Investigación

The Chilean aquaculture industry faces ongoing productivity challenges, including emerging viral diseases that severely impact fish health and cause significant production losses.

To provide innovative solutions, the University of Santiago de Chile (Usach) executed the Fondef IT project: “Validation of a Prototype Vaccine Against Piscine Reovirus 1 (PRV-1)", demonstrating a pilot recombinant vaccine's protective potential in Atlantic salmon. The study was led by researchers Dr. Marcelo Cortez (Faculty of Chemistry and Biology) and Dr. Yesseny Vásquez (Faculty of Medical Sciences).

Plastic has become an omnipresent material in daily life—found in food packaging, water bottles, and utensils—yet scientific researchers warn that toxic chemical components in these plastics pose significant long-term health risks.

A primary example is bisphenol A (BPA), a toxic chemical compound linked to severe disruptions in immune, neurological, and endocrine systems. Due to these health risks, BPA regulations and usage restrictions have been implemented internationally, including in Chile.

Every year, millions of metric tons of plastic end up as waste, making plastic pollution one of the world’s major environmental challenges. According to global plastic waste statistics from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), more than 408 million metric tons of plastic waste are currently generated each year, but only about 9% is effectively recycled; the rest ends up incinerated, in landfills, or improperly disposed of in natural ecosystems.

In winemaking, terroir factors—including climate, temperature, water availability, and soil characteristics—directly influence grape development and composition. Once harvested, the grapes undergo wine fermentation, a crucial process that transforms natural fruit sugars into alcohol, defining the wine's final quality, unique aromas, and characteristics.

"Today, understanding the fundamental mechanisms of life requires much more than superficial observation; it demands that we deconstruct and analyze the forces governing self-organized matter at its most intimate scale. At this intersection of physics and living systems, materials science—a field historically devoted to 'hard' materials such as metals, ceramics, and polymers—provides an extraordinary methodological foundation for addressing 'soft matter,' the very substance that underpins life.

Climate change and public policies to reduce carbon emissions are rapidly transforming Chile’s electricity system. This challenging shift involves a gradual move away from fossil fuel technologies like coal, diesel, and natural gas power plants, towards renewable sources such as wind and solar power.

Unlike conventional power plants, which operators could dispatch based on demand, these new renewable sources depend directly on climatic factors like solar radiation and wind intensity. This introduces a new level of variability and uncertainty into the electricity grid.

Following the results of the Dicyt competitive grants program (Directorate of Scientific and Technological Research), the Faculty of Humanities (FAHU) will incorporate new lines of inquiry in areas such as health, theater, and power networks. Among this diverse range of approaches, one linguistic research project to be launched is led by Dr. Patricio Pino Castillo, a faculty member in the Department of Linguistics and Literature.

Dr. Andrea Mahn and Dr. Ernesto Castillo, from the Faculty of Engineering, are part of the team working on the Dicyt project “Advanced Numerical Methods for the Simulation and Optimization of Food Freeze-Drying Processes,” recently awarded by the Faculty of Science.

This project aims to enhance and optimize freeze-drying—a critical technology for preserving high-value foods while maintaining quality, safety, and shelf life. Despite its importance, the process currently faces significant challenges regarding production costs, energy consumption, and precise process control.

An international team of astronomers has captured rare images of planetary systems during a "little-explored" evolutionary stage: planetary adolescence. Conducted through the ARKS project (ALMA survey to Resolve exoKuiper belt Substructures), the study utilized the power of the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) to peak into this transition phase.

A group of students and academics from Arturo Prat University conducted a research stay as part of the FOVI 240220 project, “Applications of Advanced Materials in Sustainable Renewable Energy and Innovations in Water Treatment: a collaboration between Arturo Prat University (UNAP), the University of Santiago de Chile (Usach), and the University of Saskatchewan (Canada).