Category / Funding opportunities

Want some money?

Funding opportunities, Fusion

I thought that might get your attention! The latest call of the FIF (or the ‘Fusion Investment Fund’ for those of you who haven’t yet added this acronym to your vocabulary) is open for 2 more weeks so if you haven’t applied yet or haven’t seen my previous blog posts, let me give you the highlights:

 

 

So basically you could be given a pile of cash to enable you to do what you love! Pursue that dream of undertaking world-leading research or travel across the pond to work collaboratively with experts in your field. Become a hero and take your rightful place on that pedestal that your peers and students will put you on.*

 Sound good? Find out more.

 *BU cannot guarantee this.

 The Fusion Investment Fund is managed by Samantha Leahy-Harland. Please direct all initial enquiries to the Interim Fusion Administrator, Dianne Goodman, at Fusion Fund.

Latest major funding opportunities

Funding opportunities

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

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.

ESRC knowledge exchange funding to change

Funding opportunities

ESRC is to change the way in which it allocates funding for knowledge exchange activities. The current knowledge exchange opportunities scheme provides funding for social scientists to undertake a range of activities with non-academic stakeholders and requires 50% contribution from a partner in the user community. It is open to any social scientist to undertake knowledge exchange based on their research, whether funded by ESRC or not. This scheme will close on 31 March 2014.
From summer 2014, a replacement scheme (Impact Acceleration Accounts) will fund knowledge exchange through a block grant allocated according to institutions’ recent ESRC funding. Those institutions allocated funding will then be required to submit a business plan in order to release the money.
BU has not been allocated funding through the Impact Acceleration Accounts, so if you are a social scientist and hope to undertake funded knowledge activities, start planning your application now for submission by March… Further information can be found at http://www.esrc.ac.uk/collaboration/knowledge-exchange/opportunities/index.aspx.

Latest Funding Opportunities

Funding opportunities

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

 

  • The Academy of Medical Science are providing funds to support travel between the UK and Middle East through the Daniel Turnberg UK/Middle East Travel Fellowship Scheme.  Funding of up to £3,500 is available closing on 15/01/14.
  • The AHRC Science in culture innovation awards are now open.  Funding of up to £80,000 (80% of FEC) over a period of 12 months will be awarded to successful grants.  The closing date for this opportunity is 27/02/13.
  • AHRC have opened a call for Research Innovation grants in Translating Cultures.  Funding of between £150,000 and £200,000 is available.  Closing date is 06/03/14.
  • Have a great idea for an engaging exhibition stand at next Novembers Great British Bioscience Exhibition?  The BBSRC have just announced £10,000 worth of funding to support these innovative and engaging ideas.  Closing date for applications is 15/01/14.
  • The British Academy are supporting visiting fellowships through the Association of South-East Asian Studies in the United Kingdom by providing awards of up to £5,000 to enable scholars to make research visits to research centres operated by the European Consortium for Asian Field Study.  Closing date is 20/12/14.
  • EPSRC provide funding to encourage international collaboration through their Bilateral research workshops.  Funds will cover the UK participants travel costs and for UK meetings, cover the core meeting expenses. There is no set closing date for this opportunity.
  • Taking place at The University of Nottingham the EPSRC are hosting a two day workshop in Exploring the science behind additive manufacturing and 3-D printing sandpit.  Funds are available to cover the cost of travel to Nottingham. Closing date is 10/12/13.
  • Research grants of up to £1m are available from the MRC to support a wide range of projects.  Topics include Infections and Immunity (closing 15/01/2014), Molecular and Cellular Medicine (closing 08/01/14), Population and Systems Medicine (closing 21/01/14), and Neurosciences and Mental Health (closing 04/02/14).
  • £150 million is being put forward as capital by the MRC to enhance the UK’s clinical research capabilities and technologies.  Individual awards of up to £20 million are available, closing for expressions of interest is 07/01/14 with funding decisions being made in July for spend in 2015/16.
  • Funding of up to £2000 is available from the NERC to cover travel and subsistence costs associated with undertaking a Work shadow placement.  There is no closing date for this award.
  • The NIHR invite applications invites applications for the researcher-led workstream under its efficacy and mechanism evaluation programme. The closing date for this year’s round of funding is 27/02/14.
  • RCUK provide support to disabled students on a RCUK studentship through a Disabled Students Allowance scheme providing assistance with the additional expenditure arising from their disability.
  • The TSB, in collaboration with the Welsh government and the EPSRC are investing a total of £3.8 million in business led projects to develop innovative Tools and services for synthetic biology.  Individual projects should be for between £100,000 and £350,000 however those outside the range will be considered.  Closing date for registration is 08/01/14 and the deadline is the 15/01/14.
  • Four awards of up to £25,000 are available from the TSB as part of their Digital innovation contest in advertising.  The closing date for this opportunity is 06/01/14.

