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Come along to the next Fusion Seminar on 22 February!

Fusion

The third event in the Fusion Seminar and Conference Series is on Wednesday 22 February and will focus on the Sharing aspect of the BU2018 strategy.

The February Seminar will take place between 12:00-1:30pm. Registration will open at 11:45 and the sessions will begin at 12:00. There will be one hour of short and focused presentations followed by 30 minutes of networking opportunities over lunch. The Seminar will be hosted by David Willey who will open the seminar with a 10 minute presentation. This will be followed by five brief and succinct presentations by invited speakers, with each presentation lasting no more than ten minutes including questions.

The Seminar will be held in the EBC (7th floor) and will start promptly at 12pm. Please arrive for registration from 11:45am, ready for the 12pm start.

To view the programme and to register your place, visit: http://fusionseminars.eventbrite.com/?ebtv=C

For an excellent summary of BU’s Fusion strategy, watch this short video from Professor John Vinney:

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZrUxINNWzjQ&

Leverhulme Trust visit – 1st February – venue change

Funding opportunities

This is a reminder that Jean Cater from the Leverhulme Trust  is coming to BU on 1st February.

** Venue change!!  The event will now take place in the Allesbrook Lecture Theatre **

 

There are limited places available – if you would like book a place please click here.

What’s happening?

Jean Cater from the LT is coming to BU, and its a great opportunity to find out more about how the Leverhulme works,  what they are looking for in a proposal and what they fund.    

The Leverhulme Trust offers a range of funding opportunities – across all disciplines.   This includes research grants, international networks, early career fellowships, research fellowships and more. 

The session will cover:  

  • where the Leverhulme sits in the funding spectrum
  • schemes and application procedures
  • things to bear in mind if applying
  • plenty of time to ask questions too.  

This session is for you if:

  • you have a research idea and wonder if the Leverhulme Trust might be an appropriate funder
  • you are developing a funding proposal for the Leverhulme Trust
  • you don’t know much about the Leverhulme Trust and would like to find out more

Details:

  • Date:Wednesday, 1st February 2012
  • Time: 2-4pm
  • Place:  Allesbrook Lecture Theatre
  • Refreshments will be available.

** To book your place please click here. ** 

If you have any questions please contact Caroline O’Kane

BU academics win AHRC grant!

Awarded & submitted bids

We heard some excellent news at the end of last week that BU academics Dr Bronwen Thomas and Dr Julia Round, both based in the Media School, have been awarded funding from the AHRC!

The research project, due to start imminently, aims to understand the impact of digital transformations on the reading process. Digital technologies have made it much easier for readers to participate in a wide range of activities around their reading, including connecting with other readers, commenting on a range of texts, and even writing stories themselves.  Online communities and fan forums present researchers with a wealth of data not only on what readers are reading, but how they are reading and engaging with texts. This data is potentially invaluable, especially in a context where reading is supposedly in decline, and where new devices such as ereaders are threatening to supplant the printed book.  This project will investigate the implications of these changes, and how they may potentially benefit a wide range of stakeholders, including those working in education and in the creative industries, as well as academics interested in readers and audiences.  The research will provide insights into emerging forms, practices and epistemologies amongst readers, while also reflecting on the ethical and methodological implications for researchers engaged in this kind of activity.

This is an excellent achievement, congratulations Bronwen and Julia 🙂

Bronwen and Julia’s successful proposal was reviewed internally via our internal peer review scheme (the RPRS) prior to submission, and they also received support from Martin Pickard during one of his grant writing sessions. BU regularly hosts these sessions with Martin – keep an eye on the Blog for the next one to be advertised! It is strongly advised that all research proposals are reviewed via the RPRS prior to submission. See our RPRS webpage or contact Caroline O’Kane for further details.

new from NERC – demand management sanctions

The news is out today:  NERC is considering the introduction of sanctions in a bid to boost low success rates for responsive-mode grants.

NERC will continue to strongly encourage self-regulation for universities. But, current measures for reducing demand, such as limiting re-submissions, is not raising success rates as hoped.  Success rates are currently running at 16 per cent for recent standard grant proposals.

New measures may include:

  • NERC identifitying  institutions with a high number or proportion of unsuccessful submissions, meeting with them and setting targets
  • Sanctions to research organisations if they fail to reduce the number of uncompetitive proposals to agreed targets and timescales
  • Organisations to nominate a ‘designated first point of contact’ for demand management.

NERC says: The overall aim of introducing these measures is to increase success rates in NERC responsive mode schemes year on year for several years. This is likely to be a gradual process, but initial progress is expected to be achieved within two years

How to make sure your application stands the best chance of being funded:

If you are submitting a bid to NERC (or any other funder for that matter) you are strongly encouraged to work with Caroline O’Kane through BU’s internal peer review scheme (Research Proposal Review Service – RPRS). 

