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A terrible fate awaits North Korean women who escape to China

South Koreans protest against China’s treatment of northern defectors. EPA/Jeon Heon-KyunAs North Korea’s nuclear weapons programme and provocative missile tests draw the world’s attention, one crucial reality about the totalitarian regime has been left largely unnoticed: as bleak as life is for most who live in North Korea, it is often far worse for those who flee – most of whom are forced to suffer horrific human rights abuses away from the world’s scrutiny.

Since China shares a border with North Korea, it has become the first destination for desperate North Koreans who risk their lives to escape. An unofficial figure estimates that there are between 50,000 and 200,000 North Koreans living in China. The Chinese government denies most of them refugee status, instead treating them as economic migrants who have illegally crossed the border to seek work. Most have no formal identification or legal status. In addition, Beijing works together with Pyongyang to capture defectors and send them back, making their lives as escapees completely untenable.

I have interviewed many North Koreans now settled in the UK. Many of them told me they had been caught by the Chinese police and repatriated to the north a number of times, but managed to escape again and again. The combination of desperation, the denial of legal status and the terror of the Chinese police operation exposes these people to gross exploitation – especially women.

Among those who successfully leave North Korea, women make up the majority. In their search for freedom, many of them paradoxically end up being trafficked, detained and treated inhumanely because of their precarious and insecure positions in China as “illegal migrants”.

Vulnerability exploited

Drawn to what they hope is a guarantee of work, some women who cross the border are instead sold to Chinese or Korean-Chinese men in rural areas who cannot find wives due to poverty, undesirable living conditions, disability and the lopsided gender demographics created by the now-replaced one-child policy. Other women are abducted in public spaces, such as streets and trains, and forced into prostitution. As a survival strategy, a few women or family members volunteer themselves to be sold. Some are lucky enough to find decent and kind men, but they are a vanishingly small minority.

Most are locked up so they cannot escape. They are denied contact with their family members or friends, and often a whole village effectively becomes a community of guards to watch them so they cannot run. Many of the women forced into these relationships endure physical hardships, forced to work in the fields and do endless household chores. Some are trafficked to households with several men, where their keepers take turns to violate them on a regular basis.

Pro-defector outrage at the Chinese embassy in Seoul. EPA/Jeon Heon-Kyun

During their captivity, many of them also become pregnant. If they manage to escape to other countries, such as South Korea, they are forced to leave their children behind – and since these children aren’t officially recognised in China, they are denied basic rights and entitlements, foregoing even basic healthcare and education.

And so even those fortunate enough to escape from their dire situations in North Korea and China are left with agonising worry and guilt about their left-behind children. Out of shame, many never talk about the intense pain they feel, instead suffering in lonely silence.

What must be done

A 2014 UN Commission of Inquiry report on the human rights situation in North Korea criticised the Chinese government for its violation of the human rights of North Korean refugees on a number of counts, including its repatriation of North Korean refugees, its failure to protect them from trafficking, and its refusal to recognise the children of North Korean women and Chinese men. However, the Chinese government rejected the commission’s report and refused to change its stance.

It is therefore time for the rest of the world to change the way it interacts with China. International organisations, governments and the media must apply even greater pressure on Beijing to change its policy towards North Korean refugees and the children they have in China; it must recognise that they’re entitled to refugee status by virtue of the human rights abuses they endure at home.

If governments are to act, their citizens and media must pressurise them to make this issue a higher priority. If a global campaign can gather enough momentum and strength, the Chinese government will be forced to listen and reconsider.

It may be a significant obstacle, but it is a challenge we can all play our part in. By demanding action, we can all support the fight against the sustained human rights abuse of desperate North Korean defectors and their invisible children. We might not be able to see it, but we know it’s happening – and we have a human duty to act.