 

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.

Fifteen top tips for getting research funding

Funding opportunities, Guidance

How can you increase your chances of being successful when applying for research funding? Here are a few ideas from an AHRC panel member (with thanks to AHRC and the panel member):

  1. Ensure the scheme and applicant are a good match. Funders won’t give millions of pounds to new researchers.
  2. Does the team include an appropriate mix of people? Someone should be able to cover all of the disciplines represented in the proposal, and individuals at a range of career stages should be included.
  3. Remember that the assessors will be both subject specialists (the reviewers) and generalists (panel members). The panel can be targeted through the lay summary.
  4. Use the subject area to define the research expertise of your reviewers. Stating that your research is in the field of philosophy when this is peripheral to the study may mean your reviewers are unfamiliar with your subject.
  5. Imagine your nightmare critic and pre-empt their criticisms; respond to these without being defensive, but without glossing over any problems.
  6. Make the link to the funder’s remit clear. If the panel need to discuss whether or not the project is within the funder’s remit, the project is unlikely to be funded.
  7. Allow time to prepare and write the application. Two months to prepare, and a full week to write the application is to be expected, and then costing, gaining internal approvals etc still need to follow. Successful applications may be useful as a model, but slavishly following them may not succeed as the funder’s objectives may have changed.
  8. The application should cohere as a whole, but not be too repetitive. Stick to the first or third person, ensure it is clear who is meant when you say ‘I’ and make sure your spelling and grammar are correct. If the funder offers guidance on headings for specific sections, use them.
  9. If the funder requires an impact statement, be modest and realistic, set specific goals and milestones and don’t over-inflate your claims.
  10. If your research involves human participants, there will be ethical considerations. If the project involves a collaboration, make it clear who will take the lead for ethical approvals and ongoing ethical considerations.
  11. It’s all in the detail: name which conferences at which you hope to present your work and the journals in which you plan to publish. Explain how the publications differ, and detail which team members will work on each.
  12. When working out the costs, don’t skimp on hours. If you have fractional research assistants, explain why. If you are planning to publish a manuscript, allow time for revision. Don’t make the project cheap just for the sake of it, but make sure it is well considered and achievable within the resources. The reach and significance of the project are more important than the overall budget.
  13. Detail monitoring arrangements for the project: who will monitor progress, within what institutional structures, will there be management or advisory boards and what is the reporting structure? For early career researchers, what monitoring, career development and mentoring will be in place?
  14. Use internal peer review services (at BU, RPRS is available for all research applications) and talk to panellists or peer reviewers for your funder. Some people at BU may have relevant expertise you can tap into – get in touch with RKEO and we may be able to offer some names.
  15. Use your right to reply where funders allow. A critical review is not the end of your funding hopes, and a PI response can be used to elaborate on thoughts you didn’t have space for in the original application. Don’t be aggressive or defensive; it may be worth asking a colleague to read through your response to remove any emotional involvement. Also don’t repeat the positive comments; the panel will see these when they consider the application, and you can better use the space responding to misunderstandings or requests for further detail.

Latest Major Funding Opportunities

Funding opportunities

 

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

 

  • The UnBox LABS 2014 is an exciting opportunity for creative practitioners, artists and researchers to take part in a 10-day lab experience bringing together the UK and India to explore the theme “Future Cities”.  The AHRC are providing support for travel and accommodation to India, along with a small prototype development budget.  Closing date is 06/12/13.
  • The British Academy’s annual Wiley prize in psychology is now open providing an award of £5,000 in recognition of excellence in research in psychology. The 2014 award will be focussing on promising early-career work by a UK based psychologist.  They are also offering the Wiley prize in economics which recognises outstanding contributions to the field from early career researchers.  The closing date for both nominations is the 31/01/14.

