SAPHIR aims to develop vaccine strategies effective against endemic pathogens responsible for high economic losses in livestock in order to strengthen the profitability of food animal systems, improve animal welfare and reduce xenobiotic usage in farming with a One Health perspective. SAPHIR will bring novel vaccine strategies to the market i) at short term, with several promising vaccines brought to demonstration (RTL6), ii) at long term, with cutting edge strategies brought at proof of concept (RTL3) and iii) in line with socio-economic requirements. SAPHIR has selected two representative pathogens of pigs (Porcine Reproductive and Respiratory Syndrome Virus and Mycoplasma hyopneumoniae), chickens (Eimeria and Clostridium perfringens) and cattle (Bovine Respiratory Syncytial Virus, Mycoplasma bovis) to develop generic vaccine approaches applicable to other pathogens. SAPHIR will issue i) knowledge of immune mechanisms of protection, ii) affordable, safe and multivalent vaccines with DIVA properties, iii) efficient adjuvants targeting dendritic cells, optimal formulations, new mucosal and skin delivery systems, a new generation of DNA vectors and viral replicon platforms for fostering an earlier and longer duration of immunity including the perinatal period, and iv) basal biomarkers of individual immuno-competence for future breeding strategies. The SAPHIR dissemination and training programme includes creation of an integrated health management website, launch of a Global Alliance for Veterinary Vaccines and organization of workshops directed at food animal system stakeholders. This will ensure optimal research translation of SAPHIR outputs to market and field applications. SAPHIR brings together interdisciplinary expertise from fourteen academic institutes including a Chinese partner, five SMEs and two pharmaceutical companies.

Large engineering structures like turbines, bridges or industrial machinery are still manufactured by traditional processes such as forging, casting or by machining from solid blocks. These processes do not allow local control of material properties to achieve a specific function like anti-corrosion or hardness. To meet the functional specifications, engineers must operate within a limited range of design options, with high “buy-to-fly” ratios and long lead times. Unlike any other metal AM technology, wire arc additive manufacturing (WAAM) produces fully dense metallic structures with no porosity. WAAM is also unbeatable in terms of production times, making it uniquely suited for large and functionally demanding engineering structures. In Grade2XL, we will demonstrate the potential of multi-material wire arc additive manufacturing (WAAM) for large scale structures. The high printing rate of WAAM, combined with the ability to control material properties down to the nanoscale, will allow us to build strong and durable engineering structures. Grade2XL will deliver multi-material products of superior quality and performance, cut lead times by up to 96% and enable massive cost savings for the maritime and energy industry, as well as for industrial machinery. These outputs will rapidly roll out to other sectors with similar key performance indicators and become an attractive investment opportunity for SMEs. This project will strengthen Europe’s capacity to drive manufacturing innovation globally and withstand growing competition from Asia.

Worldwide consumption of footwear per year per person has increased from 1 pair of shoes in 1950 to over 3 currently. In 2022, approximately 23.9 billion pairs of shoes were produced globally. In the EU alone, it is estimated that the amount of postconsumer shoes waste is over 1 million tonnes per year. End-of-Life (EoL) management is gaining more attention in the footwear industry, due to increased raw material costs, environmental legislations and ambitious textile waste management targets, e.g., 50% of textiles must be recycled and 20% must be reused from 2025 onwards. However, the recycling rate of footwear is still lower than 5%. This is due to the wide variety of components, e.g., footwear can consist of up to 40 different components, which makes a circular approach to EoL challenging. It is clear that footwear needs a radical shift to achieve circularity. This shift involves simpler shoe design with similar functionality, consumers willing to buy sustainable shoes and increase the longevity, installation of collection and sorting infrastructure, and cost-efficient recycling processes producing high quality secondary resources from old shoes. The SCARPA Doctoral Network on footwear circularity has a clear mission: to train a new generation of experts who possess the skills and fundamental knowledge required to understand how footwear should be designed to allow recycling, how consumers play a role in the value chain, how different recycling technologies can create high value recyclates, and how a decision in one part of the value chain influences the whole value chain’s sustainability, including LCA.