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Learning the Italian way

Last week we were on a study visit to Italy and were lucky enough to visit and meet Italian colleagues from four regions who are doing some pretty innovative work in their respective work places. Of particular interest to us was a museum project in Rome (given our visit to MOMA last year and the workshops they delivered last month for staff and students and also museum and heritage workers from across the UK), and two music projects, one a music therapy project in the North of Italy run, and another violin group in Rome (as we have our ongoing BSO/BUDI orchestra project) but what I ended up being surprised and really excited about was the work of a colleague, Dr Andrea Fabbo, a geriatrician who is responsible for dementia services for the Local Health Trust in Modena, an area devastated by an earthquake a few years ago but with the silver lining of many new dementia projects being funded as a result. The images included in this post are great examples to ‘myth bust’ the risk aversion that is often shown to those living with dementia. Those who attend the services in Modena are encouraged to cook, to garden and to swim, normal activities that are too often denied to those living with dementia who may lose some of their abilities to undertake such tasks and rather than assist them to retain their skills with the changes in their cognitive abilities too often these tasks are performed by others in well meaning attempts to provide the support people with dementia need. We were lucky to meet innovative academics and practitioners on our trip, but our Italian colleagues were clear that these type of project are highly unusual in Italy where a traditional clinical approach is taken based on a biomedical understanding of dementia, but as you can see from the images here Andrea and his team have created a fantastic example of psycho-social support for those living with dementia that promote social inclusion and fun for those with dementia.

Festival events – what can we tempt you with today?

Festival of Learning

Here are a handful of Festival Events you can come along to next week – to find the full list of events head to the website, or look out for programmes around campus. See something that might interest a friend or family member? Spread the word!

As usual, just click on the links to be taken to the website to find out more and book your place

Star Wars planets: Lessons in planetary geology

Saturday 14 June

11am – 12pm, Executive Business Centre (EB306)

Consider yourself a Star Wars fan?  Come along to this fascinating event that teaches you planetary geology for the world of Star Wars:

What would it be like to live on Tatooine with two suns? Or on the ice world of Hoth, or molten Mustafar? This event will focus on a selection of ‘Star Wars’ planets. You’ll explore their geology and learn about our own planet along the way.

Run by Matthew Bennett

Have we made banking good?

Thursday 12 June

12pm – 2pm, Executive Business Centre (EB708)

Since the global financial crisis and ensuing credit crunch, there has been substantial EU and UK sector re-regulation. This panel discussion looks at whether the result is a safer banking system, focused on serving the public good.

Run by Andy Mullineux

Bug grub!

Monday 9 June

11am – 12pm, Poole House (PG73)

A good way to spend an early lunch hour perhaps?  Come along to this event and challenge your dietary perceptions

Supply of conventional protein such as meat and fish is under strain as the world supports a growing population. In order to feed the world we must be open to alternative forms of food – including bugs! Challenge your cultural palate and gastronomic sensibilities by consuming unconventional foods, which are likely to form a large proportion of the food chain in the future.

Run by Andy Boer

What does a forensic scientist really do?

Tuesday 10 June

10am – 4pm, Kimmeridge House (KG03)

One to send on to any teenagers in the family:

This event features a range of illustrated talks and practical exercises for years 10, 11, 12 and 13 students interested in forensic science. It will introduce students to a range of investigative forensic skills using observation, physical and chemical tests.

Run by David Osselton

‘Technophiles’, ‘technophobes’ and ‘technodopers’: Sport & its technology.

Tuesday 10 June

4pm – 5pm, Poole House, (Stevenson Lecture Theatre)

If you missed Bryce’s fantastic talk last year on Prosthetics technology then make sure you don’t miss out again this time!

Be it a ball thrown or a wheelchair raced, this talk highlights the role that technology plays in sport. You’ll learn its colourful history and join the debate on the many controversies that have occurred in sport. We’ll discuss how maximising the performance of technology can be the fine difference between success or failure for an athlete.

Run by Bryce Dyer

 

 

 

 

Delivering healthcare in prisons

Last week Jane Senior from University of Manchester and Research Project Manager of the Offender Health Research Network (OHRN) visited Bournemouth University. She came to BU to share her recent research findings with students, staff and professionals working with prisoners and ex-offenders.

Jane is a clinician-researcher who is a qualified mental health nurse with over 20 years post qualification experience of working in prisons and secure mental health settings. During the session Jane presented findings from three recent research projects:

  • Liaison and diversion services in England
  • Mental health in-reach service
  • Critical Time Intervention

These large-scale studies have been undertaken in collaboration with a number of UK Universities and also Columbia University, New York.