You can also check the Blog on a regular basis to see what proposal writing sessions are running at BU.  They are always excellent and well received.   The more people we know about who are planning on submitting a proposal to a funder the better – then we can develop some tailored support to enhance your chances of success.

Click here  to read more about NERC and Demand Management

Click here to learn more our series of blog posts on Demand Management

 

NEW IDEAS FOR KNOWLEDGE TRANSFER

New ideas on how universities can improve knowledge transfer have been proposed following a six months project undertaken by JISC as part of a business and community engagement project.

 The search to find a better model for knowledge transfer stems from one simple practical problem: knowledge transfer is simply too inefficient as a process. The under-exploitation of the intellectual assets arising from universities has been widely reported.

 The new ideas are based on current innovation theory, modern social media tools and current thinking on market behaviour or motivation, to provide a more effective model of Knowledge Transfer; a model that is capable of delivering more with less.

 Recommended is a less proprietorial approach to knowledge transfer, and a new, open, technology-enabled approach which has potentially wide applicability across the sector.

 For more details click here.

The authors highlighted a number structural inefficiencies in current methods of knowledge transfer that manifest themselves in three pinch points that need to be cracked to increase successful knowledge transfer and IP exploitation:

  • · The project selection pinch point
  • · The business development pinch point
  • · The early-stage proof of concept pinch point

Proposed is a new knowledge transfer model based on the feasibility of:

  1. Building a virtual KT organisation that moves beyond the university is more skilled, more scalable and better engaged than physically co-located employees
  2. Funding it on a combination of external and incentivised or intrinsically motivated, resource
  3. Reducing transaction costs via a combination of social media and automation in order to extend the number of opportunities that the university can handle.

For a summary of what is proposed, see presentation on link above. Start the presentation at 26 minutes.

Find collaborators online with citeulike

citeulike is a free service which you can use to store, organize and share papers you are reading. When you see an interesting paper, you can click one button and have it added to your personal library (the citation details are automatically extracted and it works from your web browser so you don’t need to install anything).You can then access your library from any internet related device, as it is stored in an online server.

A real selling point with citeulike I think is the ability to share your library with others and groups, and find out who is reading the same papers as you. Identifying people with similar research interests is a great way to start to network.Another advantage to library sharing is the possibility to discover literature which is relevant to your field but you may not have known about.

citeulike is really intuitive but also has loads of online guides, so why not start having a look now…?

Grant writing workshops for BU Studentship Competition

To assist staff in preparing their applications for the internal PhD funding competition John Wakeford, Director of the Missenden Centre, is coming to BU to deliver 2 one day workshops on 31st January and 1st February.   There are only a small number of spaces remaining on each day so if you would like to come along please register here asap. 

The workshop will run from 9:30am to 4:30pm and it is an excellent chance to pick up some advice from John on bid writing in general as well as honing your application for the studentships.  The first 6 draft applications received by John will be reviewed as part of the day.  A copy of the draft programme of the day is below.

If you have any queries about the day please contact Susan Dowdle.

Draft programme

 9.15                Coffee and Registration

 9.30                Institutional context – information on the studentships and the support of the Graduate School. Questions.

                                    Prof Tiantian Zhang – new Head of Graduate School

                                    Dr Fiona Knight – Graduate School Manager

 10.00              Agenda sharing (participant introductions and identifying concerns and priorities to be covered).

 10.30              Introduction – National policy and recent developments. Questions and discussion.

 10.45              Coffee break

11.00              Reviewing good research bid.  Teams act as reviewers and prepare outline of comments.  Plenary feedback from John Wakeford and teams.

 12.00              What to do before applying.

 12.30              Lunch.  Groups discuss bidding narrative.

 13.15              Plenary discussion of points arising from narrative.

 13.30              Advising colleagues on draft applications.  Teams act as critical colleagues and prepare advice on drafts direct at different agencies.  Plenary feedback.     Questions and discussion.

 14.30              Coffee break

 14.45              Writing a good application.

 15.30              Reflecting after having an application turned down.

 16.00              Action planning: individual participants draw up plans for progressing own research.  Participants make suggestions to the university to help those bidding for funds.

 16.25              Evaluation

 16.30              Close

Knowledge Exchange Funding Opportunities

Funding opportunities

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

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

The next call will open on 14 December 2011 and close at 16.00 on 7 February 2012. 

Applicants can apply for projects up to one year in duration. However, the proposed start date should be no earlier than 1 September 2012.

