Latest research and knowledge exchange news at Bournemouth University
Do you want to know how to use social media to enhance your research profile and get your message to a wider audience? Then this session is for you!
Our expert presenter – Prof Dimitrios Buhalis – will cover how to use social media sites such as Twitter and Facebook to network online and raise your academic profile.
As part of the BRAD framework this session will take place on January 10th and you can book your place via the Staff Development webpage.
Title: Servicing Big Data
Time: 14:00-16:00 Wednesday, 18 Dec. 2013
Venue: PG143 (Thomas Hardy Suite, Talbot Campus)
Speaker: Prof. Athman Bouguettaya, Head of School of Computer Science and Information Technology at RMIT University, Melbourne, Australia
Abstract
Big data is here and in a big way. Big data is coming from all sorts of sources and means, including sensors, deep space, social media, smartphones, genomic, etc. The cloud has been instrumental supporting the storage and processing of the ever increasing amount of data. “Domesticating” the data, i.e., making it useful, however, has been a major challenge. Service computing is the next major evolution of computing that aims at transforming massive data into artefacts that are acted upon, i.e., services. Service computing is increasingly being recognized as part of a broader agenda in Service Science. In that respect, service computing may be viewed as the “engineering” side of service science. Service computing broadly focuses at providing a foundational framework to support a service-centric view of designing, developing, and exposing data (and applications), whether it is in the enterprise or on the Web. In that respect, the Web is and will undoubtedly be the preferred delivery platform of service-based solutions. More specifically, Web services are currently without contest the key enabler for deploying service-centric solutions. Fully delivering on the potential of next-generation Web services requires building a foundation that would provide a sound design for efficiently developing, deploying, publishing, discovering, composing, trusting, and optimizing access to Web services in an open, competitive, untrustworthy, and highly dynamic environment. The Web service foundation is the key catalyst for the development of a uniform framework called Web Service Management System (WSMS). In this novel framework, Web services are treated as first-class objects. In this talk, I will first motivate the need for a uniform service management to service big data. I will then overview the core components of a typical WSMS. I will conclude by describing our latest research servicing sensor data.
Short Bio
Athman Bouguettaya is Professor and Head of School of Computer Science and Information Technology at RMIT University, Melbourne, Australia. He received his PhD in Computer Science from the University of Colorado at Boulder (USA) in 1992. He was previously Science Leader in Service Computing at CSIRO ICT Centre, Canberra. Australia. Before that, he was a tenured faculty member and Program director in the Computer Science department at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University (commonly known as Virginia Tech) (USA). He is a founding member and past President of the Service Science Society, a non-profit organization that aims at forming a community of service scientists for the advancement of service science. He is on the editorial boards of several journals including, the IEEE Transactions on Services Computing, ACM Transactions on Internet Technology, the International Journal on Next Generation Computing, VLDB Journal, Distributed and Parallel Databases Journal, and the International Journal of Cooperative Information Systems. He is also on the editorial board of the Springer-Verlag book series on Services Science. He served as a guest editor of a number of special issues including the special issue of the ACM Transactions on Internet Technology on Semantic Web services, a special issue the IEEE Transactions on Services Computing on Service Query Models, and a special issue of IEEE Internet Computing on Database Technology on the Web. He served as a Program Chair of the 2012 International Conference on Web and Information System Engineering, the 2009 and 2010 Australasian Database Conference, 2008 International Conference on Service Oriented Computing (ICSOC) and the IEEE RIDE Workshop on Web Services for E-Commerce and E-Government (RIDE-WS-ECEG’04). He has published more than 170 books, book chapters, and articles in journals and conferences in the area of databases and service computing (e.g., the IEEE Transactions on Knowledge and Data Engineering, the ACM Transactions on the Web, WWW Journal, VLDB Journal, SIGMOD, ICDE, VLDB, and EDBT). He was the recipient of several federally competitive grants in Australia (e.g., ARC) and the US (e.g., NSF, NIH). He is a Fellow of the IEEE and a Distinguished Scientist of the ACM.
In 2014, the British Science Festival 2014 is taking place in Birmingham from 6 – 11 September. The British Science Association is working with their hosts, the University of Birmingham and associate partners Birmingham City Council, Aston University and Birmingham University. The association are now seeking proposals for the entertainment and family programme.
Specifically, they are looking for original, high quality science entertainments events for a wide range of audiences, including families, children , young adults, special interest groups and followers of the arts.
Events in the Festival programme include:
You can find out more about submitting your proposal for the entertainment and family programme, here.
If you would like to discuss any event ideas that you have, please contact Farrah Nazi by email, or by telephone on 020 7019 4941.