Those who attended particularly enjoyed having the opportunity to discuss with Jane the implications for her findings for professional practice now and in the future. One attendee said the session ‘was excellent – very interesting and engaging’ and another ‘ I really enjoyed the format of the session – so informative’. The critical Time Intervention is on-going research project and several of the professionals attending  the session felt was a great opportunity to learn more about this new pilot initiative.  The session was made possible through funding from the Society and Social Welfare Community.

Erasmus+ partner universities e-workshops

 3rd Sustainable e-Tourism Research and Applications

Virtual Workshop

25 June 2014
Participating Erasmus Mundus partner Universities:

Bournemouth University (UK), University Lyon2,
Staffordshire University (UK), Universite Joseph Fourier Grenoble 1
and Universita degli Studi del Sannio (Italy)

Aims & Subjects

Workshop Aims

The workshop is organized under the Erasmus-Mundus Action 2 “Sustainable e-tourism program”.

This third edition of the workshop aims to promote knowledge exchanges, discussion, and dialogue on innovative management issues in e-tourism, effective and more efficient approaches to the Sustainable e-Tourism programs our partner universities.

The workshop series mainly involves PhD students of the program. The first and second edition of the workshop took place at June 2012 and May 2013.

Master, PhD as well as Post-Doc members of the program were involved.

The overall objectives of these workshops under the Erasmus Mundus Action 2, Sustainable e-tourism are:

To enhance the capacity for international cooperation between universities in Asia and universities in EU countries by facilitating mobility of people, transfer of know-how and best practices by training the researchers and academic staff of the next generation.

To develop new co-operative teaching and research links in the tourism sector and to enhance knowledge and skills of teaching staff, students and researchers in promoting a sustainable e-Tourism philosophy.

To transfer the technology and knowledge in the following fields: business and strategy in the tourism industry, knowledge management, advanced ICT, cross-cultural analysis among the research patterns.

To set up innovative management policies based on the use of ICT, which enhance sustainable development in the tourism sector in Europe and Asia and help to create and spear knowledge in both directions.

Workshop topics

Knowledge management and related topics for e-tourism   –  Mobile technology for e-tourism   –   The reputation and trust model in social network  –   Product lifecycle management  –  Product data management and Eco-product lifecycle management   –   Multi agent system for dynamic web service composition   -Customer relation management for e-tourism -e-Commerce   –   e-Business for e-tourism   –   e-Learning and human capital for e-tourism   –  Sustainable Management for e-tourism   –  Sustainable Supply chain   –  Tourism Destination Images   –  Tourist behaviour and e-tourism marketing   –   Semantic Web/Web services/ontology   –   Information retrieval / Service recommendation   –
Web search personalization / customization   –   User profile management / context management   –   Social networks / collaborative filtering   –  User privacy protection – Natural language processing – Classification / clustering algorithms – Location based services –  Robotics and Applications

Workshop Committee:

General Co-Chair:

Xi YU, University of Lyon 2, France

Program Co-Chair:

Fei YUAN , Staffordshire University, UK
Lei MU, Universite Joseph Fourier Grenoble 1
Trung Hien NGUYEN International School Vietnam National University, Italy
Vivek Chacko, Bournemouth University, UK
Xi YU , University of Lyon 2, France

Scientific Committee:

Prof.Abdelaziz Bouras, University of Lyon 2, France
Prof.Hongnian Yu, Bournemouth University, UK
Prof. Lbath Ahmed, Universite Joseph Fourier Grenoble 1, France
Prof. Yacine Ouzrout, University of Lyon 2, France
Prof. Matteo Mario Savino ,Universita degli Studi del Sannio, BIOGEM, Italy
Prof. Paul Jean-Jacques, Royal University of Law and Economics ,Cambodia
MA. Do Thu Huong,International School – Vietnam National University,Vietnam
Dr. Garidkhuu Ariuntuul,Health Sciences University of Mongolia, Mongolia
Dr. Nouansavanh Khamlusa,National University of Laos, Laos
Mr Ou Yusong, Chengdu University, China
Dr.Nopasit Chackpitak, Chiang Mai University, Thailand
Dr. Aurélie Charles, University of Lyon 2, France
Dr. Néjib Moalla, University of Lyon 2, France
Dr. Antoine Nongaillard, University of Lyon 2, France
Dr. Vincent Renner, University of Lyon 2, France
Dr. Aicha Sekhari, University of Lyon 2, France
Dr. Wided Batat, University of Lyon 2, France

