connecting the innovation actors within the ecosystems.
e) Open and Universal Science (OPUS)
On September 1, 2022, the University of Rijeka started implementing the activities within the OPUS project, designed to develop coordination and support measures to reform the assessment of research and researchers at Research Performing Organisations (RPOs) and Research Funding Organisations (RFOs) towards a system that incentivizes and rewards researchers to take up Open Science practices. Our participation in the project is a logical continuation of our Open Science Policy, adopted by the University to highlight our stance that scientific information and research data that are the product of scientific activities financed by public means must have open access.
f) Sustainable Careers for Researcher Empowerment (SECURE)
By participating in the SECURE project, in the span of two years (January 2023 – December 2024), the University of Rijeka will also focus on improving research careers and reducing career precarity. By building on existing policies and recommendations for improving research careers, the project will develop coordination and support measures to create, trial, implement, and mainstream a common Research Career Framework (RCF).
