Further details and how to apply can be found here.
Individuals to complete application form, including 2 supporting statements from a co-supervisor and a PGR.
Individuals to submit application to the Doctoral College by Monday 19 June 2023, including email support from your Deputy Dean for Research & Professional Practice
Doctoral College to submit applications to UKCGE by Friday 23 June 2023
UKCGE to review application and feedback to individuals.
In line with the UKCGE guidance, individuals should send their completed application to the Doctoral College (fknight@bournemouth.ac.uk) before the BU Window Closing date below:
BU Window Closes
UKCGE Window Closes
Expected Outcome
19 June 2023
23 June 2023
September 2023
Book here to attend the Supervisory Lunchbite on Wednesday 10 May 2023 for support about the application process!
Join Cafe Scientifique next Tuesday 4th April at the Black Cherry Cafe, Boscombe.
At Café Scientifique, you can explore the latest ideas in science and technology in a relaxed setting. Enjoy listening to a short talk before engaging in debate and discussion with our guest speaker and audience.
We’ll be joined by Professor Lee Miles and Martin Travers on Tuesday 4 April from 6:30 – 8:00pm.
African countries are increasingly vulnerable to disasters of all kinds and must urgently enhance their abilities and capacities to deal with these hazards. Join us to learn how social science research could help improve disaster management in Africa using innovative Single Points of Failure approaches and partnerships with local stakeholders. We’ll hear how African countries have embraced new technology and how disaster management can even take place over WhatsApp!
We will welcome two speakers; Lee Miles, Professor of Crisis and Disaster Management at Bournemouth University and Martin Travers, a highly experienced practitioner who has worked in Sierra Leone, to hear both academic and practical perspectives.
This event will be held at The Black Cherry in Boscombe, Bournemouth. Although the talk starts at 6:30pm, the café will be open early so we encourage you to arrive early for a drink and a bite to eat before the talk starts.
At BU, we are proud of our commitment to equality, diversity and inclusion, and to improving the staff experience for all colleagues. We would like your feedback to help us progress our work in this area.
The Athena SWAN charter is an initiative run by AdvanceHE. It is a framework to support and transform gender equality within higher education (HE) and research. We are proud to have an institutional Athena SWAN bronze award and of our five departments, who hold departmental bronze SWAN awards.
To inform our ongoing programme of gender equality work and future submissions for Athena SWAN awards, we want to hear your views on the inclusiveness of our culture. Your responses will help us to identify good practice, as well as areas for development. Please complete our survey by 23.59 on Friday 31 March.
The survey will take 10 minutes to complete. It is open to all BU colleagues and we want to encourage everyone to take the time to share your feedback with us. This will help us get the best understanding possible of what is working well and what we need to address to continue to support all genders of our community equally. The survey refers to gender in broad and inclusive terms, encompassing those who identify as women, men or non-binary. All responses will be anonymous and no data will be used to identify individuals.
If you are a line manager, please encourage your team to complete the survey, so that we get as many responses as possible. Thank you.
PRES will launch on Monday 17 April 2023 for postgraduate research (PGR) students to complete.
Look out for an email from the University containing your unique link to the survey.
We are keen to make sure our PGRs have the best possible experience while studying with us. To do this, we need to know what you think works well and what as a University we could do better. This is your chance to tell us about your experience as a PGR at Bournemouth University. We also kindly ask that all supervisors encourage their PGRs to participate in the survey.
This year the survey will open on Monday 17 April 2023 and close on Monday 15 May 2023. Upon completing the survey, PGRs will be entered into a free prize draw where you can win one of four prizes of a £50 Love2shop gift voucher. Terms and conditions apply.
In addition, and as thank you for taking part, we will be making a £1 donation for every survey completed to the student mental health wellbeing charity, Student Minds.
How do I take part?
PGRs will receive an email from the University on Monday 17 April 2023 containing a unique link which will allow you to access and complete the survey. If you can’t find this email, contact PRES@bournemouth.ac.uk and we’ll help you to get access.
What will I be asked?
The survey will take around 15 minutes to complete. Your response is confidential, and any reporting will be entirely anonymous. The survey is your chance to tell us about your experience as a PGR at BU. It will ask you to share your views on supervision, resources, research culture, community, progress and assessment, responsibilities, support, research skills, profession development, opportunities, and overall experience.
Why should I take part?
Your feedback is important. The Postgraduate Research Experience Survey is the only national survey of PGRs and so is the only way for us to compare how we are doing with other institutions and to make changes that will improve your experience in the future.
More information
If you would like to know more about the survey, please visit: PRES 2023
We hope you take the opportunity to get involved this year and help us make improvements to your experience.