  • BBSRC’s FLexible Interchange Programme supports the movement of people from one environment to a different one to exchange knowledge, technology and skills in order to develop bioscience research and researchers.  This programme closes 28/01/14.
  • The BBSRC are opening calls for super follow-on funding on the 2nd December.  This programme is designed to support the translation of research into practical and commercial application.  The maximum award is £2 million.  The closing date is 05/02/14.
  • The MRC are offering New Investigator Research Grants aimed at researchers who are ready to take the next step towards becoming independent principal investigators.  The maximum award is unspecified and the closing date for this award is 21/01/14.
  • Interested in building a career in health economics?  The MRC are offering early career fellowships in economics of health, providing three years of paid salary, cover for training and other associated costs.  The closing date for this opportunity is 17/06/14.
  • The MRC are offering a Methodology Research Fellowship aimed at developing the next generation of research leaders in biomedical and health research problems.  This is an intermediate level fellowship for those with between 4-8 years of post-doctoral experience. The closing date for this award is 17/06/14.
  • Are you an outstanding postdoctoral researcher?  Take the next step to becoming an independent investigator with this Career Development Award from the MRC.  Closing date 30/04/14.
  • There is a call by the MRC for research proposals in prevention and treatment of type 2 diabetes in low and middle income countries.  Up to £2m in available in funding for multiple proposals and the closing date is 11/02/14.
  • A Biomedical Informatics fellowship is available from the MRC to support individual with a clear ambition for research in biomedical and health research.  Closing date 17/06/14.
  • Designed to fund rapid response to unexpected and temporary environmental events NERC offer Urgency Grants of up to £52,000.  There is no specified closing date.
  • Five Dorothy Hodgkin Fellowships are available from the Royal Society to help early career researchers who may need to a flexible working pattern due to personal commitments such as child care or health issues.  Closing date is 13/01/14.
  • The TSB are looking to invest up to £3 million in collaborative R&D projects with a focus on Vessel Efficiency – better systems at sea.  Projects should be collaborative and business led and will typically range in size from £500K to £1.5 million.  Registration ends 26/02/14 and the closing deadline is 05/03/13.
  • The Wellcome Trust are offering Arts awards for small to medium sized projects that encourage collaboration between art and science.  The maximum aware is £30,000 and the closing date is the 28/02/14.
  • Small grants of up to £5,000 are available from the Wellcome trust for scoping exercises or meetings to discuss research in the medical humanities. There is no specified closing date for these awards.

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

Hurry the FIF up! 4 weeks until the deadline!

Funding opportunities, Fusion

 

 

 

If you haven’t already sent in your application, don’t panic! There’s still time. With three funding strands available for staff there are a wealth of opportunities for both academic and professional support staff to take advantage of:                                                                                                                             

 In the July round:

  • the Staff Mobility and Networking (SMN) strand committee  funded 18 applications in July totalling £73K. 
  •  the Study Leave strand (SL) committee awarded £107K.
  •  the Co-Creation and Co-Production (CCCP) strand was the most popular of the three in round one with 47 applications. A total of £92K was awarded to successful applicants.

 For all the updated strand policy documents, Fund FAQ’s and information about applying, please visit the FIF intranet pages.

 

The Fusion Investment Fund is managed by Samantha Leahy-Harland. Please direct all initial enquiries to the Interim Fusion Administrator, Dianne Goodman, at Fusion Fund.

Professional services staff can apply too….FIF-tastic!

Funding opportunities, Fusion

Not only does the Fusion Investment Fund provide opportunities for academic staff at BU, there are also options for professional services staff:

Staff can apply to Erasmus which is most appropriate for enabling academic and professional staff based at higher education institutions (HEIs) to spend a period of training or teaching between 5 working days and 6 weeks in a European HEI or enterprise.  Under training mobility, the purpose is to allow the staff members to acquire knowledge or skills relevant for their current job and their professional development and to help create cooperation between organisations. There are also opportunities to invite staff from enterprises to Bournemouth University to give presentations and provide teaching. Professional staff can undertake training at a European educational institution.

