The European research community has taken a landmark step toward advancing infrastructure for environmental health and exposome science. The EIRENE Implementation Project (EIRENE IMP) has been officially selected for funding under the Horizon Europe Research Infrastructures call (HORIZON‑INFRA‑2025‑01), marking the beginning of the infrastructure’s transition from planning to full operational readiness.
Coordinated by Masaryk University’s RECETOX Centre (Czech Republic), EIRENE IMP unites 25 partners from across Europe and global research leaders from the United States, Canada, Japan, and Australia. Over three years, the project will build the structures, frameworks, and technological foundations required to establish EIRENE as a European Research Infrastructure Consortium (ERIC)—the highest and most sustainable legal form for EU research infrastructures.
At the heart of the Implementation Project lies a clear ambition: to complete all steps necessary to form the EIRENE ERIC. Over the next 36 months, the consortium will design the entire governance and decision‑making architecture of the future ERIC, including its statutes, membership rules, financial contributions, management structure, and operational procedures. The project will also develop long‑term financial and operational models ensuring the sustainability of the research infrastructure beyond the Horizon Europe funding period. Importantly, EIRENE IMP will prepare the full ERIC application documentation—covering scientific justification, legal frameworks, financial planning, and technical readiness—for submission to the European Commission.
A significant part of the work will focus on securing political and financial commitments from national ministries and funding agencies. Through close coordination with the EIRENE national nodes, ESFRI delegates, and governmental stakeholders, EIRENE IMP aims to build the multi‑country support base required for the formal establishment of the ERIC. This political dimension is essential: only once sufficient Member States officially commit to joining can the European Commission launch the legal process to establish EIRENE as an ERIC.
Parallel to the legal and governance work, the project will deliver the operational structures that the future ERIC will oversee. This includes the development of a harmonised European service architecture for exposome research, connecting advanced analytical laboratories, population cohorts, biobanks, monitoring systems, modelling platforms, and data infrastructures distributed across the consortium. The project will also implement a comprehensive data governance framework aligned with FAIR principles and the European Open Science Cloud (EOSC), ensuring that EIRENE can provide integrated and GDPR‑compliant data services once operational.
Capacity building is another core pillar of EIRENE IMP. The project will establish the EIRENE Training Network, an integrated European platform offering technical, managerial, and scientific education for researchers and infrastructure operators. This network will help develop the skilled workforce needed to operate EIRENE as a fully functioning ERIC, support user uptake, and strengthen the exposome research community across Europe.
By the end of the Implementation Project, EIRENE is expected to reach full organisational and operational readiness. With its governance structures defined, financial frameworks validated, service catalogue consolidated, data systems prepared, and ERIC application submitted, EIRENE will be positioned to launch as a long‑term pan‑European research infrastructure supporting frontier environmental health science, regulatory innovation, and precision public health.
The selection of EIRENE IMP marks a turning point not only for the consortium but for the wider scientific and policy communities working to understand how environmental exposures influence human health. As Europe prepares for the establishment of its first dedicated exposome research ERIC, the EIRENE initiative is poised to deliver transformative scientific, societal, and regulatory value in the years ahead.
SIRENE is a Horizon Europe INFRA‑SERV project that integrates leading European infrastructures to provide harmonised, open access to exposome and environmental health services, enabling researchers to better understand how environmental exposures impact human health.
The conference supported by BioNet, the Euro-African Biomonitoring Network, took place in the impressive new campus of the Euromed University in Fez.
