Rumen-Innovate, a €4.8 million Marie Skłodowska-Curie Doctoral Network coordinated by Queen’s University Belfast, brings together leading European institutions to advance ruminant microbiome science.
IRTA is a partner in Rumen-Innovate, a newly launched €4,833,648 Marie Skłodowska-Curie Doctoral Network funded by the European Union to advance sustainable ruminant agriculture through microbiome science. The network, coordinated by Queen’s University Belfast, was formally signed on 30 June 2026 and will begin in March 2027.
Rumen-Innovate (formally titled Doctoral Training in Ruminant Microbiome Science: Developing Evidence-Based Interventions for Sustainable Food Production and Climate Change Mitigation) will recruit 15 doctoral candidates across 11 beneficiary institutions in 8 countries. IRTA participates as a full beneficiary partner, contributing expertise in animal genetic improvement and hologenomics and will lead a work package focused on discovery and prediction. Furthermore, in collaboration with the Irish Cattle Breeding Federation, the University of Galway, and INRAE, will co-supervise two PhD projects focused on the implementation of hologenomic-informed breeding strategies and the design of synthetic microbial consortia for more sustainable ruminant production.
Recruitment is planned for autumn 2027, with positions open to researchers from across the world.
The consortium is deliberately broad in both geography and institutional type. The 11 beneficiaries include universities, national public research organisations and applied research institutes across the United Kingdom, Norway, France, Spain, Finland, Ireland, the Netherlands and Belgium. The 19 associated partners extend the network further, encompassing private companies in the nutrition, agritech, genomics and dairy sectors alongside additional universities and research institutes, including partners in the United States. Altogether, the network (beneficiaries and associated partners combined) spans 9 countries.
The network addresses critical global challenges facing the livestock sector: feeding a growing population sustainably, reducing greenhouse gas emissions from ruminant animals, and improving animal health and production efficiency. Research spans the full pipeline, from machine learning and multi-omics through to on-farm diagnostic tools and delivery systems, with biosafety assessed as an integral part of the work.
Cattle and sheep produce significant amounts of methane, a greenhouse gas that is far more potent than CO₂ in the short term. Rumen-Innovate will develop practical tools that work at the level of the trillions of microbes living inside these animals, with the goal of reducing those emissions directly on the farm. Understanding how those same microbes influence how animals digest food and stay healthy should also help farmers produce meat and dairy more efficiently, with less waste, lower costs, and a smaller environmental footprint. Ultimately, healthier animals managed through better science mean a farming system that works better for everyone, from the farmers who rely on it to the consumers who buy the food and the environment we all share.
Participation in Rumen-Innovate gives IRTA the opportunity to contribute to transformative research at the intersection of microbiome science, animal production and climate action. This collaboration will produce highly skilled researchers and technologies with real-world impact for the livestock sector
Computational biology and Hologenomics researcher
The project is funded under the Horizon Europe Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions programme (Grant Agreement ID: 101311612). Full project details are available on the EU CORDIS database: https://cordis.europa.eu/project/id/101311612.
Rumen-Innovate is a Marie Skłodowska-Curie Doctoral Network funded under Horizon Europe (Grant Agreement ID: 101311612), coordinated by Queen’s University Belfast. The network will recruit 15 doctoral candidates across 11 beneficiary institutions and 19 associated partners spanning 9 countries and a range of institutional types, including universities, national research organisations and private industry. Its aim is to advance microbiome-based innovations in ruminant agriculture, improving animal health, enhancing production efficiency and reducing the environmental footprint of the livestock sector. The network runs from March 2027 to February 2031.