Another option is to apply to the standard element of the Staff Mobility and Networking (SMN) strand. Non-academic staff must be able to demonstrate through their application how their travel will benefit the academic process within BU and particular focus should be placed on the creation of sustainable collaborative networks of academics or professionals linked to specific outputs or partnership developments. 

 For more information please read the relevant policy documents and information available on the FIF intranet pages.

The Fusion Investment Fund is managed by Samantha Leahy-Harland and the Interim Administrator is Dianne Goodman. Please direct all initial enquiries to Fusion Fund.

FIF says ‘If you prefer to stay put, let the professionals and/or academics come to you!’

Funding opportunities, Fusion

Did you know that under the FIF you can invite an academic or professional to BU in respect to the development of projects or to provide training which is linked to any aspect of Fusion?

 

2 elements of the Fusion Investment Fund provide support for inward mobility:

The Standard element of the Staff Mobility and Networking (SMN) strand supports UK or overseas travel and subsistence in pursuit of any aspect of Fusion – research, education, and/or professional practice – with no minimum or maximum duration. Awards made will be between £1k and £10k. Particular focus should be placed on the creation of sustainable collaborative networks of academics or professionals linked to specific outputs or partnership developments. 

The Erasmus element of the Staff Mobility and Networking (SMN) strand provides opportunities to invite staff from enterprises to Bournemouth University to give presentations and provide teaching.

For more information please read the relevant policy documents and information available on the FIF intranet pages.

 The Fusion Investment Fund is managed by Samantha Leahy-Harland and the Interim Administrator is Dianne Goodman. Please direct all initial enquiries to Fusion Fund.

Are you FIF aware?!

Funding opportunities, Fusion

Because the FIF team are lovely, lovely people we’ve decided to hold some awareness sessions to give you the valuable opportunity to make your Fusion bid the very best it can possibly be. Two sessions will take place where you can discuss your application/s with the FIF Manager, Samantha Leahy-Harland, and committee members and, in addition, Dr. Martin Pickard of Grantcraft will be running a two and a half hour session giving his expert and essential Fusion bid writing advice. Martin is a specialist in writing and supporting research grant applications and tenders, as well as providing administrative and management support services for ongoing projects (additionally there will be some 1-2-1s available with Dr Martin Pickard in the afternoon of the 20th of November).

Come along to find out what makes a great application, what the committee members like to see in proposals and errors to avoid.  

  • Wednesday 13 November at 12-1pm, S203, Lansdowne – with the FIF Manager and committee members
  • Monday 18 November at 2-3pm, Casterbridge room, THS, Talbot – with the FIF Manager and committee members
  • Wednesday 20 November, at 9.30am – 12 midday in, CG04, Christchurch House, Talbot Campus – with Dr. Martin Pickard.
  • Additionally we have arranged some 1-2-1s in the afternoon between 1pm-5pm with Dr Martin Pickard to assist you specifically with your Fusion Bids.

 If you are interested in attending any of these sessions or to book a 1-2-1 appointment please contact Fusion Fund to confirm your place and your preferred session.

For all the updated strand policy documents, application form and more information please visit the FIF intranet pages.

The Fusion Investment Fund is managed by Samantha Leahy-Harland and the Interim Administrator is Dianne Goodman. Please direct all initial enquiries to Fusion Fund.

 