Contacts at BU: Prof. Hongnian Yu and Vivek Chacko

Data as Utility and Analytics as a Service

We are currently experiencing an incredible, explosive growth in digital content and information. According to IDC, there currently exists over 2.7 zetabytes of data. It is estimated that the digital universe in 2020 will be 50 times as big as in 2010 and that from now until 2020 it will double every two years. Research in traditionally qualitative disciplines is fundamentally changing due to the availability of such vast amounts of data. In fact, data-intensive computing has been named as the fourth paradigm of scientific discovery and is expected to be key in unifying the theoretical, experimental and simulation based approaches to science. The commercial world has also been transformed by a focus on BIG DATA with companies competing on analytics. Data has become a commodity and in recent years has been referred to as the ‘new oil’. We are entering a new era of predictive analytics and data intensive computingwhich has been recognised worldwide with various high profile reports highlighting the challenges and attempting to quantify its huge potential benefits.

In addition to our previously advertised Data Science workshop suitable for a broader audience (Data Scientist: The sexiest job of the 21st century?), this much more focused EPSRC IT as a Utility Network+ (http://www.itutility.ac.uk/) and EU INFER (http://www.infer.eu/) co-sponsored event organised as part of the Bournemouth University’s Festival of Learning will explore the value of very quickly growing data and feasibility of providing data and predictive analytics as services in various industries, public sector and academic disciplines.

The workshop will feature five invited 30 minutes talks to set up the scene for:

i) looking at the growing value of data and treating it as a utility; and

ii) feasibility of providing data and predictive analytics as a service on a large scale and across many industries and disciplines.

The talks will be followed by breakout interactive/discussion sessions in mixed groups with potential linking of partners for various follow on activities (grant applications, proof of concept projects etc.).

The attendance is free and if you are interested to join us please register following this link: http://microsites.bournemouth.ac.uk/festival-of-learning/events/data-as-a-utility-and-analytics-as-a-service/.

Confirmed invited speakers:

Prof. Nello Cristianini, Prof. of Artificial Intelligence, University of Bristol, UK

Prof. Detlef Nauck, Chief Research Scientist, BT’s Research and Innovation Division, UK

Tom Quay, Director, We Are Base Ltd, UK

Prof. Trevor Martin, Prof. of Artificial Intelligence, University of Bristol, UK

Dr. Dymitr Ruta, Chief Researcher, EBTIC, Khalifa University, UAE

 

Date: 9 June 2014: 12pm – 6pm.

Location: 3rd Floor, Executive Business Centre, 89 Holdenhurst Road, Bournemouth, BH8 8EB

Workshop programme:

12.00 – 12.45 – Registration and buffet lunch.

12.45 – 13.00 – Welcome and introduction (Bogdan Gabrys, Bournemouth University, UK)

13.00 – 13.30 – Prof. Detlef Nauck (BT, UK)

13.30 – 14.00 –Prof. Nello Cristianini (Bristol University, UK)

14.00 – 14.30 – Tom Quay (We Are Base Ltd, UK)

14.30 – 15.00 – Coffee break

15.00 – 15.30 – Prof. Trevor Martin (Bristol University/BT, UK)

15.30 – 16.00 – Dr Dymitr Ruta (EBTIC, Khalifa University, UAE)

16.00 – 16.15 – Break

16.15 – 17.15 – Breakout discussion sessions: i) data as a utility; ii) analytics as a service.

17.15 – 18.00 – Summary, recommendations and follow on actions.

 

Please contact the workshop chair, Prof. Bogdan Gabrys (bgabrys@bournemouth.ac.uk), if you require any further information.

AHRC to hold roundtable on arts and humanities perspectives on risk

AHRC are inviting expressions of interest from arts and humanities researchers with an interest in risk to take part in a roundtable discussion, with a deadline of 16th June and the event to take place on 14 July. The one day event will offer the opportunity for post-doctoral researchers at all stages of their careers to contribute insights and identify potential future research agendas. In particular, AHRC are looking for the following areas:

* language and creative/cultural perceptions of risk;

* ethics, rights, values, trust and risk

* historical and temporal perspectives on risk

* risk in relation to creativity and innovation, including in areas such as health, science and the emergence of new technologies.

If you are interested in taking part in the roundtable, you need to submit a one page CV and 500 word account detailing your specialism, relevant research, publications and interest to AHRC. Travel costs will be paid for those selected to attend the event. Further details are available at http://www.ahrc.ac.uk/News-and-Events/Events/Documents/EOI%20Roundtable.pdf.