Young People’s Programme
The British Science Association are also accepting proposals for their Young People’s Programme. Next year they are focusing on highlighting career pathways and oppurtunities available to those who study science. Although the focus will be on young people aged 14+, they will also be offering activity for primary and lower secondary students.
You could propose:
You can find out more about submitting your proposal for the Young People’s Programme, here.
If you would like to discuss your ideas for an activity, please contact Jo Coleman by email, or by telephone on 020 7019 4936.
In January 2014, the British Science Association will issue the call for proposals for events. If you have a talk, panel discussion or debate in mind, they will want to hear from you then.
You can register for more information on their website, or keep up-to-date on their Facebook page and twitter page.
If you would like to apply to any strands of the FIF in this round please make sure you submit your application by the deadline which is 2pm on Friday 13 December. No exceptions will be made to this deadline.
For all the updated strand policy documents, Fund FAQ’s and information about applying, please visit the FIF intranet pages.
The Fusion Investment Fund is managed by Samantha Leahy-Harland. Please direct all initial enquiries to the Interim Fusion Administrator, Dianne Goodman, at Fusion Fund.
At the end of November Stella Rawnson and Catherine Angell (both Senior Lecturer in Midwifery at BU) attended the European Midwives Association Education Conference in Maastricht, the Netherlands. This two-day event brought together 300 midwife educators from universities across Europe, from Norway to Greece and Ireland to Hungary.
Stella presented ‘The best people for the job’ which focused on our experience of introducing new methods for assessing the suitability of applicants to BU’s BSc Midwifery programme. This generated a considerable amount of interest and discussion. It was clear that student selection was an issue for educators from a wide range of countries, both in terms of identifying competence in numeracy and literacy but also assessing applicants’ communication and ‘people skills’.
Catherine’s presentation was entitled ‘Loosing the luggage; strategies that enable effective learning around infant feeding for student midwives’. This identified how we have used education theories to develop a programme that enables students to ‘unlearn’ negative or unrealistic ideas about infant feeding before embarking on new learning around this subject. This fitted well with a key theme that emerged from the conference relating to the role of emotion in enabling and blocking learning.
The conference included keynote presentations from Prof. Cees van der Vleuten, who spoke about evaluation and assessment of health sciences students, and Prof. Raymond DeVries who discussed the value of academic skills in midwifery. The conference highlighted the considerable differences in terms of length of midwifery programme, entry route and content between different countries in the EU. However, it also enabled us to learn from sharing some of the challenges that we experience in areas such as recruitment and assessment, and in terms of developing curriculums against shifting models of care and changing political priorities. Naturally it also provided an excellent opportunity for networking and identifying potential collaborations.
Winter in Maastricht
If you have been following my previous posts then you will know that today is the final Cyber Security Seminar for this semester. We hope you have found the seminar series interesting so far.
We are currently planning the seminars for next semester. Please get in touch if you have suggestions for potential speakers, or topics you would like to hear more about. Although the budget we have available is modest, we will do our best to accommodate your suggestions.
The EC has published proposals for Public Private Partnerships (PPPs) in the form of Joint Technology Initiatives. As these PPPs have academics, industry and other key stakeholders involved, they are a great way to get into EU funding. Linking up with those involved in JTIs will also help you set the direction of future funding calls. It is anticipated that calls will be made in Spring 2014 and the Joint Technology Initiatives are below.
Earlier this year HEFCE held two consultations with the sector about open access outputs and the post-2014 REF exercise (likely to be REF 2020). As part of this is was suggested that monographs should not fall into the requirement to be freely available in order to be eligible for submission to the next REF, and HEFCE agreed to launch a project looking into the viability of this for future exercises. The following text is taken from the HEFCE website: http://www.hefce.ac.uk/whatwedo/rsrch/rinfrastruct/oa/monographs/
Monographs, edited collections and other long-form publications are a very important part of the academic publishing world, and they hold particular importance for scholars in the humanities and social sciences. But many people tell us that monograph publishing is facing difficulties: sales are falling, costs are increasing, and scholars are finding it harder to find an outlet for their work.
In planning an approach for open access and the next REF, we received very clear advice that the monograph publishing world is not yet ready to support an open-access requirement. We have listened to this advice, and are proposing that monographs will not be required to be published in an open-access form to be eligible for the next REF.
But we are very keen to understand the issues better and to support efforts to solve them wherever possible. We are optimistic about the potential for open-access publishing to help sustain scholarly communications in the humanities and social sciences, and we are confident that open-access monograph publishing will continue to grow over the coming years.
