Three research leaders met to share their interdisciplinary research addressing the most urgent problems in our world such as food security and sustainable mobility. The panel, Challenges and solutions: transformation from Tec de Monterrey marked the beginning of Tec Science Summit 2025, showing how innovative projects solve real challenges through cross-disciplinary work.
Among the researchers participating in the high-impact interdisciplinary research projects panel were Jorge de Jesús Lozoya, research professor at the School of Engineering and Sciences, Marilena Antunes, researcher at the Healthy Food Unit in the Institute for Obesity Research, and Misael Sebastian Gradilla, Head of Department of Sustainable Technologies and Civil Engineering.
The three projects share key elements for successful collaboration between disciplines, including communication between collaborators, flexibility in accepting new ideas, and prioritizing the users of the technology they develop. Antunes highlighted the importance of establishing clear objectives before starting: “Once established, each person visualizes how to get there from their area of expertise,” she advised.
The focus of her work consists of searching for “functional ingredients” for the food industry that not only taste good but also have health benefits. The work goes through various stages, from characterizing the compounds, designing industrially viable extraction processes, to formulating new foods and validating them in the market.
“We have to think about how to design foods that are feasible, that people can access, and that can really be available in the market,” said Antunes. This requires investment from various experts outside the researcher’s environment, including marketing, design, and other industries necessary for products to succeed.
Tackling Greenhouse Gases and Using Clean Mobility
Gradilla presented a project in collaboration with the German Agency for Sustainable Development Cooperation, focused on evaluating the potential for mitigating greenhouse gas emissions in Mexico.
A significant challenge has been establishing effective communication between scientists and public policy makers. “We have different logics, vocabularies, and different ways of communicating,” says Gradilla. For scientists to transfer their tools from the laboratory to the appropriate sector, flexibility and adaptability are crucial.
Lozoya, leader of the Mobility Research Group, presented a project called Campus City that seeks to accelerate the adoption of clean and accessible mobility technologies. The project, which began in 2020, focuses on autonomous vehicles that travel a four-kilometer circuit around Monterrey Campus.
Uniting the work of three laboratories, Lozoya hopes that Campus City will bring about a cultural change in the way we transport ourselves. “We don’t need more vehicles, we don’t need more streets. We need to provide more mobility services with less infrastructure,” said Lozoya.
These projects represent the type of initiatives that Tec seeks to promote toward 2030 through research, innovation, and entrepreneurship. As the panelists expressed, real impact happens when bridges are built between disciplines and when solutions developed at the university respond to real societal needs.
“Science should not be envious,” said Lozoya in conclusion. “We can all contribute our grain of sand so that solutions reach the people who need them.”
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