Dr Tara Zaksaite shares her experience of presenting at BU’s Cafe Scientifique on Tuesday 7 March.
My research
The research I presented as part of the Café Scientifique was on spatial memory. Spatial memory refers to our ability to remember where things are, for example remembering where you have put down your keys, or where you have met a friend. Interestingly, our spatial memory is affected by the emotional nature of information to be remembered. Research has found that emotional items, compared with neutral items, tend to be remembered better. However, these studies have mostly asked people to remember sets made-up of all neutral, all negative, or all positive items. In my research, I found when I intermixed items of different emotional valence, emotional items (both positive or negative) appeared to be remembered better than neutral items. There was also evidence of people using emotional information as a category to aid memory. The categorical effect was replicated, including with non-emotional categorical items (gender).
My Café Scientifique experience
I wanted to participate in Café Scientifique because I am passionate about public engagement in research. I acknowledge that there is a big gap in the way that we communicate research findings within academia and to the public, and I would like to contribute to narrowing this gap. I have also done public engagement events in the past and have thoroughly enjoyed them.
“I found that in general people tend to be enthusiastic about research, and that enthusiasm has rekindled my own enthusiasm for my research.”
I prepared for the event by thoroughly simplifying one of my conference presentations. This involved adding images to explain every step of the research, identifying key terms and how to best explain them, and only presenting information that was essential to understanding the research itself. I practiced the presentation several times to make sure I was comfortable delivering it, and adjusted it almost every time I practiced it, to make sure I did not skip any information, went too fast over it, or assumed any expertise on behalf of the audience.
I thought that the talk went very well. I was greeted by Adam and George who were very friendly and welcoming, putting me at ease. I liked the format of the event too: firstly, 30-40 minutes for a talk is very generous and more than most regular conference presentations. Then, after the talk there was a break, which was a good way to catch my breath and relax a little. After this, there was the question portion of the evening. I admit I was a little nervous about the questions at first. However, the atmosphere was very nice and everyone in the audience was really friendly. I got asked interesting questions which led to some interesting discussions and useful suggestions for future research, as well as additional insight into the research.
Overall, I am very grateful for this opportunity to share my research with others, and to remind myself that this research is interesting and valuable. I am really thankful for the team organising these events and to everyone who came to listen. I hope there will be an opportunity to participate in Café Scientifique again in the future. If you are a researcher would like to present your research to the public, I would highly recommend this event – both for those who are new at public engagement and for those who have done events before.
Cafe Scientifique is a place where anyone can come to explore the latest ideas in science and technology. We’ve been holding these talks in Bournemouth for over ten years and are currently at The Black Cherry, a fantastic venue in Boscombe, Bournemouth.
These Cafe Scientifique events are organised by the Research Excellence Team, in RDS. If you would like to take part in a future Cafe Scientifique, please complete our expression of interest form and we will be in touch if we think you’ll fit the bill.
After a short break, the research process seminar series is back, with a seminar almost every week between now and mid June. Unlike other seminar series’ that often showcase the findings and outcomes of research, we pay attention to the process of research: the methods, the challenges, the successes and failures and the reflections we collect along the way.
Today we are delighted to welcome an external speaker, Rainer Freudenthaler (Universität Mannheim), who is talking about automated content analysis using machine learning
This session will focus on measuring explicit and implicit bias and implicit racism in ethnic minority reporting. We use semi-supervised machine learning to distinguish explicit and implicit stigmatization of ethnic and religious groups in German journalistic coverage (n = 697,913 articles). The talk will engage with how we validate the method, what the strengths and weaknesses of the method are, etc.
The NIHR is seeking to appoint members to their Health and Social Care Delivery Research (HSDR) Programme and Health Technology Assessment (HTA) Programme committees as Committee Member Development Scheme (CMDS) Participants. They are one year development opportunities are for nurses and midwives currently at Band 6 or above, or in an equivalent academic role who have a good understanding and experience of front-line health and care practice. Read more information here.
This month’s Webinar welcomes Bels Wathen from HealthBus. The HealthBus Trust is a charity that provides accessible and appropriate healthcare to people experiencing homelessness in Bournemouth and the surrounding areas. The Trust operates a mobile, GP-led service in close relationship with a multidisciplinary team and other providers of homeless services.
Bels will share details about the HealthBus Trust, and her involvement in coordinating volunteers, managing projects and supporting the clinical team by taking the mobile clinic to designated sites across Bournemouth
Community voices is a collaboration between BU PIER partnership and Centre for Seldom Heard Voices to provide a platform and a voice to local community activists.