A new HEFCE project – we want to understand the issues better, and help to identify potential ways forward. We have started a project, in collaboration with the Arts and Humanities Research Council and the Economic and Social Research Council, to help us do this.
Geoffrey Crossick, Distinguished Professor of the Humanities at the School of Advanced Study, University of London, is leading this work. Professor Crossick was formerly Vice-Chancellor of the University of London and Warden of Goldsmiths.
We have convened an Expert Reference Group to establish what evidence is needed to inform understanding in this area, and to provide advice on an appropriate programme of work to gather this evidence.
The group brings together key representatives from interested organisations to develop increased understanding about the challenges and opportunities for open-access monograph publishing.
A steering group comprising representatives from HEFCE, the research councils, and the British Academy will govern the project. We expect the project to run until mid-2014.
For further information on HEFCE’s monographs work, please contact Ben Johnson, tel 0117 931 7038, b.johnson@hefce.ac.uk
WISERD 2014 Conference – Call for Papers
The WISERD 2014 Conference will be held on 3-4 July 2014 in Aberystwyth University. We are delighted to be able to confirm that Professor Bob Jessop and Professor Karel Williams have agreed to deliver keynote addresses. Call for papers WISERD 2014
The 2014 conference is the fifth annual WISERD conference, and follows on from four successful conferences, held in Cardiff, Swansea, Bangor and South Wales Universities. WISERD conferences attract colleagues from across the academic, policy, public, private, and third sectors in Wales; and have become established as one of the most important events in the social science calendar.
How to get involved
We are currently inviting submissions of abstracts for papers and posters. We have both themed and open strands for which submissions are invited. The themed sessions are as follows:
· Culture, Values and Creative Industries
· Civil Society
· Economic Life
· Health, Environment and Wellbeing
· Transitions in Education, Childhood and the Labour Market
· Social Care across the Life-course
In terms of open sessions, the programme for the conference is intended to reflect the research interests and priorities of the social science and policy sectors within Wales, the UK and internationally. As such, all topics will be considered for inclusion within the conference programme.
WISERD invites submissions from all areas of the research community including, but not restricted to, academics, students and third sector colleagues.
PhD Student Competition
WISERD, in collaboration with the ESRC Wales Doctoral Training Centre, will be awarding prizes to postgraduate students who present posters.
All posters submitted by postgraduate students will be automatically entered into the competition. If you do not wish your poster to be entered, please note this in the ‘additional information’ section of the abstract proforma.
Essay Competition
In addition to the Poster competition, the 2014 WISERD conference will include a ‘collaboration short essay competition’. Entrants must be currently registered PhD students and must be attending the conference.
Entries should be sent to WalesDTC@cardiff.ac.uk by Friday 13 June 2014. They will be judged by the DTC Director and a senior WISERD representative.
To submit a proposal
The full call for papers is here: WISERD 2014 Conference Abstract Proforma FINAL. To submit a proposal, please complete and send to: wiserd.events@cardiff.ac.uk.
The deadline for submission of abstracts is 17 January 2014.
The Annual Conference of the PSA Media and Politics Group (MPG) was held at Bournemouth University on 13-14 November, 2013, attracting over 50 delegates from the UK and abroad. It was organised by BU colleagues Heather Savigny, Richard Scullion, Anna Feigenbaum and Dan Jackson.
A crisis of political engagement?
The conference opened with a keynote by Ruth Fox, the Director and Head of Research for the Hansard Society. Her talk titled: “The Media and Political Engagement: Helpful or Harmful to our Democratic Health?” presented some of Hansard’s recent data on political engagement and the media and politics. For Fox, the situation is no less than a crisis, with their data suggesting that the media has a lot to answer for, and little evidence that tabloids enhance the democratic life of the country. She also encouraged scholars to download and use their data and engage in further scrutiny of their work.
Dr Ruth Fox, Director and Head of Research for the Hansard Society
Minority Voices, Media and Politics
The primary theme of this year’s conference was ‘Minority Voices, Media and Politics.’ The conference explored the often problematic relationship between the media, politics and marginalised, silenced or minority voices in contemporary society. Taking a broad approach to the topic, our conference included papers from different disciplinary, methodological, historical and national perspectives; from the voices of extremist violence, to mediations of tear gas and representations of disability in the media. We were also treated to a keynote by Dr Emily Harmer (Loughborough University), who presented her research on press coverage of female politicians in historical perspective. We aim to take forward some of the conference papers into an edited collection on the conference theme.
Music and Beer
Our third keynote was more than just a Professor of American Literature and Culture, Will Kaufman is a musician whose keynote was a musical tribute to Woody Guthrie; the enduring voice of 1930’s protest music.