Latest Major Funding Opportunities

Funding opportunities

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

  • The AHRC are running an International placement scheme providing funded research fellowships at leading international research institutions.  The maximum award is unspecified, Closing date is 15 Jan 14.
  • The AHRC are offering Collaborative research grants in partnership with the São Paulo Research Foundation enabling transnational British and Brazilian teams to apply for funding for collaborative research projects. This is an open call with no set deadline.  The proposal total should not exceed £2 million.
  • The BBSRC are offering Modular training partnerships  designed to help develop master’s-level training in areas of significant need for industrial sectors. The award maximum is unspecified with a closing date of 28 Jan 14.
  • The BBSRC invite proposals for their Welfare of managed animals strategic priority area.  The maximum award is not specified, closing date: 09 Jan 14.
  • The BBSRC are offering funding for the Animal health research club.  The club’s research focuses on improving the resistance of farmed animals. A maximum of £5.5 million is available to support a variety of projects at 80% full economic cost.  Projects usually last 3 -4 years but funding of up to £2m for a maximum of 5 years will be considered. Closing date: 11 Dec 13.
  • The EPSRC ICT pioneers competition is now open,  providing recognition for UK PhD students who can communicate and demonstrate the excellence and exploitation potential of their research.  There are four prizes of £2000 each are available.  Closing date is 04 Dec 13.
  • The fourth call from CHIST-ERA is now open from ERA-Net CHIST-ERA.  Proposals for this call should be transformative and highly multidisciplinary research projects in ICST. The indicative budget is approximately €11.6 million, closing date 21 Jan 14.
  • EUREKA’s Eurostars programme  is supporting SME’s using research to gain competitive advantage.  Funding is provided on a country by country bases with an average project budget of €1.4 million.  The maximum award is unspecified with a closing date of 13 Mar 14.
  • The MRC are offering UK-Japan collaborative proposals, specifically looking at neuroscience disease challenges and the use of next generation opitical microscopy technologies.  The maximum MRC contribution will not be more that £120,000 over three years.  Closing date 05 Dec 13.
  • The MRC are offering a  Senior non-clinical fellowship  providing non-clinical researchers opportunities to become research leaders. The maximum award is not specified and the closing date is 30 Apr 14.
  • The MRC are awarding funds in Stratified medicine to support investigator-led methodological research into the challenges raised by stratifying patient groups. Over the next 4 years, £60 million will be committed to this area of research. Maximum award is not specified, closing date: 23 Jan 14.
  • The Royal Society of Edinburgh are offering Scottish Enterprise/RSE enterprise fellowships to encourage the development of a new Scottish businesses based around a technological idea.  Fellowships cover the fellow’s salary for one year.  There is no maximum award and it will close 28 Nov 13.
  • The Royal Society are offering funds to run small three-day South Africa-UK scientific seminars to bring together groups of early- to mid-career scientists from South Africa and the UK.  Grants are worth up to £12,000 to be used to cover costs of international airfares for up to 5 scientists, local travel costs, accommodation and organisational support.  Award maximum is £12,000, closing 18 Feb 14.
  • The TSB are offering Infrastructure for offshore renewables.  Funds will be given to collaborative, business led projects looking to reduce costs associated with offshore wind, wave and tidal stream energy generation through technology.  Registration closes 29 Jan 14 with a final submission date 05 Feb 2014 .
  •  Improving cell and tissue analysis for stratified medicine.  The TSB seek development of innovative technologies to enhance cell and tissue sample analysis.  Projects should be between £200,000 and £1.5 million and last up to three years.  Award maximum not specified, closing date: 04 Dec 13.
  • The Wellcome Trust are offering Doctoral studentships in medical humanities.  The award will cover stipend, conference travel, research expenses, overseas fieldwork, and university and college fees for up to 3 years.    Maximum award unspecified, closing date: 02 Apr 14.
  • The Wellcome Trust People Awards support projects to explore the impact of biomedical science on society, its historical roots, effects on different cultures, or the ethical questions that it raises. Up to £30,000 is available per project.  Closing date: 31 Jan 14.
  • Wellcome Trust are offering Capital funding for learned societies. This scheme provides funding, usually for up to £200,000, to projects that support the scholarly activities of learned societies. There is no specified deadline or maximum award.
  • Society and ethics doctoral studentships are available from the Wellcome Trust to enable scholars to undertake full-time research on a topic related to the ethics and society programme.  Maximum award is not specified, closing date: 02 Apr 14.
  • Research training fellowships are available from the Wellcome Trust to support medical, dental, veterinary or clinical psychology graduates who have limited research training, but who wish to develop a career in academic medicine. Award amount maximum not specified. Closing date is 07 Feb 14.
  • Society and ethics small grants are available from the Wellcome Trust to  support small-scale research projects, scoping exercises or meetings whose subject matter falls within the remit of the ethics and society programme. The maximum grant is £5,000. There is no closing deadline.

SMN could just be the strand for you!

Funding opportunities, Fusion

The Staff Mobility and Networking strand (SMN) of the FIF may seem like your normal, everyday standard strand but look carefully and you’ll see it’s a strand with a difference. It has 2 elements meaning even more opportunities for you! Not only is there a Standard element which includes Santander, but there is also an Erasmus Staff Mobility element too!