Hyun-Joo Lim, Senior Lecturer in Sociology, Bournemouth University

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

Photo of the Week: Loxodes rex- The ‘King’ of Tropical Microbes

Loxodes rex- The ‘King’ of Tropical Microbes

Loxodes rex– The ‘King’ of Tropical Microbes

Our next instalment of the ‘Photo of the Week’ series features Hunter N. Hines’s image of the freshwater species Loxodes rex.  The series is a weekly instalment, which features an image taken by our fantastic BU staff and students. The photos give a glimpse into some of the fascinating work our researchers have been doing across BU and the wider community.

Loxodes rex is a flagship freshwater ciliate species, a large eukaryotic organism that is a single cell. The photomicrograph is an image taken in Florida (USA), using 100x magnification. This species was long believed to exist only in Tropical Africa.

This research into flagship species in new global regions questions the ideas of microbial biogeography and dispersal.  This species is 1,200µm long (1.2 millimetres!) and visible to the naked eye. The large mouth is at the top left of the image and you can see numerous food items within the cell. The many lines running down the cell are ciliary rows, which are used for swimming.

Further research into the project will reveal more flagship species in novel regions, and could uncover species which are new to the science world.

If you’d like find out more about the research or the photo itself then please contact Hunter.

This photo was originally an entry to the 2017 Research Photography Competition. If you have any other questions about the Photo of the Week series or the competition please email research@bournemouth.ac.uk

ESRC Festival of Social Science – what have we got for you!

The ESRC Festival is a month away…

With planning underway we wanted to let you know what events you could get involved in and find out more about the Social Science research we have at Bournemouth University.

Here are a few of the events that we are organising, you can find out more about the festival and book your tickets here.

Brexit: Next Steps for Business and Trade Policy – Sangeeta Khorana and Jens Holscher are inviting policy makers to come together with academics and businesses to discuss options around pressing post-Brexit issues. 9th November, London.

Tackling Loneliness through connections and creativity – Dr. Lee-Ann Fenge and Sally Lee are raising awareness on the impact of loneliness on health and well-being in older generations. This event hopes to give Social Care workers inspiration of connecting and creating with older generations which will help to combat loneliness, whilst raising awareness of the susceptibility loneliness makes people to financial scams. 9th November, The Shelley Theatre Boscombe.

Thank you for coming: Why gratitude matters – Fiona Cownie will teach you the power of saying ‘thank you’ whilst giving you an action plan which you can implement within your work/volunteering environment. 10th November, Bournemouth University Talbot campus.

We can’t wait for you to join us at the ESRC Festival of Social Science. There are activities for everyone, without costing you a penny!

Creative Industries Clusters Programme – Creative R&D Partnerships Call Launched- Internal Process


The AHRC Creative R&D Partnerships Call has been launched with funds available of £6-9m per collective R&D partnership. Any application that BU submits with its partners is likely to be diverse in nature and could accommodate many sub-projects (work packages) in relation to themes around the Creative Industries.

The will be an internal process to manage the applications to this fund.  Applicants will be asked to complete a short form detailing their proposed programme by 9/10/17.

For further details and a copy of the form, please contact Ehren Milner (emilner@bournemouth.ac.uk).

BU He Policy update for the w/e 29th September 2017

innovation, international

UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) Non-Executive Board

On Thursday Jo Johnson announced the non-executive members of the UKRI Board.