Prof Will Kaufman (UCLAN) delivers his musical keynote on Woody Guthrie
Alongside this musical feast, we decided to give the conference drinks reception something of a twist. We have all attended conference wine receptions, right? Memorable? Probably not. We therefore wanted to make our drinks reception stand out, and offer something for those beer lovers like ourselves. Ably supported by our BA Politics and Media students (who are responsible for the funky logo!) we ran the inaugural Media and Politics Group beer festival. A selection of ten British ales was offered, each with accompanying tasting notes courtesy of BU’s Dr Darren Lilleker. We even got a bit carried away and designed a beer festival logo which was printed on conference glasses!
All modesty aside, it was a rip-roaring success, and something we will be doing for future events.
The MPG beer festival
Prof Ivor Gaber (City University/ University of Bedfordshire) and Dr Michael Higgins (University of Strathclyde) settling into their beer tasting…
Well wonder no more! Research Professional has produced this very handy map to show you where your favourite scheme under FP7 now sits under Horizon 2020.
As part of the delivery planning process in 2013, a draft institutional development plan for research and knowledge exchange (RKE) at BU was produced. The aim of the document was to set out a long-term plan for developing and supporting RKE activity to meet the objectives of the BU2018 strategy. The aim is to instigate the plan from early 2014.
The plan has been drafted and has been road tested with UET, URKEC and around 20 academics to date. We are now seeking views from the academic community on the plan as a whole and on specific elements of the plan. Your feedback, comments and ideas will feed into the final version which will be the blueprint for how RKE activity is supported and developed in the long-term.
Feedback and discussion will be facilitated online. Upon accessing the site you will be able to read the plan in its entirety and see the key elements on which we are seeking views and suggestions.
Click on one of the topics and you will be presented with a brief summary of what is being proposed as part of the institutional development plan. Beneath this text you will see the previous comments that have been left by colleagues. You are strongly encouraged to add a reply stating your own views and suggestions. This is especially important and will ensure that the academic community has shaped the support and development mechanism put in place. If you wish to feedback confidentially then please send your comments to Julie Northam.
The aim of this website is to provide a forum to facilitate the discussion of the plan as a whole and the identified key elements. Providing feedback works in the same way as adding a comment to the Research Blog, i.e. you can add a comment and this will be visible to all other viewers. The site is password protected and the password is only available to BU staff from the Staff Intranet.
This feedback exercise will run from 28 November until 10 January. A final version of the plan will be circulated to all staff in early 2014.
The site is password protected to ensure only BU staff are able to contribute. To access the password please see the story on the Staff Intranet: https://staffintranet.bournemouth.ac.uk/news/news/thismonth/rkefeedbackneeded.php
BUDI, in the form of Clare, Derek, Sarah and Chris, along with 3000 other delegates attended an extremely busy Birmingham Care Show 2013 at the NEC between the 12 and 13 of November. A diverse range of experts from all sectors of the care industry, from care home providers to academic institutions were present, making it a fantastic opportunity to network and introduce BUDI to a range of potential collaborators.
Our very orange stand at the Birmingham Care Show definitely stood out!
The ‘Dementia Design Academy’ (a new feature of The Care Show this year) drew much attention with regular lectures, presentations from experts within the field, interactive virtual environments to tour and BUDI’s very own ‘Don’t Mention Dementia Project’ on display. Over the course of the two day event we met and exchanged details with over 100 delegates interested in buddying up with BUDI in the future, many interested in our bespoke educational programmes. The event demonstrated how the care industry has become extremely focused on offering ‘dementia friendly’ services and products. This was reflected by the high interest in the BUDI stand, although the chocolates and free mouse mats may also have played a part in that!
I’m sure I heard a collective sigh of relief radiate across both campuses last week when BU’s REF2014 preparations were finally submitted. It’s been a huge amount of work, especially in the last few weeks. I myself did a little dance when I eventually handed the case studies over for PengPeng to upload, and then bought a sausage sandwich to mark the occasion.
But all the hard work and late nights that have been put in across the academics community, professional services and the leadership team are well worth it. I truly believe the ‘submit’ button was pressed in the knowledge that BU has absolutely put its best institutional foot forward and, regardless of the result (which I’m sure will be fabulous), no one will be left feeling, ‘We could have done better.’
I’m already looking back on the REF preparations fondly. I feel very lucky to have worked on this important project with such a great group of people. BU has so many talented researchers who are passionate about their subject. Matthew’s energy, vision and drive meant the submission presented BU at its absolute best. And I can honestly say I never met a more organised and efficient group of people than Julie Northam, PengPeng Ooi and Becca Edwards!