BU Nepal health research at international midwifery conference

PG research

Yesterday HSC Ph.D. student Sheetal Sharma presented her key research findings under the title ‘Getting women to care: mixed–methods evaluation of maternity care intervention in rural Nepal’ at the 30th congress of the ICM (International Confederation of Midwives) in Prague.   Sheetal’s Ph.D. evaluates the effectiveness of a health promotion intervention aiming antenatal care attendance in rural Nepal.  Her evaluation suggests that practice should be socio-culturally appropriate and inclusive not only of women but also their families.

This afternoon three HSC posters were displayed as part of a special session on Midwifery in South Asia.  All three posters featured aspects of maternity care research conducted in the Centre for Midwifery, Maternal and Perinatal Health in Nepal.

Poster 1:        Staff perspectives of barriers to women accessing birthing services in Nepal: A qualitative study

Milne, L, Hundley, V, van Teijlingen, E, Ireland, J, Simkhada, P,

Poster 2:        Pregnant & Dirty?

Sharma, S., van Teijlingen, E., Hundley, V. Simkhada, P., Angell, C.

Poster 3:        Getting women to care in Nepal: A Difference in Difference analysis of a health promotion intervention

Sharma, S.  Sicuri, E., Belizan, JM., van Teijlingen, E., Simkhada, P., Stephens J., Hundley, V., Angell, C.

 

Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen

CMMPH

MoMA lead the way – what does this mean for the UK?

Fusion, Training

BUDI were delighted to welcome colleagues from the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York to Bournemouth University from 20-23rd May 2014, thanks to Fusion Investment Fund Mobility Strand Funding. Our local partnership working was put into practice to host international workshop leaders attended by participants near and far. MoMA’s specially trained Museum Educators ran two workshops in which they shared their successful model and established approach for making their services dementia-friendly (validated via evaluation from New York University). These workshops showcased their innovative style of education delivery, and provided attendees with an opportunity to hear the success of their approach and view a practical demonstration in a gallery or museum space.

 On 21st May 2014, 15 members of BU Staff and PhD Students took part in a free workshop at Talbot Campus and in the Atrium Art Gallery. This was followed on the 22nd May 2014 with a second workshop at Poole Museum which was attended by 40 participants currently working in museums, art galleries and the wider heritage sector, from as near as Poole and as far as Paris. During this workshop participants learnt how they could implement these approaches within their individual organisations. Participant’s fed back how useful they found the workshop:

  • It was a really good insight into what it’s like to provide for people with dementia. It was great to spend time looking at the paintings in the museum in a new way.
  • I will adopt my art gallery sessions to follow many of MoMA’s techniques.
  • I found the workshop both enjoyable and constructive and hope BUDI will run others on related topics.
  • Very well facilitated, clear well structured presentations. Very useful for my professional work.

We look forward to seeing how the participant’s learning translates into their future practice, and the wider impact of this approach within museums, art galleries and the heritage sector in the UK. We would also like to thank Poole Museum for kindly providing the venue and refreshments for the second workshop.

Michelle Heward

Data scientist: The sexiest job of the 21st century?

Festival of Learning

UK Government has identified Data Science as the ‘transforming and growth driving force across all sectors of economy’ and named Big Data as one of the ‘eight great technologies’. With an unprecedented growth in digital content and data, as the digital universe in 2020 is estimated to be 50 times as big as in 2010, we have entered a new era of predictive analytics and data intensive computing. Data scientists are expected to play a key role in this data revolution and their job has even been referred to as “the sexiest job of the 21st century”. This EU INFER sponsored one-day open workshop will combine talks by eminent speakers, a panel-audience discussion, exhibition of projects, hands-on experience session with a number of digital devices and provide a chance to meet data science experts from academia and industry.

Please register at: (http://microsites.bournemouth.ac.uk/festival-of-learning/events/data-scientist-the-sexiest-job-of-the-21st-century/) and join us during this exciting event.

Date: 10 June 2014: 9am – 6pm.

Location: 3rd Floor, Executive Business Centre, 89 Holdenhurst Road, Bournemouth, BH8 8EB

Workshop chair: Prof. Bogdan Gabrys, Data Science Institute, Bournemouth University

Detailed program of the workshop:

9.00 – 9.15 – Welcome and introduction

9.15 – 10.15 – Prof. Nello Cristianini (Bristol University, UK), ThinkBIG : The Impact of Big Data on Science and Society

10.15 – 10.30 – Break

10.30 – 11.30 – Prof. David van Dyk (Imperial College London, UK), Big Data and Complex Modeling Challenges in Astronomy and Solar Physics

11.30 – 14.30 – Lunch combined with networking, exhibitions, poster session and hands on experimenting.