This strand provides support in the form of subsistence and travel costs and for staff to:

  • Travel within the UK or overseas with respect to development of projects linked to research, education, professional practice or any combination thereof.  Particular focus will be placed on the creation of sustainable collaborative networks of academics or professionals linked to specific outputs or partnership developments.
  • Travel within the UK or overseas for academic conferences, where one or more oral presentation is being presented and there is clear evidence of additional institutional value in terms of network creation or partnership development. 
  • Travel to at least one university from the the UK Santander Universities Network or one of the Overseas Santander Partner Universities with respect to development of projects linked to research, education, practice or any combination thereof. Please see the following for a list of participating institutions
  • Travel overseas in order to develop academic partnerships or lasting collaborative ventures around research, education and/or practice. 
  • Undertake a programme of mobility and/or networking across a series of linked trips or visits which are inter-disciplinary, especially where they are clearly linked to the BU Research Themes or involve student and staff participation. 
  • Travel in support of a Study Leave application.
  • Invite external partners to visit the University. For example, this might include inviting academics from other institutions or professionals from businesses to visit BU to develop projects and/or co-convening or facilitation of an international workshop.

 Previously funded activities under this strand:

Bournemouth-Birmingham-Brasilia: Consortium Building and Joint Work (BBB).

Dr Raian Ali, a Senior Lecturer in Computing, is the Principal Investigator of the BBB project which creates a community of interest involving the computing groups of the University of Brasilia, University of Birmingham, and Bournemouth University. The three groups are focused on Software Engineering research and this timely research project focuses on adaptive software systems, particularly, cloud and service computing. Exchange visits as part of this project have encouraged partnership development and international collaborative working. 

  Archaeology Professional Practice Forum: Bridging the Gap

The ‘Bridging the Gap’ project has been a highly successful networking and information gathering exercise, which will inform and drive actions to better prepare students for careers within archaeology, to better meet the needs of the profession and to enhance both subject-specific employability and transferable skills. An Archaeological Professional Practice Forum event was held to gather information from archaeology practitioners, employers, recent graduates and current students on the nature and extent of the skills gap between graduation and entry-level employment within archaeology. It explored ways to improve the industry-readiness of our students in order to give our new graduates a competitive edge when seeking employment, and to service the needs of the profession.  

 Please be aware that the Erasmus scheme differs quite significantly from the other FIF strands. More information is on the Erasmus intranet page  and more general information can be found on the FIF intranet pages.

 The Fusion Investment Fund is managed by Samantha Leahy-Harland and the Interim Administrator is Dianne Goodman. Please direct all initial enquiries to Fusion Fund.

 

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:

26th November 2013

28th January 2014

25th February 2014

25th March 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.

An opportunity for study leave, secondment or placement? Thank FIF for that!

Funding opportunities, Fusion

The Study Leave strand (SL) has three sub-strands: Academic Study Leave, Internal Secondments and Industrial Staff Placements.

  • Academic Study Leave This is to provide academic staff with a period of paid academic study leave, normally up to six months in duration, for the purposes of undertaking research, educational development (eg. the development of teaching programmes) or professional practice.  There must a clear benefit to both the individual and to BU and the stakeholder benefits with respect to Fusion should be clear. 
  • Internal Secondments:  In order to drive interdisciplinary research at BU a limited programme of internal secondments is available.  Secondments may last up to a maximum of six months.  A secondment application must be agreed between the host and the applicant with both parties contributing to the submission.  Cases will be judged on merit in terms of the collaborative output(s) that they will deliver which might include but are not restricted to: (1) completion of an interdisciplinary book or publication programme; (2) submission of a major research grant; (3) curriculum or pedagogic development; and (4) completion of a period of professional practice or knowledge exchange project. 
  • Industrial Staff Placements:  Staff have the opportunity to arrange their own placements with local and regional businesses/organisations for between two and six months.

 Examples of projects funded under this strand:

Engaging students in industry and updating professional practice

Associate Senior Lecturer, Sue Sudbury worked with Sequoia Films, which was commissioned by Channel 4 to develop an idea for their flagship documentary strand Cutting Edge and also to develop and produce an international feature-length documentary, Indian Spacemen, for BBC Storyville. Sue took ten BU students on broadcast production work experience while at the same time updating her professional practice.

