Yearly Archives / 2012

British Academy Calls

BU research, Funding opportunities

The British Academy have a number of funding opportunities available at present.  To find out more details, please follow the links below:

Mid-career Fellowship – Deadline 2/9/12

Skills Acquisitions Awards– Deadline 31/10/12

Small Research Grants – Deadline 7/11/12

If you are interested in any of the above then the RKE Operations team can help you with your application.

Good Luck and Congratulations!

Awarded & submitted bids

Congratulations to Venky Dubey (DEC) for securing funding from the National Institute of Academic Anaesthesia (NIAA)/Obstetric Anaesthetists Association (OAA), Christos Gatzidis (DEC) for securing funding from the European Commision – Leonardo programmes, Crispin Farbrother (School of Tourism) for the implementation of the Hospitality Services – WSET Short course series

Good luck to Venky Dubey and Alexander Pasko (DEC) for their application for funding from the Wellcome Trust and Julie Robson and Chris Chapleo (Business School) for their application to the Technology Strategy Board

Munchausen by Internet

BU research, Featured

Online health forums offer much needed support, advice and friendship for people suffering with illnesses. But within this supportive atmosphere, unwelcome visitors sometimes lurk; a breed of malicious, hurtful Internet trolls masquerading as real group members.

Munchausen by Internet (MBI) sees people faking illnesses and fabricating serious health conditions in online support groups, building relationships with genuine sufferers and generating sympathy for their invented condition.

In one case documented in 2011, a brother and sister posed as relations of a multiple sclerosis sufferer on a social networking website and created an elaborate narrative, which included diagnosis of terminal cancer and Hodgkin’s lymphoma, a baby miscarriage, pneumonia and the death of a loved one through a heart attack. They trapped their victim – a genuine MS sufferer called Elizabeth – into providing half a year of time-consuming and emotionally draining interaction with themselves and their fake personas.[i]

Events such as these can have devastating effects on online health communities, destroying trust when the hoax is exposed and sometimes damaging the communities beyond repair. But what can be done to manage this more effectively?

Andy Pulman and Dr Jacqui Taylor from Bournemouth University are the authors of a recent article on MBI and its motivation, opportunity, detection, effects and consequences. They suggest that MBI trolling should be formally acknowledged: “This will help patients, caregivers and practitioners to more effectively identify cases of MBI and minimise the growth of this behaviour as more and more people seek reassurance and support about their health in an online environment,” they explain.

Pulman and Taylor also suggest that more research is required in order to provide victims of suspected MBI trolls with the right advice and for facilitators of discussion groups to effectively manage interactions. “There is a clear, compelling need to recognise that in addition to MBI being classed as a condition in its own right, there is a subsection of people currently tagged as MBI sufferers who are MBI trolls intentionally harming well intentioned support groups and abusing members for their own pleasure or enjoyment. It is this area which needs urgent attention and action either by group users or the creators of the software that host them.”

‘Munchausen by Internet (MBI): Current research and future directions’ is published by the Journal of Medical Internet Research (JMIR). Read it online here.

[i] Case documented in Cunningham JM, Feldman MD. Munchausen by Internet: current perspectives and three new cases. Psychosomatics 2011 Apr;52(2):185-189.

Research Professional

BU research, Funding opportunities, Guidance, Training

Every BU academic has a Research Professional account which delivers weekly emails detailing funding opportunities in their broad subject area. To really make the most of your Research Professional account, you should tailor it further by establishing additional alerts based on your specific area of expertise.

Research Professional have created several guides to help introduce users to ResearchProfessional. These can be downloaded here.

Quick Start Guide: Explains to users their first steps with the website, from creating an account to searching for content and setting up email alerts, all in the space of a single page.

User Guide: More detailed information covering all the key aspects of using ResearchProfessional.

Administrator Guide: A detailed description of the administrator functionality.