14.30 – 15.45 – Panel discussion: Is Data Science “the transforming and growth driving force across all sectors of economy”? Is a Data Scientist the “sexiest job of the 21st century”? (Panelists to include the keynote speakers and a number of users and experts from academia as well as public and private sectors)

15.45 – 16.00 – Break

16.00 – 17.00 – Prof. Detlef Nauck (BT, UK), Predictive Analytics and Big Data

17.00 – 17.15 – Break

17.15 – 18.00 – Prof. Bogdan Gabrys (Bournemouth University, UK), Data Science at BU

 

Information about invited keynote talks and speakers:

Talk 1: ThinkBIG: The Impact of Big Data on Science and Society by Prof. Nello Cristianini, Professor of Artificial Intelligence, Bristol University

Abstract: Computers can now do things that their programmers cannot explain or understand: today’s Artificial Intelligence has found a way to bypass the need for understanding a phenomenon before we can replicate it in a computer. The technology that made this possible is called machine learning: a method to program computers by showing them examples of the desired behaviour. And the fuel that powers it all is DATA. Lots of it.

For this reason, data has been called the new oil: a new natural resource, that businesses and scientists alike can leverage, by feeding it to massive learning computers to do things that we do not understand well enough to implement them with a traditional program. This new way of working is all about predicting, not explaining. It is about knowing what a new drug will do to a patient, not why. But: was not science meant to help us make sense of the world? Or is it just meant to deliver good predictions? And let us remember that the fuel that powers this revolution is very often our own personal data, and that we still do not have a clear cultural framework to think about this.

Short Bio Note: Nello Cristianini is a Professor of Artificial Intelligence at the University of Bristol. His current research covers the large scale analysis of media content (news and social media), using various AI methods, and the implications of Big Data.

Cristianini is the co-author of two widely known books in machine learning, “An Introduction to Support Vector Machines” and “Kernel Methods for Pattern Analysis” and of a book in bioinformatics “Introduction to Computational Genomics”. He is also a former recipient of the Royal Society Wolfson Research Merit Award and a current holder of a European Research Council Advanced Grant.

Talk 2: Big Data and Complex Modeling Challenges in Astronomy and Solar Physics by Prof. David van Dyk, Professor of Statistics, Imperial College London

Abstract: In recent years, technological advances have dramatically increased the quality and quantity of data available to astronomers.  Newly launched or soon-to-be launched space-based telescopes are tailored to data-collection challenges associated with specific scientific goals. These instruments provide massive new surveys resulting in new catalogs containing terabytes of data, high resolution spectrography and imaging across the electromagnetic spectrum, and incredibly detailed movies of dynamic and explosive processes in the solar atmosphere. These new data streams are helping scientists make impressive strides in our understanding of the physical universe, but at the same time generating massive data-analytic and data-mining challenges for scientists who study the resulting data. This talk will give an overview of a number of statistical challenges that arise form big data and complex models in astronomy and solar physics.

Short Bio Note: David van Dyk is a Professor in the Statistics Section of the Department of Mathematics at Imperial College London. After obtaining his PhD from the University of Chicago, he held faculty positions at Harvard University and the University of California, Irvine before relocating to London in 2011. Professor van Dyk was elected Fellow in the American Statistical Association in 2006, elected Fellow of the Institute of Mathematical Statistics in 2010, received a Wolfson Merit Award in 2011, and was elected to the Board of Directors of the American Statistical Association (2015-17). His scholarly work focuses on methodological and computational issues involved with Bayesian analysis of highly structured statistical models and emphasizes serious interdisciplinary research, especially in astronomy. He founded and coordinates the CHASC International Astrostatistics Center and is particularly interested in improving the efficiency of computationally intensive methods involving data augmentation, such as EM-type algorithms and various Markov chain Monte Carlo methods.

Talk 3: Predictive Analytics and Big Data by Prof Dr Detlef Nauck, Chief Research Scientist, BT

Abstract: Detlef’s research focuses on exploiting large operational data sources to improve BT’s systems, networks and processes. The ultimate goal is the introduction of autonomic systems into operations that can learn from historic data to self- improve, self-configure and self-heal. In his presentation, Detlef will discuss how the application of predictive analytics to operational data has led to a number of solutions in BT’s operations that predict performance of networks, systems and processes, and forecast expected demand. Detlef will also discuss some current research topics at BT, which range from automatic discovery of patterns, to autonomic behaviour in processes and systems, to the challenges of exploiting Big Data.

