Category / EU

The advantages of winning EU funding: BU’s Sherry Jeary shares her experiences

“I spent the first three months of this year sitting in REC, a software engineering company  in Wroclaw, Poland doing the job of a Software Engineer. So what is unusual about that? I am a Senior Lecturer in Software Engineering and have, for the first time in my career, had complete immersion in a company doing the subject I research, talk to students about, enthuse with colleagues about and generally bore my outside friends about. As part of the INFER project headed up by Bogdan Gabrys which is creating a complex, predictive, adaptive system, I have had an opportunity that rarely comes an academics way. I got to live in Wroclaw, had fun getting about in a beautiful part of Poland and really enjoyed being among the Polish people. ( I would also recommend the Bison grass Vodka J).

As a result I have already written a conference paper and had it accepted whilst a journal paper will follow. I will have two very useful case studies which I can discuss with colleagues and have learnt a great deal about the processes involved in the company (my particular research interest). I am advising the company on the ways that they can improve what they are doing – so it is a two way thing. Finally, as a result of the project my network has expanded considerably with both academics and industrialists.  I can see how I may need change my teaching strategy to respond to what is happening in the real world and I am well placed to consider applying for funding with my company colleagues in the future to continue the work I have started.

At a recent meeting discussing our strategy for BU’s engagement with Europe,  I was surprised to hear that many academics were either not interested or were nervous of starting out in the EU. I agreed to write about my current journey. If you work at BU and want to find out more, let me know. I am happy to help.”

Fuel Cell and Hydrogen Call for Proposals launched

The Call has a budget of 109M€ and a deadline of August 18th. A webinar organised by the Fuel Cell and Hydrogen Group of the Energy Generation & Supply KTN was held last week  and the slides and a recording of the presentation are available on the pages of the Focus Working Group on the FCH JU 2011 Call. You will need to be a member of the Group to access these materials and the added benefits of joining are that you will also be able to work with other members of the fuel cell and hydrogen community to explore how to prepare a successful bid into the FCH JU Call, exchange experiences, gain insights into the 2011 topics, search for collaboration partners and find a range of information on how to work and apply for European funding.

LIFE Programme & Resource Efficiency: Decoupling Growth from Resource Use

The EU’s 2020 Strategy sets the priority of moving to a more resource efficient, green and competitive economy. The LIFE programme has a long track record of innovative approaches for building a resource efficient Europe. This LIFE Focus publication aims to showcase how LIFE funding has generated a vast portfolio of know-how for a diverse range of beneficiaries and sectors: from LIFE Environment projects that have helped improve the resource efficiency of production processes to products that incorporate eco-design principles throughout their lifecycle. Other exemplary projects highlight approaches that can save water, reduce the negative impacts of transport, agriculture, fisheries and the food and beverage sector and lead to more energy-efficient buildings. The publication also shows how LIFE projects are helping to realise key EU policy goals such as better land use and planning, the development of green skills and Green Public Procurement. Todownload the publication,  click here.

EC Strategy Launched to Improve Biodiversity

The European Commission has launched a new strategy to protect and improve the state of Europe’s biodiversity over the next decade. Six priority targets have been set which address the main drivers of biodiversity loss. They are:

  • Full implementation of existing nature protection legislation and network of natural reserves, to ensure major improvements to the conservation status of habitats and species
  • Improving and restoring ecosystems and ecosystem services wherever possible, notably by the increased use of green infrastructure
  • Ensuring the sustainability of agriculture and forestry activities
  • Safeguarding and protecting EU fish stocks
  • Controlling invasive species, a growing cause of biodiversity loss in the EU
  • Stepping up the EU’s contribution to concerted global action to avert biodiversity loss.

The strategy is in line with two major commitments made by EU leaders in March 2010 – halting the loss of biodiversity in the EU by 2020, and protecting, valuing and restoring EU biodiversity and ecosystem services by 2050. It is also in line with global commitments made in Nagoya in October 2010, in the context of the Convention on Biological Diversity, where world leaders adopted a package of measures to address biodiversity loss world wide over the coming decade.

As an integral part of the Europe 2020 Strategy, the biodiversity strategy will contribute to the EU’s resource efficiency objectives by ensuring that Europe’s natural capital is managed sustainably, as well as to climate change mitigation and adaptation goals by improving the resilience of ecosystems and the services they provide.

Full details of the strategy and its launch can be found here.

Official UK position paper on the next Framework Programme released!

Funding for EU Research and Innovation from 2014: a UK Perspective is the official response to the EU consultation on the Common Strategic Framework for Research and Innovation funding. It takes the form of a 16 page statement setting out the UK’s views, key points are:

  • green growth should continue to receive a high, and ideally increased, proportion of an albeit smaller overall EU budget;
  • focus on impact, dissemination and knowledge transfer should be increased;
  • social sciences and arts and humanities research should be embedded in all aspects of the future programme and increasing its share of funding;
  • a small number of thematic challenges should be agreed and these should include climate change, energy, water and food security, the protection of natural resources and the ageing population;
  • maintaining excellence should be at the heart of the programmes, but also provide support to the aspirations of EU12 countries to increase their participation;
  • as well as providing research and innovation funding, the programme should also support the provision of finance for businesses and follow-on activities; and
  • a step change in simplification is needed with time to grant periods being reduced and the number of audits being kept to the minimum necessary.