For more than a century, the BBC has been a fixture of British cultural life. However, few people are aware of the key role played by women in its earliest days.
The next event in our online public lecture series will showcase the pioneering women of the BBC – from female producers through to the engineers, broadcasters and managers who carried the BBC through the Second World War and beyond.
The free event will take place online from 7pm – 8.30pm on Thursday 23 March.
Dr Kate Terkanian and Dr Kate Murphy – from the Faculty of Media and Communication – will share stories uncovered by their research into women in the BBC, from the 1920s up to the 1950s.
There will also be the opportunity for audience questions.
The event takes place during Women’s History Month, which this year is celebrating ‘The Women Who Tell Our Stories’, encouraging recognition of women, past and present, who have been active in all forms of media and storytelling.
It is the third event in BU’s 2022/23 online public lecture series, which showcases our research and expertise across key areas. The first lecture series attracted more than 1,000 attendees from across the world.
I’m currently seeking PhD students in Science and Technology AND Arts and Humanities disciplines to participate in a research study exploring positive research cultures for PGRs.
I’m interested in PhD student experience, your thoughts on what makes a positive research culture and giving PGRs a voice. Participants must be PhD students, at BU, who started at least 6 months ago.
You will be invited to an online interview which will take approximately 45 minutes.
Participation is voluntary and any involvement will remain anonymous.
This work is part of my PhD and not my role in the Doctoral College.
Since the introduction of the new electronic ITB form on 24 January 2022, there have been incremental updates and the current e-ITB form is now available.
The e-ITB form continues to give a better user experience, creates a more efficient administrative control process for Research Development and Support (RDS) and provides accurate reporting outcomes for management.
Updated ITB form: The Intention to Bid (ITB) form and the updated Research Costings Request Sheet are both available now in the Policies & Procedures/Research/Pre-award section of the intranet under Research > Pre-award. Please complete the Research Costings Request Sheet and attach it to the e-ITB form for completion. PDF copies of all submissions can be printed or saved but there are limitations to editing a form once it has been submitted.
Please send RDS the completed e-ITB form and Costing Request Sheet by the latest 4 weeks before the deadline.
Bid Enquiry Process: If you have more than 4 weeks to the submission deadline and need advice or support regarding a bid, please access the same form link and select ‘Enquiry/Advice on Bidding’. This ensures that the pre-award team will see your Enquiry, rather than emailing a sole officer who may not be available at the time.
As a service, RDS is committed to delivering service excellence to enable BU’s academic community to deliver and grow world-leading research for societal benefit. The program of work continues to look at processes to enhance the user experience.
Changes include improvements to the pre- and post-award support being offered. Building on the delivery of a new Principal Investigator report which is currently in the final stages of being rolled out, and continuing our collaboration with the Transformation Team.
Rabeea is a 2nd year PhD student who is based in the Department of Medical Sciences and Public Health. As a part of her PhD, her systematic review on the association between traumatic Injuries and HRV has recently been published as an open access research in PloS One.
It is the first systematic review to provide evidence on the relationship between non-acute traumatic injuries and Heart Rate Variability (RMSSD, SDNN and LF/HF) ratio. This also highlights paucity of evidence and calls for further research in the field, especially in the Military research- the focus of Rabeea’s PhD.
The co-authors on this paper are Rabeea’ supervisors: Prof. Ahmed Khattab (MSPH, BU), Prof. Christopher Boos (Department of Cardiology, UHD), and Prof. Alex N Bennett (DMRC, Stanford Hall).
Expressions of interest invited for Chair and Deputy Chairs of BU’s Research Funding Panels
***DEADLINE EXTENDED TO 14th APRIL 2023***
We are seeking expressions of interest (EoIs) for Chair and Deputy Chair of the new funding panels:
Studentship Funding Panel
Research Development Funding Panel
Knowledge Exchange & Innovation Funding Panel
Applications from underrepresented groups (women, minority ethnic, declared disability) are particularly welcome.
What are the Research Funding Panels?
These are the new, agile and responsive way that internal funds for projects that support Doctoral Studentships, Research Development, and Knowledge Exchange and Innovation will be managed at BU from August 2023.
Why should I apply to be a Chair or Deputy Chair? What’s in it for me?
Being a Chair or Deputy Chair of a funding panel means that you are involved in making important decisions about applications for funding. This means you need to be able to evaluate applications fairly and be able to express your thoughts about them effectively in meetings and via feedback. You will be directly involved in the process and therefore helping to ensure that internal funding at BU is used for projects that will have real world impact. It’s also a great opportunity to engage with colleagues from across the faculties.