  • Sir John Kingman (Chair of UKRI) is the Legal and General Group Chairman and Former Second Permanent Secretary to HM Treasury
  • Fiona Driscoll (UKRI Audit Committee Chair) is Chair of the Audit Committee of Nuffield Health
  • Mustafa Suleyman is co-founder and Head of Applied AI at DeepMind
  • Professor Sir Peter Bazalgette is the founder of a successful independent TV production company and now Executive Chairman of ITV
  • Professor Julia Black is Pro Director for Research at the London School of Economics
  • Professor Sir Leszek Borysiewicz is Vice-Chancellor of the University of Cambridge (stepping down at the end of the month), and Chair of Cancer Research UK
  • Lord (John) Browne of Madingley is the Executive Chairman of L1 Energy, and former Chief Executive of BP plc
  • Sir Harpal Kumar is the Chief Executive of Cancer Research UK
  • Professor Max Lu is the President and Vice-Chancellor of the University of Surrey
  • Professor Sir Ian Diamond is the Principal and Vice-Chancellor of the University of Aberdeen
  • Professor Alice Gast is President of Imperial College London
  • Vivienne Parry is Head of Engagement for Genomics England
  • Lord (David) Willetts is Executive Chair of the Resolution Foundation and former Minister for Universities and Science
  • Professor Dame Sally Davies – as Chief Medical Officer and serving civil servant, Dame Sally will not be a formal member of the board but will join board meetings in a personal capacity.

Sir John Kingman, interim UKRI Chair stated: “UKRI’s Board brings together an extraordinary array of brilliant scientific and business leaders. Together with the emerging executive team led by Mark Walport, we will be superbly equipped to ensure the new organisation delivers on the great opportunities it has.”

Jo Johnson said: “UKRI has a pivotal role in our future as a knowledge economy. This is an exceptionally strong board that will ensure the UK’s world leading research system stays at the frontier of science and innovation for decades to come.”

The government has committed to investing over £6 billion per annum in research and innovation.

Labour Party Conference

Industry Research & Innovation

The chair of the Data Analytics All Party Parliamentary Group, Daniel Zeichner, writes in Politics Home on How to convert UK excellence in science and research into wider economic success. Zeichner is a fan of the 2010 Labour government’s Catapult Network. Catapults are technology and innovation centres that are business-led by industry experts providing companies with access to expertise and equipment to speed up the commercialisation of research and drive economic growth.

Zeichner believes adopting new technology is essential to improve UK productivity but that Britain needs to be better at this, stating we’re behind other nations. Catapult centres will shortly fall with UKRI’s remit (UKRI is the merger of the UK’s seven research councils) and Zeichner sees this as advantageous for a more seamless diffusion of research expertise into the private sector, matching industry with update technology. The sticking point is that Catapults are currently partly financed by EU funding so Brexit may well lead to their downscaling or demise. In addition to supporting the expansion of the Catapult network Labour calls for new Retails and Materials and Metals Centres, and for R&D % of GDP spending to be raised, plus additional new investment. Zeichner pledges this will all happen if Labour is elected at the next general election.

In the meantime we need to see what is included in the forthcoming Industrial Strategy White Paper and the autumn budget, and of course any announcements at the Conservative conference.

Immigration – Shadow Home Secretary Diane Abbot claimed the Conservatives have ‘weaponised’ immigration. She stated the immigration targets are ‘bogus’ and will never be met. Meanwhile at the Labour party conference backbenchers are battling for Labour to amend policy and campaign for continued access of the EU single market and customs union post-Brexit. This would mean committing to retaining free movement.

Sadiq Khan‏ @SadiqKhan – To the one million EU citizens in London: you are Londoners, you are welcome & you make a huge contribution. @TSSAunion @LabourList #Lab17

Fees – Wonkhe report that Shadow Chancellor John McDonnell said that as “a result of Labour pressure, the government is now being forced into discussing reducing interest rates or raising repayment thresholds. If they bring forward effective proposals we will support them.” Wonkhe state the Shadow Chancellor did not indicate what he hoped the government would propose precisely, nor would he be drawn on the level of Government compromise that he would support.

Gordon Marsden, speaking at a UCU fringe event, stated the party would “wait and see” what the government offers before committing to a particular course of action. However, he called on the government to present a holistic package including action on loan repayment terms and maintenance support. Marsden wouldn’t state a figure for the level of fee cap which he would support as part of a deal on the student funding system.