Having helped prepare the impact case studies across the eight units, I’ve had an amazing overview of the true societal benefit BUs research brings. Through the process I’ve examined national and international policy documents, spoken to CEO s of multinational companies, patients benefiting from healthcare interventions and many other diverse beneficiaries who sing the praises of BU researchers and the application of their work.
I think what’s most telling though, is the number of case studies that haven’t been submitted this time round because the impact was too embryonic or interim. Regardless of what the next REF will look like (and impact is bound to be more prominent), this really shows the great impact trajectory that BU’s research is currently tracking. Examples include:
From January I’m really looking forward to working on these and other projects, using communication as a tool to enhance dissemination of research findings, helping deliver impact to the heart of society.
(And now I have reacquainted myself with my kitchen, I may also cook some vegetables to counter all the ready meals and chocolate that’s kept me going recently)!!
SDRC has added a new fluid property research and education resource to its experimental lab. This resource will be deployed in the current on-going research in renewable technology and coupled with the MEng/BEng Level I thermodynamics & heat transfer unit. This will provide opportunity to realise BU Fusion initiative through research informed education.
Description
The F1-30 Fluid Property Apparatus is part of the Engineering Teaching & Research Equipment in SDRC. It consists of a collection of components that demonstrate individual fluid properties:
For education purpose, it can introduce students a clear understanding about the physical properties of fluids that can build the foundation for them to study the behaviour of fluids in static or dynamic applications.
For research purpose, it allows bench tests to be performed for measuring physical properties of fluids from a wide range of applications.
Measuring Capabilities
If you would like to know more about the research and education activities within the SDRC themes please contact
Dr Zulfiqar Khan (Associate Professor)
Email: zkhan@bournemouth.ac.uk
Our final Interdisciplinary Cyber Security Seminar this semester will take place on Tuesday, 10th December at 5pm. The seminar will take place in EB202 in the Executive Business Centre, and will be free and open to all. If you would like to attend, please register at https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/interdisciplinary-seminar-in-cyber-security-tickets-9688353125
Our speaker will be Dr. Simon Parkin from UCL. Simon is a Senior Research Associate in the Information Security group at University College London, contributing to the Productive Security project within the Research Institute in the Science of Cyber Security (RISCS). He was previously a member of the Innovation Team at Hewlett Packard Enterprise Security Services (HP ESS) until mid-2012. From 2007 to 2011, Simon was a Postdoctoral Research Associate in the School of Computing Science at Newcastle University, where he also obtained his PhD. His research interests include: IT-security policy management metrics, models and tools; holistic IT-security management principles, and; IT-security risk management approaches and knowledge formalisation.
Abstract: Individuals working within organisations must complete their tasks, and are often expected to do so using secured IT systems. There can be times when the expectations for productivity and security are in competition, and so how would an organisation measure the outcomes in practice? We will review a series of interdisciplinary research efforts that characterise the human factor in IT-security within large organisations, as part of a holistic view of security. There are furthermore a variety of modelling approaches and frameworks that have emerged and informed this view. We will consider the challenges that remain in affording measurement of the human factor in IT-security within organisations, and some of the changes that are required for such activities to be sustainable and effective.
Okay so it’s not exactly free….you will have to do something for it but what if I told you that you will be hailed within BU, and who knows, maybe the world, as a researcher/support staff member extraordinaire! Your peers will bow down in the corridors in your honour, you will be met with applause when you enter the atrium.*
I know what you’re thinking….’This sounds brilliant! Where can I find out more?’ Just point your mouse here, my friend, and all will be revealed.
*This may not actually happen.
The Fusion Investment Fund is managed by Samantha Leahy-Harland. Please direct all initial enquiries to the Interim Fusion Administrator, Dianne Goodman, at Fusion Fund.
Do you want to know how to use social media to enhance your research profile and get your message to a wider audience? Then this session is for you!
Our expert presenter – Prof Dimitrios Buhalis – will cover how to use social media sites such as Twitter and Facebook to network online and raise your academic profile.
As part of the BRAD framework this session will take place on January 10th and you can book your place via the Staff Development webpage.
BU staff can login below:
Register to attend | The 16th Annual Postgraduate Research Conference
ADRC Launches Online Seminar Series
Applications are now open for 2025 ESRC Postdoctoral Fellowships!
Horizon Europe – ERC CoG and MSCA SE webinars
ERC grants – series of webinars Horizon Europe – ERC CoG and MSCA SE webinars
MaGMap: Mass Grave Mapping ERC grants – series of webinars
Last reminder – MSCA Postdoctoral Fellowships 2024 internal deadline next week MSCA Postdoctoral Fellowships 2024 – internal deadline approaching
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