Chair and Deputy Chair further information:
Eligibility is as follows: EoIs from full members of the Professoriate for the posts of Chair and from Associate Professors and Professors for the posts of Deputy Chair.
These posts are very important to the running of the panels you will be chairing meetings, ensuring that decision-making is fair and robust. As such, we require applicants to these posts to have some experience of chairing meetings, sound knowledge of the panels area and a keen desire to lead the research and knowledge exchange agenda across the university. There won’t be huge demands on your time, but you will be required to read and review multiple applications and there will be occasions when you may need to respond swiftly to requests to amend uses of funds.
Sounds like it could be interesting. How do I apply?
EoIs for the Chair or Deputy Chair roles should consist of a case (maximum length of one page) outlining your suitability for the role. Please outline your experience, your understanding of agenda and anything else you feel relevant.
These should be submitted to the relevant panel mailbox by the deadline of 4.30pm 14th April 2023. Please ensure your EoI clearly states whether you are applying for the Chair or Deputy Chair position.
Buhalis, D. and Chan, J. (2023), Traveling with pets: designing hospitality services for pet owners/parents and hotel guests, International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management, Vol.34. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJCHM-10-2022-1192
Pet-friendly hotels are growing rapidly. The prevalence of pet adoption has largely resulted from loneliness due to social distancing that happened during the Coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic. Many hotels around the world aim to become pet-friendly to satisfy the growing demand. Hoteliers believe that the popularity of pet-friendly hotels will continue, as pet owners often treat pets as their kids. This study aims to investigate how pet-friendly hotels need to design and manage pet-friendly services and policies. Using grounded theory methodology, this research conducts interviews with 25 pet-friendly hotel managers from Hong Kong (HK). The study includes hotels from different hotel categories and classifications. It examines the conceptualization of pet-friendly service design, drawing on a service blueprint. Building on the service marketing and service blueprint literature, this research provides a synthesis that reflects how pet-friendly hotels can serve both guests with and without pets.
The findings reveal that pet-owner’s service expectations are formed on anthropomorphism, that is, an inclination to attribute human features to non-human entities. Hotel managers and those with pets personally understand better how pet-friendly service can be adapted to meet the expectations and requirements of pet owners while accommodating guests without pets. The market for pet-friendly hospitality is growing, with high-profit potential from pet owners who are willing to spend generously. Data were collected from selected pet-friendly hotels in HK through interviews with pet-friendly service providers. The research is qualitative and exploratory in nature. It aims to explore and examine the multilevel pet-friendly hospitality service design from a managerial perspective. This research enriches the literature on anthropomorphism theory, the design of pet-friendly services and the application of service blueprint. The research offers explicit suggestions for the design of pet-friendly hospitality services. A pet-friendly hotel service blueprint is developed. This can help managers to develop essential pet-friendly policies and service collaborations between internal departments and with external specialist organizations, maximizing the value for all stakeholders. The study explores a rapidly emerging market and scrutinizes its specific design requirements. It extends theoretical insights by enriching the anthropomorphism theory and broadening the conceptualizations of service blueprint based on anthropomorphism theory.
It’s sometimes difficult to imagine how the planet we call home, with its megalopolis cities and serene farmlands, was once dominated by dinosaurs as big as buses and five-storey buildings. But recent research has helped deepen our understanding of why dinosaurs prevailed: the answer may lie in their special bones, structured like Aero chocolate.
Brazilian palaeontologist Tito Aureliano found that hollow bones filled with little air sacs were so important to dinosaur survival, they evolved independently several times in different lineages.
According to the study, aerated bones evolved in three separate lineages: pterosaurs, technically flying reptiles, and two dinosaur lineages theropods (ranging from the crow-sized Microraptor to the huge Tyrannosaurus rex) and sauropodomorphs (long-necked herbivores including Brachiosaurus). The researchers focused on the late Triassic period, roughly 233 million years ago, in south Brazil.
Hollow dinosaur bones, structured a bit like this chocolate, proved to be a major advantage. Kev Gregory/Shutterstock
Every time an animal reproduces, evolution throws up random variants in genetic code. Some of these variants are passed on to offspring and develop over time.
Charles Darwin believed evolution created “endless forms most beautiful”. But some adaptations emerge spontaneously time and time again, a bit like getting the same hand of cards on multiple occasions. When the same hand keeps cropping up, it’s a sign that evolution has hit upon an important and effective solution.
The variant the Brazilian team studied was aerated vertebrae bones, which would have enhanced the dinosaurs’ strength and reduced their body weight.
