INCOBRA - Increasing International Science, Technology and Innovation Cooperation between Brazil and the European Union

Today we present you the BMMO (Beneficial Microorganisms of Marine Organisms) Network, one of the 5 EU-Brazil STI cooperation networks selected by INCOBRA to receive a 19500€ grant and light mentoring support.

What are BMMO objectives?

Our research groups have summarized different beneficial and pathogenic roles of the microbiomes associated with marine organisms, and proposed new terms and approaches to understand, and potentially improve their resilience. Our aim is to bring together researchers from different countries who have a passion and expertise to work together on the development, improvement and application of probiotics in marine management.

Which are the potential impacts yielded from your network for?

1. Share protocols and knowledge to accelerate action;
2. Development of joint actions to facilitate the use of marine probiotics globally;
3. Disseminate acquired knowledge;

What are the main activities carried out so far, and the main achievements in strengthening EU-BR research and innovation (R&I) cooperation in your thematic area?

Main activities include;

• the preparation and application of joint research proposals, where joint experiments are ongoing or planned to happen soon,
• slack group establishment where information and protocols have been exchanged and new collaborative work have emerged,
• preparation of a paper with perspectives and guidelines and new insights to improve the field
• hosted one workshop which aimed to brainstorm, plan and define next steps
• planned the next workshop to take the BMMO further and ensure actions are delivered.

Which are the most beneficial outcomes of bringing together the participants of the network in the foreseen events/meetings?

• We have discovered new avenues of research which the leading researchers had not necessarily thought of to focus on
• We have found valuable new expertise in the group to ensure the work we are aiming for can be achieved

For example, the recent workshop in Germany brought about new collaborations and introduced early career researchers to more seasoned scientists ensuring skills are passed on and new technologies are discussed. We also have new ideas of potential sponsors and calls to apply for, as the face-to-face discussions allow us to closely interact and be inspired to think out of the box.

What are the plans for the future?

For the near future, we aim to apply for a funding call available in Germany to cover sequencing expenses of work developed by the network. Further we will keep developing current and further joint projects and finish our joint paper.

Looking more broadly, we plan to bring more people on board and turn the marine hosts-microbiome interactions and manipulations filed into a very popular topic. This will involve developing discussions and experiments on a wide variety of marine organisms from seagrass to sponges and through to aquaculture species. This will include multi-localized parallel experiments being held all over the globe aimed at moving the science and practice forward and defining whether such strategies can be, safely, applied in the field.

How INCOBRA is supporting your network? Is it useful? What are the advises you would give to other R&I players willing to engage in international cooperation programmes (with BR and with EU)?

• Such a useful program, among other things, the guidance we have been given on grant opportunities and grant writing has been invaluable.
• Working with a dedicated representative from INCOBRA was a nice touch and made us feel a part of the bigger picture.
• The various workshops held centrally, and webinars have highlighted the vast amount of opportunities for networks such as ours to get more funding.
• It’s difficult to find funding to bring together diverse and mixed groups of researchers - so this call was extremely valuable to us as scientists but also hopefully to our fields as our science increases to gain impact.