J-WAFS awards seed grants to seven MIT projects in water and food
The MIT Abdul Latif Jameel Water and Food Systems Lab (J-WAFS) announces the 2024 J-WAFS Water and Food Seed Grant recipients, awarded to seven MIT projects addressing food, water and climate challenges. The projects will be led by fourteen principal investigators across ten MIT departments, labs and centres. The research focus of this year's projects ranges from resiliency frameworks and migration planning to atmospheric water harvesting and techniques to address water pollutants.
Rohit Karnik, associate director of the lab, says: “We received many excellent proposals from faculty across MIT, resulting in a competitive selection process. The seven projects that were awarded funding stood out for their technical and team strength, and likelihood of having a meaningful impact. The awarded projects reflect the drive and ability of MIT researchers to tackle fundamental research, create new technologies, work with communities and propose innovative solutions, all with the goal of addressing humanity’s need for water and food.”
MIT’s Abdul Latif Jameel Water and Food Systems Lab, or J-WAFS, is solving important problems in water and food systems, including problems associated with what might be the most pressing issue facing humanity today—climate change. Envisioning a world where every person on Earth has access to clean, safe water and plentiful food, necessitates multi-faceted solutions that span across different disciplines and take climate change into serious consideration. Luckily, the MIT faculty, research staff, and students that J-WAFS supports have a broad range of expertise that enables them to take on some of the most pressing water and food challenges of our time.
The 2024 J-WAFS seed grant recipients will pursue research on topics as diverse as novel techniques to improve atmospheric water harvesting for arid regions and collaborative planning frameworks to address climate-driven water and food shortages for Indigenous and migrant communities.
“We received many excellent proposals from faculty across MIT, resulting in a competitive selection process. The seven projects that were awarded funding stood out for their technical and team strength, and likelihood of having a meaningful impact,” said J-WAFS associate director Rohit Karnik. “The awarded projects reflect the drive and ability of MIT researchers to tackle fundamental research, create new technologies, work with communities, and propose innovative solutions, all with the goal of addressing humanity’s need for water and food,” he added.