Short Bio Note: Detlef Nauck is a Chief Research Scientist with BT’s Research and Innovation Division located at Adastral Park, Ipswich, UK. He is leading a group of international scientists working on Intelligent Data Analysis and Autonomic Systems. He is a Visiting Professor at Bournemouth University and a Private Docent at the Otto-von-Guericke University of Magdeburg, Germany. Detlef holds an MSc (1990) and a PhD (1994) in Computer Science both from the University of Braunschweig, Germany. He also holds a Habilitation (post-doctoral degree) in Computer Science from the Otto-von-Guericke University of Magdeburg, Germany (2000). Detlef has published over 120 papers, holds 4 patents and 20 active patent applications.

Citizen journalism, hippos and Bio-Beach: Lots of great content on the research website

Training

I’ve just counted up what has been added to the new research website over the last week (Tuesday 27 May – Monday 2 June) and there have been 16 new pieces of content. That’s an average of three pieces of exciting BU research news being shared every day.

The new site was implemented at the end of 2013. As in any big organisation, changing processes or systems can take time, but I’m so pleased to see that colleagues are engaging with it and sharing their research through it. People are simply logging in and uploading their content themselves quickly and easily, rather than having to log a job and go through various other people.

The content is wide ranging and really interesting. Some colleagues are using the site to promote public engagement activity or give details of new publications. Some highlights from the last week include:

If you’re not familiar with the site yet you can log in herewith your usual BU username and password. There’s a very handy technical guide you can download from the first page you come to once you’re in the system.

I’m currently arranging some other training dates and we have a specific session with the Psychology department this month. If any other departments or research groups would like a session all to themselves, please let me know and we’ll get something booked in. Alternatively, if you think a one-to-one session would help then I’m happy to sit down with you and go through it. Just email me.

And remember, the site is externally facing, aimed at our research users, peers at other institutions, funders and members of the public. It is different from this blog, which is aimed at the internal BU research community. It’s worth just keeping this in mind when you’re deciding where to post your content.

Thank you again to everyone who has contributed content. It makes me happy!

Latest Major Funding Opportunities

Funding opportunities

The following opportunities have been announced. Please follow the links for more information:

AHRC is pleased to announce details of its major new funding initiative for modern languages: the Open World Research Initiative  (OWRI). OWRI seeks to establish a new and exciting vision for languages research in response to the challenges and opportunities presented by a globalised research environment and multi-lingual world. The initiative seeks to present a cogent, positive and compelling vision for the role of modern language expertise in opening up research opportunities drawing on other cultures, literatures and histories. The research programmes will be multi-institutional and multi-disciplinary and demonstrate the strategic importance of language-based research and enhanced language expertise across the arts and humanities. Up to £4m Full Economic Cost (fEC) is available per OWRI programme over 4 years. Successful applicants will be funded at 80% of fEC. Closing date: 23/10/14.

Do you want to collaborate with overseas researchers? If so, consider the Japan, India,  Brazil , China, Taiwan, USA  and Europe Partnering Awards announced (or forthcoming) by the BBSRC. These awards are to set up partnership links between UK and overseas laboratories; to promote the exchange of scientists, particularly early career scientists and to promote access to facilities. Funds can only be used for travel, subsistence and other activities, such as workshops or exchanges.  Funding varies with each award. Amongst other eligibility criteria, the lead applicant must be BBSRC funded. Closing date: 13/11/14.

For those interested in working with academics from other nations, the BBSRC Other Countries Partnering Awards may be applicable. These are designed to: establish partnerships between UK and overseas laboratories; promote the exchange of scientists, particularly early career scientists; promote access to facilities;  enhance collaborative activities with CGIAR Centres and programmes (Consultative Group on International Agriculture Research Centres). While this scheme will consider applications for partnership activities with any country not currently covered by individual schemes, BBSRC particularly welcomes applications which seek to partner with researchers in South Africa, South Korea, Australia, Mexico, Vietnam, Argentina, Canada, New Zealand and Russia. Typically up to £30k over a four-year period is available for partnerships with one or more life science laboratories in countries not currently eligible through their existing partnering award schemes. Amongst other eligibility criteria, the lead applicant must be BBSRC funded. Closing date: 13/11/14.

The BBSRC is also promoting its International Workshops scheme. These aim to: stimulate joint working in topics important to BBSRC’s strategy; match numbers of scientists from the UK with other countries to identify areas of commonality and explore the potential for international collaboration and to receive applications involving collaborations with any other country, although the US, Canada, Brazil, EU member states, Japan, China, India Australia and New Zealand are particularly encouraged. There will be around 8 awards each year, of approximately £10k each. This scheme is open to current BBSRC research grant holders and researchers employed at BBSRC sponsored institutes who are in receipt of BBSRC funding. Closing date: 13/11/14.