Light but mighty
Your regular deliveries from Amazon or other online retailers come packed in corrugated cardboard, which has the same advantages as aerated bones. It is light, yet tough.
Corrugated cardboard or as it was first known, pleated paper, was a man-made design experiment that was hugely successful and is now part of our everyday lives. It was patented in England in 1856 and was initially designed to support top hats which were popular in Victorian England and the US at the time.
Three years later, Darwin published his On the Origin of Species which outlined how evolutionary traits that create advantages are more likely to be passed on to future generations than variants which don’t.
CT scan technology allowed Aureliano and his colleagues to peer inside the rock-hard fossils they studied. Without the modern technology, it would have been impossible to look inside the fossils and detect the air sacs in the spinal columns.
The study found no common ancestor had this trait. All three groups must have developed air sacs independently, and each time in slightly different ways.
The air sacs probably enhanced oxygen levels in the dinosaurs’ blood. The Triassic period had a scorching hot and dry climate. So more oxygen circulating in the blood would cool dinosaur bodies more efficiently. It would also allow them to mover faster.
The air sacs would have buttressed and reinforced the internal structure of the dinosaurs’ bones while creating a greater surface area of attachments for large, powerful muscles. This would have enabled the bones to grow to a far larger size without weighing the animal down.
In living birds aerated bones reduce overall mass and volume, while enhancing bone strength and stiffness – essential features for flight.
Palaeontology not only tells the story of what might have been for Earth, had it not been for that infamous asteroid, but also helps us learn about the evolution of still living creatures.
Prehistoric connections
Echoes of this dinosaur legacy lie in many animals alive today. It is not only long-dead animals which found this type of adaptation useful. Many bird species living today rely on hollow bones to fly. Others animals use the air sacs to buttress and strengthen their large bones and skulls, without weighing them down.
An excellent example of this is the elephant skull. Inside elephant skulls are large air sacs which allow the animal to move its massive head and heavy tusks without straining the neck muscles.
The human brain is also protected by two layers of hard, compact, bone (inner and outer tables) which sandwich a layer of softer, spongey and aerated bone in between, known as the diploe. This allows our skulls to be light, but strong and able to absorb shocks to cranium.
These are examples of convergent evolution in which animals are faced repeatedly with the same problem, evolving similar – but not always identical – solutions each time. Animals today are playing by the same evolutionary playbook as the dinosaurs.
We are delighted to inform you that BU is launching the Bournemouth University Culture, Employment, and Development in Academic Research survey (CEDARS). It runs from today Monday 20th March 2023 to Friday 21st April2023 and is open to all staff who are research active.
What is it? – a UK survey that explores the views and experiences of researchers and those supporting them across UK higher education institutes.
Who can complete it? Anyone who is research active at BU (especially researchers/principal investigators).
Why is it important? Because this is an opportunity to share your experiences and idea- and to influence the research culture, BU policies, and initiatives.
SETS research seminars aim at reflecting with critical instruments and theories on socio-ecological transformations in times of crisis – with a special focus on everyday life and the sphere of social and ecological reproduction. In particular, SETS aim at eliciting reflection on the different practices and “fields” where struggles and transformative action take place. The seminars are open to a diverse audience, including academics, students, practitioners, social movements, and non-specialist public.
Erinch will present “Doughnut design for business: redesigning businesses through Doughnut Economics”.
His presentation will tackle the question: how can we rethink and transform the deep design of business – its purpose and networks, how it is governed and owned?
May 24th
Alf Hornborg, Professor of Human Ecology at Lund University
Alf will deliver the talk “Unpacking the Black Box of Energy Technology”.
His presentation will tackle the question: what are the cultural assumptions constraining human approaches to economics, technology, and ecology?
All sessions are held online, using Zoom, and start at 3 pm (UK time)
A recent study of 43 journals in the global health field found that PLOS Global Public Health has the joint highest diversity index, whilst also recording the maximum geographic diversity score! [1] The paper by a team from Pakistan and Canada addressed the question: “What is the current state of ethics of diversity and representation in global health publications?” In order to be able to answer this question they developed their own Journal Diversity Index (JDI) to measure three parameters of diversity and representation, namely gender, geographic & socioeconomic status.
The fact that PLOS Global Public Health came out top is good news for the Centre for Midwifery, Maternal & Perinatal Health (CMMPH) as we published a paper in this journal last month. [2] Our qualitative paper ‘Perceptions around COVID-19 and vaccine hesitancy: A qualitative study in Kaski district, Western Nepal’ comprises 19 interviews in the city of Pokhara and its surrounding rural areas.