BME teachers in schools – Shadow Education Secretary Angela Rayner hit the headlines this week after indicating that current school recruitment policies are not promoting equality stating: “If the only people we see in schools that are black or ethnic minority are the cleaners… then we are perpetuating the problems we have in our communities…. I am sick of soft targets. I am all for hard targets, and if it means we have to force quotas, then I am an advocate for that.”

An article in Politics Home notes that an additional 68,000 teachers from BME backgrounds would be required to reflect the proportion of ethnic minority pupils in English state schools and quotes a DfE source who notes a steady increase in the minority ethnic trainee teachers recently and describes the Leadership, Equality and Diversity Fund. This supports schools to provide coaching and mentoring for BME teachers and increase the representation of BME teachers in senior leadership roles.

National Education Service – Angela Rayner launched her 10 principles behind the National Education Service (NES) described here by Schools Week. This is Labour’s ‘cradle to grave’ proposal for the reform of education and includes increasing school funding, free adult education throughout life, valuing all forms of education and pushing technical and apprenticeship streams as alternatives to traditional routes such as HE. David Morris (ex-Wonkhe, now VC’s policy adviser at Greenwich) blogs for Wonkhe to question what it would mean for the HE sector if Labour were elected and implemented the NES in 2022.

Jeremy Corbyn’s Keynote Conference Speech

Corbyn’s keynote speech which closed the Labour Party Conference emphasised skills and training focusing on free tuition throughout life at any stage and improving on technical and vocational training, establishing these as equal-status alternative routes. Corbyn envisions the National Education Service as ‘universal, free and empowering’, a service that “will give millions a fair chance”.’ A flurry of debate followed on twitter on whether abolishing HE tuition fees would mean reinstating student number controls.

A student numbers cap is not inevitable in a fee-free system, says @GordonMarsden in response to @mgmcquillan , and he doesn’t want one.

During the (very long) speech Corbyn reiterated Labour’s message to the Government “pull yourself together or make way” and detailed the Conservative manifesto commitments that have been dropped from policy, such as grammar school expansion. One aspect Labour agree with the Conservatives on is the importance of the Industrial Strategy.

In his speech, Jeremey Corbyn supported the automation thread prevalent in the Government’s Industrial Strategy for its potential to contribute to the nation’s work/life balance “We need urgently to face the challenge of automation… [it] is a threat in the hands of the greedy but what an opportunity if it’s managed in the interests of society as a whole.”

A Labour spokesperson stated to Politics Home that: increased use of new technology in the workplace will inevitably boost productivity, and a Labour government would force them to pass on the benefits of that to employees through higher wages and shorter hours….

“…the potential for this big technological leap and the increase in productivity to be shared in different ways. If it’s under the control only of large corporations, as it is currently, the sharing out is in one direction in long hours, the fall in real wages and increased profits. Who is in control of that process? If that process of big employment transformation is going to be managed for the benefit of the workforce, that needs to be planned at a national level, it can’t just be left to the companies employing those people or introducing advanced robotics.”

Fringe event – Tackling disadvantage experienced by the armed forces community – This fringe event focussed on issues of housing, education and barriers to future employment. There were calls for skills and qualifications to be transferable and compatible with those in civilian institutions and a particular need for work experience and placements alongside qualifications.

Fringe Event – Brexit Generation: The Debate – This fringe event presented evidence on the issues that prompted young people to vote. Asha, a Young Labour member stated the Brexit message to young people had been wrong and it needed to go beyond thinking about issues like Erasmus and University. Asha went on to say that young people wanted to engage on important issues like mental health in schools, changing the education system so it was not an “exam factory” and building a generation of young people with the digital skills they need.

Labour MP Wes Streeting said education was ‘his number one priority’ and ‘the closest thing to a silver bullet for tackling social issues’. Children should be given the opportunity to explore, fail and find what they are great at rather than being pushing into huge numbers of stressful exams, he stated.