Our jazzy new EU tab!

Some of you sharp-eyed bloggers may have noticed we have a brand new EU tab.  This marks the Research Development Unit’s dedication to increasing the awareness of EU funding and supporting you to maximise networking opportunities. The EU blog will feature essential information including networking events, forthcoming information days, key policy changes, internal workshops and of course calls for proposals.

All stories from this tab will feature in our snazzy daily digest email so make sure you’ve signed up so you don’t miss out!

Workshop on Information Discovery and Data Analytics Made Easy

DEC are hosting a workshop on Information Discovery and Data Analytics Made Easy facilitated by Prof. Michael R. Berthold, Konstanz University, Germany on 18 May.

TIME: 18th May 2011, 10.00 am – 1.00 pm,

PLACE: PG10, Poole House, Talbot Campus

The purpose of the event is to present methods and tools that can be used in processing large datasets and how to discover knowledge from them. Michael Berthold is a coordinator of the project BISON that is a research project funded by EC under the 7FP. He is also one of the founders of KNIME which is a user-friendly and comprehensive open-source data integration, processing, analysis, and exploration platform. So the goal of the workshop is also to start collaboration with Konstanz University and find out more about EC 7FP projects.

The workshop is open to all BU staff and PhD students as well. It will be of interest to all people who are involved in intelligent data processing. For sure it will be of interest for DEC staff: SMART Technology Research Centre, Creative Technology Research Centre and Software Systems Research Centre. I bielieve also that people from School of Applied Sciences will be interested.

Research areas that it covers include: intelligent data analysis, predictive modelling, complexity science, complex adaptive systems, knowledge discovery from data.

SCHEDULE:
10.00-11.00 – From Pattern Discovery to Discovery Support: Creativity and Heterogeneous Information Networks
11.00-11.30 – coffee break
11.30-12.30 – KNIME. Integrating Data, Tools, and Science
12.30-13.00 – Q&A Session
13.00-14.00 – Lunch

Prof. Michael R. Berthold’s Bio
After receiving his PhD from Karlsruhe University, Germany Michael Berthold spent over seven years in the US, among others at Carnegie Mellon University, Intel Corporation, the University of California at Berkeley and – most recently – as director of an industrial think tank in South San Francisco.
Since August 2003 he holds the Nycomed-Chair for Bioinformatics and Information Mining at Konstanz University, Germany where his research focuses on using machine learning methods for the interactive analysis of large information repositories in the Life Sciences. Most of the research results are made available to the public via the open source data mining platform KNIME.
M. Berthold is Past President of the North American Fuzzy Information  Processing Society, Associate Editor of several journals and the President of the IEEE System, Man, and Cybernetics Society. He has been involved in the organization of various conferences, most notably the IDA-series of symposia on Intelligent Data Analysis and the conference series on Computational Life Science. Together with David Hand he co-edited the successful textbook “Intelligent Data Analysis: An Introduction” which has recently appeared in a completely revised, second edition. He is also co-author of the brand-new “Guide to Intelligent Data Analysis” (Springer Verlag) which appeared in summer 2010.

For more information about workshop or to book a place, please contact: Katarzyna Musial (kmusial@bournemouth.ac.uk)

Latest EU funding opportunities in media, sport and GKE

Funding opportunities

Media Funding
Promoting EU Audiovisual Works
Implementation of Media Pilot Projects

Sport Funding
Preparatory Actions in Sport

Green Knowledge Economy  Funding
Assessment of EU Climate Policies
Impact of ICT R&D in Large-Scale Deployment of Electric Vehicles
Communication Campaign on Climate Action & Low-Carbon Society
Competitiveness Eco-Innovation initiative
Clean Sky 9th Call
FP7 Fuel Cells & Hydrogen Joint Undertaking Proposals

Green Knowledge Economy  Events
Euroscience Open Forum
Eco-Innovation UK Info Day
FP7 Environment Info Day

trouble accessing UKRO? see our former blog post

book your place on the BU GrantCraft Research Workshop Day!

We are delighted to offer a bespoke GrantCraft Research Workshop Day on May 11th 2011, facilitated by Dr Martin Pickard, a specialist in writing and supporting research proposals (particularly EU). Sessions will be held on grant writing skills, impact and benefit, how to write a Marie Curie proposal and the management of EU projects. You can attend as many sessions as you like throughout the day. To read more on each session and to make a booking see our GrantCraft Research Workshop Day Event Page.

book now for the BU GrantCraft Research Workshop Day!

We are delighted to offer a bespoke GrantCraft Research Workshop Day on May 11th 2011, facilitated by Dr Martin Pickard, a specialist in writing and supporting research proposals (particularly EU). Sessions will be held on grant writing skills, impact and benefit, how to write a Marie Curie proposal and the management of EU projects. You can attend as many sessions as you like throughout the day. To read more on each session and to make a booking see our GrantCraft Research Workshop Day Event Page.