 Understanding the co-creation of leisure behaviour in socio-natural environments

Dr Dorothy Fox, a Lecturer in the School of Tourism, undertook research practice with the aim of bringing new ways of thinking about the natural environment into the academic and public arena. This was achieved through primary research carried out in the UK; overseas travel to Australia and New Caledonia (in the South Pacific); the initiation of international networking; undertaking training and the development of new teaching materials for 2013-14.

Dr Fox said: “The process of applying for study leave and its execution has had a profound impact on my way of thinking about my role at BU. This has led to a change from a local perspective to an international one.”

Need to know more? Your wish is my command! Go now to the FIF intranet pages.

The Fusion Investment Fund is managed by Samantha Leahy-Harland and the Interim Administrator is Dianne Goodman. Please direct all initial enquiries to Fusion Fund.

Prof. Ben Azvine, Global Head of Security Research and Innovation at BT. Monday the 11th of November, PG16

BU Challenges, Funding opportunities, PG research

The next of our research seminars will take on Monday, the 11th of November, PG16 at 15:00.
Our distinguished guest is Professor Ben Azvine, the Global Head of Security Research and Innovation at BT; invited by our colleague Prof. Bogdan Gabrys.

Professor Azvine holds a BSc in Mechanical Engineering, an MSc in Control Engineering, a PhD in Intelligent Control Systems all from Manchester University and an MBA from Imperial College, London. Having held research fellowship and lectureship posts in several universities, he joined British Telecom Research in 1995 and set up a research programme to develop and exploit intelligent systems technologies within BT.
Since then he has held senior, principal and chief research scientist as well as head of research centre posts at Adastral Park, the head quarter of BT R&D. Ben has edited several books and published more than 100 scientific articles. He is an inventor on 50 patents, has won two BCS gold medals, and the IET award for innovation in IT, holds visiting professorships at Universities of Bristol, Cranfield and Bournemouth in the UK.

The title of his exciting talk will be “Industrial applications of novel Intelligent Systems”. Intelligent systems play an important role in industry for managing customer relationship, providing business intelligence, helping organisations analyse their data and protecting organisations against Cyber-attacks. In this talk I’ll present a number of case studies within BT where we have used intelligent system originating from within our research organisation and successfully downstreamed them into our operations.

I strongly encourage academics and PhD students not to miss the opportunity to attend to the seminar and to discuss potential collaborations.

Emili

FIF says ‘Get co-creating!’

Funding opportunities, Fusion

The Co-creation and Co-Production strand supports activity that embraces as many of the following as possible:

  •  Demonstrates a clear, fundamental and innovative contribution to Fusion benefitting staff and students within BU. Benefits to students could include both direct and indirect benefits.
  • Requires pump-priming to initiate activity which will then become sustainable.
  • Delivers a series of clear, measurable and tangible outputs that deliver benefits beyond the team applying.
  • Presents new, innovative projects or initiatives that are likely to have both reach and significance within and beyond BU and where possible involve inter-disciplinary collaboration.
  • Leads to public engagement with a range of stakeholders.
  • Demonstrates good value for money in terms of return on investment and strategic priorities.

  Duration of the activities can be between 6 and 12 months. Awards made will be between £2k and £75k.

Be inspired by reading about some of the successfully funded activities under this strand:

The Poole and Purbeck Portal is an inter-school collaboration between the School of Applied Sciences, the Media School and the National Centre for Computer Animation.

http://www.pooleandpurbeckportal.co.uk/

Centre for Face Processing Disorders at BU

Dr Sarah Bate from the Psychology Research Centre was awarded funds from this strand to develop a Centre for Face Processing Disorders at BU.  Sarah’s work explored the cognitive presentation and treatment of face processing deficits in adults and children with a range of neuropsychological conditions, such as developmental or acquired prosopagnosia (face blindness), autistic spectrum disorder, and Moebius syndrome. 

More information about this project can be found here: www.prosopagnosiaresearch.org

Want to know more? Of course you do! Follow this link to the FIF intranet pages.

The Fusion Investment Fund is managed by Samantha Leahy-Harland and the Interim Administrator is Dianne Goodman. Please direct all initial enquiries to Fusion Fund.