Finally…Wonkhe responded to the Labour Party Conference proclamations discussing where some Labour HE policies would benefit from further details in Key questions for Labour and its higher education policy.

Student Retention

William Hammond, Universities UK, blogged about student dropout rates this week. The blog is in response to a sensationalist Sky News story which targets individual programmes at three universities with dropout rates of 50-60% without considering the validity of the statistics.

Hammond reports that the true picture for the national dropout rate for 2014/15 is near a record low at 6.2%, yet pockets of poor retention are seen within mature students at 11.8%; LPN (students coming from geographical populations where few access HE provision) at 8.2%; and acknowledges ethnicity can also be a factor. (Note: Hammond is only looking at non-completion in first year undergraduate students.)

The blog considers how universities retain students (see paragraphs 3 and 4 here) such as ensuring study choices are right for the student through providing clear information and outreach programmes, inclusive measures and the sticky campus concept.

A commenter to the blog (Andy Penaluna) questions why we don’t track student dropout for positive career opportunities.

Science and Innovation Audits

The Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) invited consortia to form around geographic and technological themes and apply to be involved in the science and innovation audit (SIA) process. These consortia are made up of businesses, universities, research and innovation organisations, Local Enterprise Partnerships (LEPs) and their equivalents in the devolved administrations.

The summary report presents the findings of the second wave of audits:

Alternative Providers

HEFCE have commenced a planned series of blogs on Alternative Providers. On Wednesday they explored the diversity of alternative providers in Alternative providers: debunking the myths. The blog covers the variability of alternative providers with regard to sizes, focus, geographical location and student loan eligibility. The blog is a useful simple introduction for colleagues unfamiliar with alternative providers.

Parliamentary Questions

Student Loans

Q: Bambos Charalambous – Whether she plans to (a) cap or (b) reduce the interest rate applied to student loans.

A: Jo Johnson – We have a world class student finance system, which has enabled record numbers of people to benefit from a university education. Latest UCAS data for 2017 shows more disadvantaged young people have been accepted to university than for the whole of the 2016 application cycle.

The student funding system removes financial barriers for anyone hoping to study, and is backed by the taxpayer. The interest rate on student loans remains significantly below the relevant Bank of England reference rate for unsecured personal lending. In addition, the repayment terms of student loans are significantly more favourable for the borrowers than commercial loans. Monthly repayments are linked to income and not to the amount borrowed or the interest rate. Borrowers earning less than the repayment threshold of £21,000 repay nothing at all. Loans are written off after 30 years with no detriment to the borrower, and student loans are available to all eligible students regardless of their previous financial history.

As with all Government policy, we continue to keep the detailed features of the system under review to ensure it remains fair and effective.

Other news

The Scottish Funding Council published a report on Widening Access 2015-16 showing dropout rates for disadvantaged students at 13% (drop out is 7% for affluent students). The Herald covers the story here.

The Guardian report on Clearing 2017: what worked for universities, and what didn’t shares a perspective from four universities on this year’s Clearing marketing practices.

Fees – Simon Marginson blogs for Wonkhe highlighting that the contribution a university education makes as public goods hasn’t been picked up during the current tuition fee wrangling. It touches upon accessibility to HE, a graduate’s more discriminating understanding of culture, and goods at the collective level – new knowledge created by research, positive effects of higher education on social tolerance. On the TEF Simon writes: If higher education institutions follow the logic of the consumer market and the Teaching Excellence Framework as the government wants them to do, over time unfinanced public goods will be whittled away. The TEF requires institutions to focus on maximising individual student satisfaction scores and individual employability. This requires England’s universities to target more precisely their spending and activities to maximise performance as measured by the TEF indicators. In other words, the more the university neglects extraneous unfunded public goods such its contributions to the local region, the more ‘effective’ it will become. Simon ends by debating whether the private/public split that funds HE should be differently balanced.

The Guardian ran an article on overseas academics who have been refused visas to speak at UK conferences.