The aim is to inform applicants of a decision on all applications within 26 weeks of the closing date for the call.

Please note, from the next KE call the Knowledge Exchange Opportunities and Follow on Fund Schemes will be amalgamated into a single funding opportunity (funded at 80 per cent fEC). Applications can still follow on from previous research, however an important change will be the requirement for all applications to involve co-funding from user stakeholders.

Call documents, including the scheme guidance can be found at:

http://www.esrc.ac.uk/funding-and-guidance/collaboration/knowledge-exchange/opportunities/index.aspx

Using QR Codes in Higher Education workshop – Tuesday 31 January

David Hopkins and Milena Bobeva in The Business School will be running a workshop on experiences and good practice in the use of QR codes within higher education on Tuesday 31 January.

QR Codes, the 2D bar codes, are becoming the new norm for businesses to reach their customers and provide a fast user-friendly way to access relevant content online through the use of mobile technology.

The workshop is suitable for both people who are new to the QR-concept and those who have substantial experience and would like to build a network to extend the use of QR Codes in education through collaboration in joint projects.

David and Milena will be joined by other QR experts such as Andy Ramsden, of the University Campus Suffolk, to discuss the challenges and good practice in using the codes effectively. 

Find out more online on the workshop webpage and reserve your free ticket here.  

University KTP put forward for Best Partnership Award 2012

Knowledge Transfer Partnerships (KTP) is Europe’s leading programme helping businesses to improve their competitiveness and productivity through the better use of knowledge, technology and skills that reside within the UK knowledge base. 

The KTP programme provides a Government grant to fund joint projects between businesses and universities.

A KTP between the company, Electronic Technicians Limited, based in Ferndown, and the School of Design, Engineering and Computing at Bournemouth University has been selected by the Technology Strategy Board (TSB) to be eligible to be nominated for the KTP Best Partnership Award in 2012. The best partnerships will be selected for England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, and each of these ‘finalists’ will go forward for consideration at the national level for the Best UK Partnership Award.

This is a significant achievement for the University. Out of approximately 1000 KTPs, only 270 are selected to enter the next round from which the Best KTP is chosen.

The KTP, undertaken on behalf of the University by Clive Hunt, Tim Reynolds and Gary Prior (Associate), involved transferring knowledge to the Company on improving its manufacturing business processes.  The exercise of reviewing those processes led to the major savings which enabled the Company to grow significantly in a declining market.

The Project gave the University a valuable insight into the challenges faced by local industry during a period of economic uncertainty. It also enabled the University to develop a significant range of new teaching materials and enhanced the relationships between business and the University.

We wish the Partnership every success in reaching the next round.  The award will be made at a TSB event to be held in the autumn of 2012.

If you require any further information on KTPs in general click here 

or contact Peter Delgado, Commercialisation and KTP Officer,.

BU’s Sarah Bate talks about developmental prosopagnosia at Birkbeck College

In September 2011 BU’s Dr Sarah Bate was invited to talk at a Face-Blindness Open Day at Birkbeck College.  The event was attended by people with prosopagnosia (face blindness) from all over the world and the media.  The other keynote speakers were big names in the face processing world: Brad Duchaine (Dartmouth College), Tim Valentine (Goldsmiths) and Martin Eimer (Birkbeck).

You can watch an excellent video of Sarah’s presentation here:

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WdCMj7Yp6CU&feature=related

PGR students – sign up to the BU Research Themes!

BU Challenges, PG research

The BU Research Themes were launched in December at the first of the BU-wide Fusion events. The Themes are societally-led, encourage cross-School working and collaboration, and will be the main vehicle through which BU research is presented externally in future.

We’re now encouraging postgraduate research students to sign up to one or more of the Themes! This is a great way to get involved in the BU research environment and to meet other academics and students from across the University.

There are eight BU Research Themes:

  • Creative & Digital Economies
  • Culture & Society
  • Entrepreneurship & Economic Growth
  • Environmental Change & Biodiversity
  • Green Economy & Sustainability
  • Health, Wellbeing & Aging
  • Leisure & Recreation
  • Technology & Design

If you would like to join one or more of the Themes, then complete the form below and I will add you to the list.

    Your Name (required)

    Your Email (required)

    Your School / Professional Service (required)

    Staff or PGR student? (required)

    StaffPGR

    Please select the themes that you are interested in (required)

    Bournemouth University Clinical Research Unit (BUCRU) Consultancy Service

    What is the Consultancy Service?

    BUCRU has developed a consultancy service aimed at organisations that have an interest in health and wellbeing. Members of the team have many years experience of providing consultation services to the NHS, public bodies, charities and businesses. In addition to research projects we can also advise on audit projects, clinical evaluations, service evaluations and other areas where the collection and analysis of good quality data is important.

