The National Science Centre announced the results of OPUS LAP call for proposals, which allows researchers at all stages of their careers to apply for funding for projects implemented in international cooperation as part of the Lead Agency Procedure (LAP). Funding was granted to two projects developed by employees of the University of Silesia in Katowice.
Funded projects include:
- ‘Political potential of conspiracy theories. A study of Poland and Slovenia’
Head of the project: Agnieszka Turska-Kawa, PhD, DLitt, Associate Professor from the Institute of Political Science of the University of Silesia
Granted funds: PLN 699,190
Implementation period: 48 months
Slovenian partner: Slovenian Research Agency
The subject of research conducted on the Polish side will involve three movements rooted in conspiracy theories, whose activity has been activated by the global pandemic: the anti-covid movement, the anti-5G movement, and the anti-vaccine movement. The aim of the project is to examine the use of these initiatives in Polish and Slovenian politics and the factors influencing their possible political attractiveness or lack thereof.
- ‘The multi-proxy studies of dedolomitization processes and related speleogenesis in central Slovenia with implications for understanding of incipient stages of sulphide mineralizations in southern Poland’
The project will be carried out under consortium with the Institute of Geological Sciences of the Polish Academy of Sciences.
Head of the project: Justyna Ciesielczuk, PhD, DLitt, Associate Professor from the Institute of Earth Sciences of the University of Silesia
Granted funds: PLN 933,092 (PLN 796,086 granted for the University of Silesia)
Implementation period: 36 months
Slovenian partner: Research Centre of Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts
The aim of the project is to describe new genetic (speleogenetic) processes in karstic cave development related to dedolomitisation, which are probably common in many environments where regional groundwater flow is implemented by evaporite-carbonate rock complexes. Such a mechanism could be responsible for the development of large-scale porosity (cavernosity) and instability in deep-seated carbonates. It is of great importance for the regional groundwater flow in karst aquifers and for the development of hydrocarbon and geothermal reservoirs, as well as for the initial stages of the formation of ore mineralisation. The proposed research should be important for the reevaluation and renewed interest of researchers on the relationship between the dedolomite and brecciated horizons, widespread in certain carbonate karst, but also ore mineralisation developed within carbonates.