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Research Professional – all you need to know

Funding opportunities

Research-Professional-logoEvery 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. The Funding Development Team Officers can assist you with this, if required.

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:

24th October 2017

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.

Have you noticed a new box appear on the BU Research Blog homepage?

By clicking on this box, on the left of the Research Blog home page just under the text ‘Funding Opportunities‘, you access a Research Professional real-time search of the calls announced by the Major UK Funders. Use this feature to stay up to date with funding calls. Please note that you will have to be on campus or connecting to your desktop via our VPN to fully access this service.

Centre for Qualitative Research ‘In Conversation” this Wed 1 pm Fenge & Jones

PG research

Not to be missed!

This Wednesday at 1 pm in RLH 201

Lee-Ann Fenge and Kip Jones converse about a focus group that became an innovative journal article, and now about to become a short ‘script in hand’ performance by YOU the audience!

“I’m her partner. Let me in!”

All BU staff and students welcome! 

See you there!

See all of the ‘In Conversation’ CQR Seminars listed here.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Physiotherapy student co-creation for published smartphone app review

Last year was the first year of a new Level 6 unit on the Physiotherapy programme called “Innovation in Physiotherapy”, and as unit lead I was keen to encourage the students to appraise smartphone apps in healthcare. Much of my research to date has been looking at “eHealth” (electronic health) and I was keen for them to have more awareness of these growing forms of healthcare adjuncts.

The students worked in groups to select their apps and then present their app reviews to the class, and following this they were encouraged to write up their app reviews and submit them for publication. I am happy to say that along with Adam Arthur, Alastair Bolton, Alex Evens and Philip Slemon, we have had our app review (“World Rugby Concussion’ by World Rugby Limited: a smartphone application for the general public”) published by the British Journal of Sports Medicine (Impact factor 6.724). This is my first co-creation paper with students since arriving at BU, and hopefully this process can be replicated in future years in the unit.

The article can be found at:

http://bjsm.bmj.com/content/early/2017/09/27/bjsports-2017-098185.full

Cafe Scientifique – Get involved!

Breathe you way into balance – Francesco Ferraro

We are looking forward to our October Cafe Scientifique next week! Francesco Ferraro will be talking to us about how inspiratory muscle training helps to improve balance.

Join us at Cafe Boscanova on Tuesday 3 October – our 5th Birthday!

Cafe Boscanova, 650 Christchurch Rd, Bournemouth, BH1 4BP

If you are interested in presenting your own research at one of our Cafe Scientifique events in 2018 – get in touch and we can find a date that fits!

Launch of EU Prize for Women Innovators 2018

Women's Academic Network

The European Commission has launched the 2018 edition of the EU Prize for Women Innovators. First run in 2011, the Prize aims to encourage more women to exploit the commercial and business opportunities offered by their research projects and to become entrepreneurs.

Europe needs more innovators to stay competitive and to spur economic growth, and yet a large number of well-educated women researchers do not consider entrepreneurship as an option, either through lack of awareness or for other reasons. The Prize is intended to increase public awareness of the contribution of women researchers to entrepreneurship – and to encourage entrepreneurial women to become innovators.

The Prize is open to women who have founded or co-founded their company and who have at some point of their careers benefited from EU funding related to research and innovation. Contestants must be residents of an EU Member State (or a country associated to Horizon 2020).

The following prizes are on offer:

  • 1st prize – €100,000.
  • 2nd prize – €50,000.
  • 3rd prize – €30,000.
  • Rising Innovator Prize of €20,000.

The deadline for entries is 15 November 2017 (17:00 Brussels local time).

An independent panel of judges from business and academia will select the 12 best applicants, who will be invited for a hearing with the jury in January 2018. All participants will be informed about the outcome of the contest in the first quarter of 2018.

For more information check out their website.