In addition to the above, there are a set of 2-3 minute videos online, designed to take a user through all the key features of ResearchProfessional.  To access the videos, please use the following link: http://www.youtube.com/researchprofessional 

Research Professional are running a series of online training broadcasts aimed at introducing users to the basics of creating and configuring their accounts on ResearchProfessional.  They are holding monthly sessions, covering everything you need to get started with ResearchProfessional.  The broadcast sessions will run for no more than 60 minutes, with the opportunity to ask questions via text chat.  Each session will cover:

  • Self registration and logging in
  • Building searches
  • Setting personalised alerts
  • Saving and bookmarking items
  • Subscribing to news alerts
  • Configuring your personal profile

Each session will run between 10.00am and 11.00am (UK) on the fourth Tuesday of each month.  You can register here for your preferred date:

25th September 2012: https://www1.gotomeeting.com/register/156092065

23rd October 2012: https://www1.gotomeeting.com/register/864991824

27th November 2012: https://www1.gotomeeting.com/register/326491841

These are free and comprehensive training sessions and so this is a good opportunity to get to grips with how Research Professional can work for you.

External Staff Profile Page to be updated

Guidance

The BU External Staff Profile pages are being updated on Thursday, 6th September and will be unavailable from 16.00 to 22.00 hours.

The URL links for individual staff pages will be shortened and will reflect the ‘link’ icon within a staff page.  The ‘link’ icon will then become active.

At an early stage in your research career? Then come to one of our ECR Forums!

BU research

Over the next six months we are running a series of forums for academic colleagues who are at an early stage in their research career.  The first forum, held in July was a success and you can find out more about this session here.

The forums will be open, informal sessions where you can meet with a group of experienced academics and Julie Northam and Julia Taylor from the R&KEO to discuss anything you like to do with research. From publications to projects to funding to research strategy we will be on hand to help and advise. Lunch / refreshments will be provided.

 The forums will be held at the following times and you will need to book to confirm your attendance (this is so we can order enough food and refreshments in advance)

17 September 12:30 – 15:00 The Octagon, Talbot Campus

19 November 12:30 – 15:00 EB702, The Executive Business Centre, Lansdowne

11 December 12:30 – 15:00 Casterbridge, Talbot Campus

BU Centre for Face Processing Disorders featured in the Independent

BU research, Featured academics, Fusion

Bournemouth University’s new Centre for Face Processing Disorders (supported by HEIF and Fusion funds) was recently featured in an article in the Independent newspaper,  together with quotes from BU’s Dr Sarah Bate.

Sarah’s work to date has explored the cognitive presentation and treatment of face processing deficits in adults and children with a range of neuropsychological conditions, such as developmental or acquired prosopagnosia (face blindness), autistic spectrum disorder, and Moebius syndrome.  The Face Centre was launched in response to the large amount of media attention generated by Sarah’s research.  After Sarah’s work was featured in The Guardian newspaper and in a BBC1 documentary last year, she has been contacted by over 700 people who believe they have prosopagnosia and would like to participate in her research.  Given that most investigations into prosopagnosia to date have examined relatively small numbers of cases, Sarah now has the unique opportunity to develop large-scale academic and societal impact by having the resources to test this large patient group.

You can read the full article in the Independent here.

Follow the events in the Centre on their webpage or via Twitter (@BUfacecentre).

External Profile Pages

BU research, Guidance

The external staff profile pages that existed before BRIAN will be removed from the BU web site on Monday, 3rd September.  These have only been available internally for the last two months.  External visitors to the web site have been directed to the new staff profile pages since the introduction of BRIAN.

To find out how to improve your external profile page, please visit the guidance available for using BRIAN and how this populates your external profile page.  You can find user guides and short videos here.

ESRC Knowledge Exchange Opportunities scheme

BU research, Funding opportunities

The scheme provides the opportunity to apply for funding for knowledge exchange activities at any stage of the research lifecycle, and is aimed at maximising the impact of social science research outside academia.

The flexibility built into the scheme is intended to encourage applicants to think creatively about knowledge exchange, and applications are welcomed for either a single activity or a combination of activities; be it setting up a network to help inform the development of a research proposal, arranging an academic placement with a voluntary or business organisation, or developing tools such as podcasts and videos aimed at communicating the results of research to the general public, or developing existing research to make it more applicable to policy or practice.

Important changes to the Knowledge Exchange Opportunities scheme

Following comments from the community on the difficulty of securing cash contributions from user stakeholders, we have changed the scheme’s co-funding requirement so that partner contributions can now consist of any combination of cash or in-kind resources. The scheme has also been broadened to allow applications for new applied research, provided this is user-led or in collaboration with a user partner. Further details regarding these changes are outlined in the guidance documents below.