    How can it help?

    The service is flexible and tailored to the client’s requirements. Typically an initial meeting will involve finding out about the client’s needs and discussing the ways in which we can help. Our involvement could range from a single meeting to discuss a particular issue, through to conducting a project on behalf of the client.

    Some examples are:

    ¨                  Advising on or conducting clinical trials, surveys, epidemiological studies, pilot and feasibility studies

    ¨                  Study design

    ¨                  Advice on sample size

    ¨                  Questionnaire design and validation

    ¨                  Outcome measures

    ¨                  Data collection and management

    ¨                  Statistical analysis and interpretation

    ¨                  Qualitative and mixed methods approaches

    ¨                  Design and evaluation of complex interventions such as found in medicine, psychology, nursing, physiotherapy and so on.

    ¨                  Managing and running studies

    ¨                  Advice on ethics and governance approval processes.

    ¨                  Involving patients and the public in research

    ¨                  Troubleshooting

    How do I find out more?

    For further information about, and access to, our consultancy service please contact:

    Louise Ward (administrator):

    Bournemouth University Clinical Research Unit

    R505 Royal London House

    Christchurch Road

    Bournemouth BH1 3LT

    BUCRU@bournemouth.ac.uk

    Tel: 01202 961939

    http://blogs.bournemouth.ac.uk/bucru/

    Research within the Bournemouth University Clinical Research Unit (BUCRU)

    Funding opportunities

    In previous blogs we have described how BUCRU can help in developing grant applications. In this blog we describe some of the funded projects we are involved in.

    BUCRU led research

    Fatigue management in multiple sclerosis (MS):  We have just completed a multi-centre randomised trial of a cognitive behavioural approach to fatigue management in people with multiple sclerosis1. This project was funded by the MS Society (http://www.mssociety.org.uk).

    Improving activity and wellbeing in people with MS: We are just starting a MS Society funded pilot study to look at the Nintendo Wii home gaming system as a method of helping people with MS increase their activity levels and wellbeing.

    Systematic review of psychological interventions for people with MS: A small grant to update our existing Cochrane review2

    BUCRU collaborative projects

    IDvIP: A National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Research for Patient Benefit (RfPB) (http://www.ccf.nihr.ac.uk/RfPB/Pages/home.aspx) funded project. This is a multi-centre trial comparing 2 methods of pain relief for women in labour; diamorphine and pethidine3. The Chief Investigator is a Consultant in one of the local hospitals and a member of the Bournemouth University Visiting Faculty. BUCRU staff were involved in the design of the study, applying for the grant, data management, statistical analysis and interpretation, and advice on project management.*

    WEIGHTED: A small grant from the College of Emergency Medicine held by a local Consultant/ member of the Visiting Faculty. This study is about to start and aims to develop a robust method of estimating the weight of patients attending a hospital emergency department. Many patients require a weight dependent dose of potentially life saving medication, but are too ill to be actually weighed.  BUCRU were involved in designing the study and securing funding, and will be involved in ongoing advice on project and data management, statistical analysis and interpretation.

    PEARLS: A large multi-centre trial of training maternity staff in assessing and repairing tears to the perineum acquired during labour and delievery4. This project is funded by the Health Foundation (http://www.health.org.uk) and run under the auspices of the Royal College of Midwives. BUCRU has been involved in data management, statistical analysis and interpretation.

    PREVIEW: A pilot randomised trial comparing two methods of looking after tears to the perineum. The Chief Investigator is based in Birmingham, and the study is funded by the NIHR RfPB funding scheme. This study has recently started, and BUCRU was involved in the design of the study and the funding application. Further involvement will be in advising on project management, data management and statistical analysis.

    Clinical Doctoral Research Fellowship: (http://www.nihrtcc.nhs.uk). Award held by BU and won by a radiographer based at the Anglo-European College of Chiropractic. The project involves tracking and measuring spinal motion. The research may have important implications in diagnosing people with chronic lower back pain. BUCRU were involved in the study design and funding application, and 2 members of staff are supervisors for her PhD.