AHRC-MRC Global Public Health: Global Challenge Research Fund Partnership Awards Call 2

Funding opportunities

The Global Challenges Research Fund (GCRF) offers a unique opportunity for the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) and the MRC to launch a global public health initiative that responds to the challenge of bringing together expertise in medical science and health interventions in developing countries, with arts and humanities research bringing an understanding of local knowledge and history, cultural and historical contexts and dynamics, community engagement, and trust.

The aim of this activity is to build inter-disciplinary research capacity and capability and to support research innovation across the MRC and AHRC communities. Successful applications will build and strengthen UK and international research collaboration and partnerships for global public health benefit. In order not to limit the potential for inter-disciplinary innovation under this call the call is open to proposals addressing any global public health issue affecting low and middle income countries.

The total funding available for this call from MRC and AHRC is £2million

Closing Date: 26/10/2017

For further details, please click here

UKRI board members announced

The 12 non-executive members of UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) Board have today (28 September 2017) been announced by Science Minister, Jo Johnson.

Over the coming months the Board will work with the UKRI Chair, Chief Executive and the executive team to ensure the successful formation and launch of UKRI, as well as the strategic direction of the organisation. This will include advising the Secretary of State on the allocation of research and innovation budgets, including the Industrial Strategy Challenge Fund.

A key task for the Board will be to ensure the strengths of the Research Councils, Innovate UK and Research England are preserved and built upon, and maximise the value and benefits from the government’s investment of over £6 billion per annum in research and innovation.

The Members of the Board:

  • Sir John Kingman (interim Chair of UKRI) is the Legal and General Group Chairman and Former Second Permanent Secretary to HM Treasury
  • Fiona Driscoll (UKRI Audit Committee Chair) is Chair of the Audit Committee of Nuffield Health
  • Mustafa Suleyman is co-founder and Head of Applied AI at DeepMind
  • Sir Peter Bazalgette is the founder of a successful independent TV production company and now Executive Chairman of ITV
  • Professor Julia Black is Pro Director for Research at the London School of Economics
  • Professor Sir Leszek Borysiewicz is Vice-Chancellor of the University of Cambridge (stepping down at the end of the month), and Chair of Cancer Research UK
  • Lord (John) Browne of Madingley is the Executive Chairman of L1 Energy, and former Chief Executive of BP plc
  • Sir Harpal Kumar is the Chief Executive of Cancer Research UK
  • Professor Max Lu is the President and Vice-Chancellor of the University of Surrey
  • Professor Sir Ian Diamond is the Principal and Vice-Chancellor of the University of Aberdeen
  • Professor Alice Gast is President of Imperial College London
  • Vivienne Parry is Head of Engagement for Genomics England
  • Lord (David) Willetts is Executive Chair of the Resolution Foundation and former Minister for Universities and Science
  • Professor Dame Sally Davies – as Chief Medical Officer and serving civil servant, Dame Sally will not be a formal member of the board but will join board meetings in a personal capacity.

New Royal Academy of Engineering Funding Opportunities

Funding opportunities

The Royal Academy of Engineering has recently released 2 funding opportunities:

Distinguished Visiting Fellowships

The scheme provides funding so that an engineering department at a UK university can host a Distinguished Visiting Fellow from an overseas academic centre of excellence for visits lasting up to one month, aiming to strengthen UK capacity and international standing, and promote new international collaborations.

Award Value – £6,000

Deadline – Monday 30 October 2017

Website – www.raeng.org.uk/dvf

Distinguished Visiting Fellowships & Missions – Turkey (Newton Fund)

Part of the Newton Fund, the scheme provides funding so that an engineering department at a Turkish university can host a Distinguished Visitor or group of Distinguished Visitors from a UK academic centre of excellence for a visit lasting up to one month. The scheme aims to build Turkey’s research and teaching capacity in key areas such as health, energy, agriculture, food and manufacturing to promote Turkey’s economic development and social welfare.