The call opened on 20 August 2012 and closes at 16.00 on 2 October 2012.

Call documents, including the scheme guidance are provided below:

Fellowship opportunities

Within this round of the Knowledge Exchange Opportunities scheme there is also the opportunity to apply for two prespecified placement fellowship projects. The first placement is with the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) and the Environment Agency, and the second placement is with the Office for National Statistics (ONS). The specification for each placement, including details of how to apply, can be found below:

ESRC aim to inform applicants of a decision on all applications within 26 weeks of the closing date for the call. Funding decisions will then be advertised on this website.

The RKE Operations team can help you with your application. Please direct any enquiries to RKE Ops in the first instance. Alternatively, contact ESRC at knowledgeexchange@esrc.ac.uk.

Future calls

  • 3 December 2012 – 7 February 2013
  • 3 April 2013 – 6 June 2013
  • 5 August 2013 – 3 October 2013

ICT SMEs in Horizon 2020

EU

As many of you will know from my previous blogposts, I am always emphasising the importance of enagaging SMEs for Horizon 2020. Last week the EC has funded a survey aimed at increasing the participation of innovative companies from the information and communications technologies (ICT) in future research programmes. The survey aims to identify and characterise highly innovative ICT companies that do not participate in Framework projects, and assess their reasons for non-involvement. This is expected to feed into recommendations to improve the participation of SMEs in Horizon 2020, in a final report due in February 2013.

This is further evidence that enagaging SMEs in your Horizon 2020 proposals will be essential, so start networking now 🙂

 

EPSRC UK-India partnership in smart energy grids and energy storage technologies

EU

The EPSRC, under the Research Council UK’s energy programme, and the Department of Science and Technology, New Delhi, have launched a joint call for proposals for their UK-India partnership in smart energy grids and energy storage technologies. This seeks to strengthen collaboration between UK and Indian research institutions within an overarching focus on research relating to smart energy grids and energy storage technologies. Proposals must address one of the following areas:

•appropriate distributed storage technologies;

•on/off grid energy systems;

•DC networks;

•control and communications.

Projects must be joint activities involving research groups from both India and the UK, and must involve personnel exchange between the Indian and UK partners. All proposals must be for consortia, with equal or proportionate participation from UK and Indian researchers. UK applicants must be the principal investigator or co-investigator on a current Research Council award. Higher education institutions, some Research Council institutes and independent research organisations are eligible to apply.

The costs for UK institutions will be met by EPSRC, and those for Indian institutions will be met by DST. EPSRC will contribute up to £5 million for this call over a three-year period with matched resources from DST. The deadline is 15.11.12

Fusion Investment Fund: Strengthening Service Computing Research in Bournemouth University

BU research, Fusion

I was inspired to send a proposal to the fusion investment fund on a hint by Prof. Mark Hadfield. I was helping with DEC internationalisation affairs, and in a meeting Mark  mentioned that we would like to have more international visiting professors in DEC. As I have built up an extensive international network,  together with my co-investigator Dr. Paul de Vrieze, we asked a number of distinguished Professors in The Netherlands, Australia and China to apply for visiting professorships. Four full professors with world wide research reputations were willing to accept the offer.

Their visiting can strongly enhance research culture and postgraduate teaching especially in relation to our newly validated MSc. Enterprise Information Systems and PhD research in the area of service computing, e-government, computational intelligence and ubiquitous computing. 

As all four visiting professors hold rich research funding and experience, the project allows face-to-face opportunities to collaborate on project proposals, research papers and other research activities that can kick start discussions for collaboration and joined project proposals.

Based on our new MSc Enterprise Information Systems we have already received inquiries on professional practice. Prof. Keith Phalp, our third co-applicant has been contacted by Welsh Government Chief Information Officer Michael Eaton. We are going to organize public panels or other industrial engagement opportunities by our visiting professors.

To prepare the application I looked at the call for proposals for the FIF and attended one of the workshops about the fund. At the workshop I explained my ideas to Prof. Matthew Bennett, with the question which Fusion Investment Fund strand to follow. Matthew gave very clear direction that the appropriate strand would be to apply for (inward) study leave from the Fusion Investment Fund. In general, we saw that our proposal has a great opportunity to integrate education, research and professional practice. The project will run from Nov 2012 to May 2013, and we hope it will bring many further opportunities to Bournemouth University.