    Contact us:

    In the first instance please contact

    Louise Ward (administrator):

    Bournemouth University Clinical Research Unit

    R505 Royal London House

    Christchurch Road

    Bournemouth BH1 3LT

    BUCRU@bournemouth.ac.uk

    Tel: 01202 961939

     http://blogs.bournemouth.ac.uk/bucru/

    1 Thomas, P.W., Thomas, S., Kersten, P., Jones, R., Nock, A., Slingsby, V., et al., 2010. Multi-centre parallel arm randomised controlled trial to assess the effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of a group-based cognitive behavioural appoach to managing fatigue in people with multiple sclerosis. BMC Neurology, 10:43

    2 Thomas, P.W., Thomas, S., Hillier, C., Galvin, K., and Baker, R. (2006). Psychological interventions for multiple sclerosis. The Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews (Vol. Issue 1, pp. Issue 1. Art. No.: CD004431. DOI: 10.1002/14651858.CD004431.pub2): John Wiley and Sons, Ltd.

    3 Wee, M.Y.K., Tuckey, J.P., Thomas, P., Burnard, S. 2011. The IDvIP Trial: A two-centre randomized double-blind controlled trial comparing intramuscular diamorphine and intramuscular pethidine for labour analgesia. BMC Pregnancy and Childbirth, 11: 51

    4 Bick, D.E., Kettle, C., MacDonald, S., Thomas, P.W., Hill, R.K., Ismail, K.. 2010. PErineal Assessment and Repair Longitudinal Study (PEARLS): protocol for a matched pair cluster trial. BMC Pregnancy and Childbirth, 10:10.

    New round of the Research Development Fund – large grants scheme – now open!

    Funding opportunities

    This week BU is proud to launch a new round of the BU Research Development Fund (large collaborative grants scheme)!

    The deadline for applications to have been received by the RDU is: Friday 17 February 2012

    The Fund is open to BU academics and will provide selective support to research initiatives considered to be of strategic importance to BU. This call is for the Large Collaborative Grants Scheme (up to £25k per annum, must include two or more Schools). The Small Grants Scheme is also currently open with a closing date of 28 February – further details are available here:

    The RDF – Large Collaborative Grants Scheme aims to provide funding for the development of large-scale, complex, inter/multi-disciplinary collaborative research activities leading to external funding. Applications must involve academic staff from at least two BU Schools. Priority will be given to applications that meet the following criteria:

    • In line with BU’s emerging Research Themes
    • Include external organizations (particularly SMEs and/or international organizations)
    • In line with the strategic priorities of major funding bodies (such as the UK research councils, European Commission, etc)
    • Clearly beneficial to BU’s submission to REF2014

    Examples of research activities covered by the RDF include:

    • Pilot projects
    • Pump-priming
    • Meeting expenses
    • Travel to proposed collaborators
    • Attendance at external networking events with the aim of expanding the network
    • Preparation of specialist material or data
    • Short-term Research Assistant support or replacement teaching
    • Consumables and equipment (providing it is clear these would not normally be purchased by the School)
    • Fees for external proposal support and review

    Awards will only cover direct costs (i.e. overheads and established staff costs will not be reimbursed). Applications need to include a precise breakdown of costs calculated using full economic costing (fEC) methodology – this will be calculated for you by the RKE Operations team.

    For further information please read the Research Development Fund policy – Large Grant Round 2.

    To apply for a Large Collaborative Research Grant, please complete the RDF Large Grant application form.

    TSB Planning to increase number of KTPs

    KTP diagramEstablished in 1975, Knowledge Transfer Partnerships (KTP) is one of the world’s leading knowledge transfer mechanisms, which provides academics with the unique opportunity to apply their knowledge and expertise to important problems facing businesses. The programme provides Government grants to fund joint projects with business or third sector organisations lasting from 6 months to 3 years.

    Following the Government’s Comprehensive Spending Review, the budget for new KTPs was reduced to £25m per annum. While this is sufficient to fund between 600 and 800  KTPs per annum, the Technology Strategy Board (TSB) is seeking other ways of funding additional KTPs. At a meeting between a number of universities, including Bournemouth University, and the TSB held on the 17th January, Debbie Buckley-Golder, the TSB’s Head of Knowledge Exchange said this additional funding is being sought from major charities and industry. While the £25m core funding will continue to be available on an any time, any topic basis, the new funding is likely to be targeted at particular subject areas with set response timescales.   Subject areas will driven by business needs and are likely to be published in March 2012.

    The current success rates for KTP applications is above 80%, however, the grant rate for multiple KTPs from the same company is likely to be reduced. Due to the significantly larger impact, most KTPs (75%) will be granted for projects with Small Medium Enterprises (SMEs). However, to facilitate the continued involvement of large organisations, the TSB are investigating a reduced grant rate KTP where the organisation will fund most of the project but continue to receive support from the TSB, for example KTP Advisers and associate training.

    Bournemouth University has been very successful in assisting businesses through the KTP programme, see article on this link.

    If you require any further information on this meeting or KTPs in general please contact Peter Delgado, Commercialisation and KTP Officer, e-mail Peter Delgado.