 

Award Value – £6,000 – £30,000

Deadline –  Wednesday 25 October 2017

Website – www.raeng.org.uk/newtonfund

 

If you are interested in submitting to any of the above calls you must contact your  RKEO Funding Development Officer with adequate notice before the deadline, preferably 3 weeks before the submission deadline. 

For more funding opportunities that are most relevant to you, you can set up your own personalised alerts on Research Professional. If you need help setting these up, just ask your School’s/Faculty’s Funding Development Officer in  RKEO or view the recent blog post here.

 

BU Briefing – Environmental hydro-refugium by vegetation vigour in the Okavango Delta

Our BU briefing papers are designed to make our research outputs accessible and easily digestible so that our research findings can quickly be applied – whether to society, culture, public policy, services, the environment or to improve quality of life. They have been created to highlight research findings and their potential impact within their field. 

Climate shifts at decadal scales can have environmental consequences, and therefore, identifying areas that act as environmental refugia is valuable in understanding future climate variability.

The Okavango Delta is the largest wetland in southern Africa and renowned for its high floral and faunal biodiversity. Due to the Okavango’s distinctive hydrological properties, this paper aims to show how these properties reduce the amplitude of seasonal and decadal variations in vegetation vigour inside the Delta extent, and consequently, enhance its capacity to buffer climate, on at least decadal timescales.

This paper uses satellite remote imagery to show how a rift basin, given suitable hydrogeology, can provide a buffer against the influence of climate on vegetation growth and thus provide a relatively stable living environment for animals amidst an otherwise arid, desert habitat.

Click here to read the briefing paper.

For more information about the research, contact Dr Sally Reynolds at sreynolds@bournemouth.ac.uk or Professor Matthew Bennett at mbennett@bournemouth.ac.uk.
To find out how your research output could be turned into a BU Briefing, contact research@bournemouth.ac.uk.

Real-time Research Professional Updates at the click of a button

Funding opportunities

Have you noticed this box on the BU Research Blog?

By clicking on this box, on the left of the Research Blog home page just under the text ‘Funding Opportunities‘, you access a Research Professional real-time search of the calls announced by the Major UK Funders. Use this feature to stay up to date with funding calls. Please note that you will have to be on campus or connecting to your desktop via our VPN to fully access this service.

Alternatively, receive regular alerts by signing up to as many groups as you want by clicking on ‘Bournemouth University‘ on the Research Professional home screen and selecting relevant searches that have been set up to locate funding calls. Just find the ones which suit your needs, click on the name of the group and select ‘Join this Group’.  You can also modify a shared search to save into your own alerts area by clicking on the padlock symbol.

 

 

You can find out more about Research Professional from the RKEO monthly updates which give further details of this service and the help available to BU staff. Just search ‘Research Professional or click on Research Professional tag at the bottom of this post to see all our posts about this subscribed service for BU staff.

We will still continue to blog about specific calls of note as usual.

If you need further assistance with using Research Professional, please contact your Funding Development Officer.

Cross research council mental health networking event

Funding opportunities, Guidance, Info Days

Location: London Date: 31 October 2017 Time: 09:00 – 17:00

Ahead of a planned cross-disciplinary research call on mental health, the research councils are holding an informal networking event at the Imperial War Museum in London on 31 October 2017. The aim of this event is for potential applicants to learn more about our expectations of the successful network plus awards, as well as meeting potential collaborators.

Attendance at this event will be capped at 100 spaces. In the event of oversubscription they will limit the number of attendees per organisation, and also by discipline to allow for even representation across the remits of the research councils. Therefore attendees will be expected to represent the wider interests of their organisation as well as their individual interests. Due to the cross-disciplinary nature of these awards, the aim is for attendees at the networking event to span the remits of the research councils.

They welcome attendance from potential applicants and collaborators representing academia and also charities, service providers, businesses, clinicians etc.

Registration will close at 16:00 on 12 October 2017.  For further information on how to register please see the ESRC website