The BBSRC‘s New Investigator Scheme assists early-career researchers – newly employed university lecturers, lecturer level equivalent fellows whose awards were secured in open competition, and researchers in Research Council Institutes at the unified Research Council Band E or its equivalent – to secure their first major element of research funding. Closing date: 24/09/14

The BBSRC David Phillips Fellowship Scheme is aimed at scientists who have demonstrated high potential and who wish to establish themselves as independent researchers. Awards are for 5 years, up to 5 are available, and include personal salary and a significant research support grant. Applications are welcome from candidates seeking flexible working arrangements. Proposals can relate to in any area of science within the BBSRC portfolio but the BBSRC particularly encourages proposals that are aligned with BBSRC’s overarching strategic priorities. Closing date: 05/11/14.

Looking ahead, The Animal Health and Welfare ERA-Net plans a third call in the area of animal health and welfare. This call is expected to be open from around mid-November 2014. If this is your discipline, why not set a date in your calendar to check this call nearer the time?

Similarly, CHIST-ERA (European Coordinated Research on Long-term Challenges in Information and Communication Sciences & Technologies ERA-Net) expects to open a call regarding Resilient Trustworthy Cyber-Physical Systems and Human Language Understanding in October 2014. Their conference in June 2014 will bring together scientists and CHIST-ERA representatives in order to identify and formulate promising scientific and technological challenges at the frontier of research with a view to refine the scientific content of the call.

The ESRC, in association with the Foundation for Research Support of the State of São Paulo, Brazil (FAPESP) and the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research (NWO)  has made a Joint Call for Proposals on Sustainable Urban Development. The aim of this call is to strengthen research cooperation between researchers from the state of São Paulo, Brazil, the UK and the Netherlands. Based on consultation with the research community in the participating countries, the research themes which have been identified are Resilience, Social justice and Governance and democracy. An application can only be submitted via the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research’s electronic application system Iris. A total budget of approximately €5.4 million is jointly made available. Closing date: 23/09/14

Applications are invited to the MRC – Biomedical Catalyst: Regenerative Medicine Research Committee. The RMRC provides support for high quality proposals aiming to develop regenerative medicine therapies to improve human health and funds pre-clinical development and early clinical testing of novel regenerative medicine therapies. Closing date: 10/07/14.

 The TSB is investing up to £2.5m to support the development of low-power energy harvesting technologies for autonomous electronic systems. Energy harvesting is the ‘scavenging’ of energy from the surrounding environment and converting it into useable electrical energy. This call seeks to explore ways to extend battery life in low-power devices or to eliminate batteries altogether. A briefing day for potential applicants will be held in London on 09/06/14. Applicants must register by noon on 18/09/14 and the full application submitted by noon on 28/09/14.

The TSB is to invest £6m in collaborative R&D projects and feasibility studies to accelerate the proving and commercial application of a wide range of recent or emerging manufacturing technologies involving mechanical conversion processes such as machining, casting, forging, moulding and joining. The main aim of this competition is to help companies of all sizes overcome the technical and business challenges of transforming novel technologies and leading-edge application knowledge into robust, competitive manufacturing capabilities and business processes. Successful projects will be driven by industrial needs and delivered through collaborative innovation teams, often involving new sources of expertise and organisations that have not previously worked together. A briefing event and webinar for potential applicants will be held in London on 17/06/14. Applicants must register by noon on 27/08/14 and the full application submitted by noon on 03/09/14.

The Wellcome Trust, through the Sustaining Heath Scheme seeks to invest in pilot research projects investigating novel aspects of any aspect of the interplay between health, environment and nutrition . Proposals should be designed to open up new research avenues, ultimately leading to work that will have a significant impact on human health. As general guidance, awards are of the order of £250,000, exceptionally up to £500,000. Closing date for concept notes: 25/07/14 with preliminary applications by 20/08/14. Invited full applications are to be submitted by 14/02/15.

The Wellcome Trust’s Pathfinder Awards  provide pilot funding for Academic-Industry partnerships to develop early-stage applied research and development projects in orphan and neglected disease areas. The Scheme is intended to kick-start pilot projects that have significant potential to help develop innovative new products in these disease areas. In the scheme, an academic lead (or a lead from a not-for-profit entity) will build on or establish a partnership with a company that has specialist knowledge and access to technologies to facilitate the development of a specific product. There is a rolling deadline for this scheme with the next deadline being 07/07/14.

