William San Martín (DIGS) awarded 5-year NSF Rules of Life Funding to Address Societal Challenges

Department of Integrative and Global Studies Professor William San Martín was awarded one of the twelve projects that received funding from the U.S. National Science Foundation’s Using the Rules of Life to Address Societal Challenges. 

The project, in collaboration with Georgia Tech researchers Lily Cheung (Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering) and Shuichi Takayama (Biomedical Engineering), will work with agricultural research institutions, scientists, and farmers in Chile to co-produce new knowledge and technologies to reduce dependency on synthetic fertilizers and diminish their harmful social and environmental effects.

Given the disproportionate access to resources to achieve agricultural sustainability among small-scale farmers in the Global South, the team will collaborate with international science-policy interface organizations, regional agricultural development agencies, agricultural scientists, and small-scale farmers and indigenous communities in Chile to co-design every stage of the project, from concept to field tests and evaluation. By following knowledge co-production principles and working closely with local communities, institutions, and researchers, this project will also provide critical opportunities for scientists and farmers in Chile to build long-term capacities and create context-specific, farmer-oriented, and policy-relevant knowledge. Furthermore, the team will foster interdisciplinary and international training that will help develop a more culturally competent, context-specific, and globally oriented team of researchers working on agricultural sustainability.

Co-Producing Knowledge, Biotechnologies and Practices to Enhance Biological Nitrogen Fixation for Sustainable Agriculture. $2.67 million (Georgia Tech and Worcester Polytechnic Institute, Award 2319430)