About
University College Cork (UCC) is a leading research-intensive university in Ireland, founded in 1845 and located in the vibrant city of Cork. It blends a long-standing tradition of academic excellence with a modern, globally focused campus, offering a broad spectrum of undergraduate and postgraduate programmes across multiple disciplines. UCC is recognised as Ireland’s foremost institution for delivering research impact and is home to many highly cited researchers. It is a global leader in sustainability and a national leader in university–industry collaboration, working closely with partners across sectors to translate research into real-world solutions. As an internationally competitive, research-led university, UCC plays a pivotal role in advancing Ireland’s knowledge-based economy and in generating innovations that help address urgent global sustainable development challenges.
Role in the project
The UCC team plays a key role in WP2 (Advanced Biorefineries: Sustainable Processing of Marine Biomass), WP3 (Validation of Food and Feed Ingredient Building Blocks), and WP4 (Quality, Safety, Nutritional, and Health Assessments), while also contributing to other work packages. Together with project partners, the team is developing tailored extraction technologies for seaweed biomass (Task 2.2) and optimizing processes for seaweed biomass valorization (Task 2.3). In addition, the team is involved in assessing the nutritional and technological properties of marine biomass and its functional ingredients for food and feed applications (Tasks 4.1 and 4.2), as well as establishing the quality profile of formulated food prototypes (Task 4.3).
Team leaders
Dr Gaurav Rajauria
Prof Seamus O’Mahony