Please note that some funders specify a time for submission as well as a date. Please confirm this with your RKE Support Officer.

You can set up your own personalised alerts on ResearchProfessional. If you need help setting these up, just ask your School’s RKE Officer in RKE Operations or see the recent post on this topic, which includes forthcoming training dates up to November 2014.

If thinking of applying, why not add notification of your interest on ResearchProfessional’s record of the bid so that BU colleagues can see your intention to bid and contact you to collaborate.

Media Skills: What Journalists Want Workshop

A Media Skills: What Journalists Want Workshop is taking place on the 17th June 2014, 10:00-11:30 over at Lansdowne Campus.

This Workshop is designed for members of staff who are thinking about utilising media as a part of their work.
What sort of stories they are after, what BU has to offer and how you can help to give journalists what they want. The session will be run by the Press and PR team, who will give examples of previous stories and current practices used to get BU into the press.

To book on please visit the Staff Development & Engagement Pages on the Staff Intranet.

Research Professional – all you need to know

Funding opportunities

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:

 

24 June 2014

22 July 2014

26 August 2014

23 September 2014

28 October 2014

25 November 2014

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.

Firsthand: HEFCE’s Open Access Policy

BU Challenges, Guidance, Info Days, Post-award, Publishing, Research assessment

A few weeks back we were privileged to welcome experts on the topic of Open Access to speak at BU in an event well attended by delegates from HEIs across England, Scotland and Wales. The event was enjoyed by all who attended and over a series of blog posts I hope to summarise some of the key points raised by each of the speakers. We also filmed the event so hope to be posting this soon for all to watch, enjoy and comment upon. 

A few days a go, I summarised Alma Swans Introductory Address on ‘The benefits of Open Access’. Today, I look at Ben Johnson’s presentation ‘Open Access in a Post-2014 REF’.

Ben Johnson is a policy adviser at the Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE), where he has worked for the past five years. He has a first class honours degree in music from the University of Southampton, and ten years’ experience working in strategic planning, process improvement and risk management. Since joining HEFCE, Ben has focussed on developing the Council’s thinking in novel, emerging and cross-cutting policy areas. Recently, these have included examining how technological advancements can drive openness in education and research. In 2013, Ben joined the research policy team to lead HEFCE’s work on open access, research information and infrastructure.

In April, HEFCE and the other three UK funding bodies published details of a new policy for open access relating to future research assessments after the current 2014 REF. To read this item in full visit: http://www.hefce.ac.uk/news/newsarchive/2014/news86805.html. In his presentation, Ben talked through this policy and answered questions from delegates throughout the day.

He opened his presentation by outlining Open Access its flavours and routes. GOLD being the journal making the work immediately and freely accessible online under a CC-BY licence and GREEN by the author depositing their work into an intuitional or subject repositories at point of acceptance – further information can be found in earlier blog posts (How to deposit to BURO, Green & Gold).

HEFCEs core principle behind the policy is that outputs submitted to a post-2014
REF should be Open Access and they have three objectives in implementing the policy:

  • Significantly increase the uptake of open access options
  • Protect author choice as much as possible
  • Stimulate the deposit of work in repositories

 

  The minimum requirements of the policy are that:

  1. The final peer-reviewed draft of your paper is deposited in an institutional or subject repository on acceptance
  2. The repository record must be discoverable ASAP
  3. The full text must be accessible ASAP (or once an embargo has elapsed)

 This will apply to all journal articles and most conference proceedings (those with an ISSN), he also stipulated that the maximum embargoes to be allowed will be:

  • REF main panels A and B – 12 months
  • REF main panels C and D – 24 months

An analysis of the REF 2014 submissions found that 96% of outputs could have been Open Access based on this criteria and the remaining 4% would be covered in the exceptions of the policy.

In addition to this, extra credit will be given in the research environment component of the post-2014 REF where an HEI can demonstrate that:

  • Outputs are presented in a form that allows re-use of the work, including via text-mining
  • Outputs not in the scope (books etc.) are made open access

 The prediction is that this will lead to:

  • Significantly greater uptake of open access (even within publishers’ current policies)
  • Increased visibility and usage of repositories
  • Many more immediate deposit mandates
  • Later: author-driven moves to faster and more permissive access
  • Later: open access is ‘solved’ for books etc.

Full slides from Ben Johnson’s presentation at Bournemouth University’s Open Access Event on the 7th May 2014 are available here internally.

If you would like to deposit your full text articles into BURO you can do this easily via BRIAN, full guidance can be found on the staff intranet pages.