Category / Communities, Cultures and Conflicts

Fusion Investment Fund — Introducing the Bournemouth-Athens Network in Critical Infrastructure Security (BANCIS)

Fusion, Fusion Investment Fund

Although largely invisible to us, our lives are dependent on critical infrastructure (CI).  CI is made up of roads, rail, pipelines, power lines, together with buildings, technology, and people.  Some of this infrastructure is modern, but much of it is ageing and interconnected in so many ways that we fail to realise our dependency on CI or its dependencies until its loss disrupts our day-to-day lives.

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This dependency has not been lost on governments, which now invest significant sums on securing this infrastructure from cybersecurity threats. Unfortunately, in most cases, this investment entails bolting security mechanisms onto existing infrastructure.  Such investment decisions are made by people with little knowledge of the infrastructure they are securing and, has such, little visibility of the impact that poorly designed security might have on the day-to-day delivery of these critical services.  Moreover, because technology innovation does not evolve at the same pace in different cultures, and security which mitigate the risks faced by critical infrastructure in one country may not be as effective in another.   The reason for these differences are myriad, and range from differences in working practices to expectations about the scale of infrastructure being secured.  There is, therefore, a need to evaluate security solutions against specification exemplars based on these nuanced, representative environments.  However, to develop exemplars of such environments requires data collection and knowledge sharing about nuances associated with particular forms of critical infrastructure for different cultures.

The Bournemouth-Athens Network in Critical Infrastructure Security (BANCIS) project will examine and model the nuances associated with two forms of critical infrastructure in different national cultures.  It will do so by building a network between Cybersecurity researchers at BU, and the Information Security & Critical Infrastructure Protection Laboratory at Athens University of Economics & Business (AUB). These nuances will be modelled as specification exemplars of UK and Greek water and rail companies. By developing these exemplars, researchers and practitioners will be able to conduct a cost-effective evaluation of new ideas based on realistic CI environments.  The exemplars will also help students appreciate the challenges associated with designing security for complex, real-world systems.  The exemplars will be modelled using the CAIRIS security design tool; this is an open-source software product maintained by researchers at BU. The data necessary to build these exemplars will be collected over a series of visits by AUB researchers to BU, and BU researcher to AUB.

Please contact Shamal Faily if you’re interested in finding out more about BANCIS, or getting involved in the project.

New publication by BU PhD student Jib Acharya

Publishing, student research

Jib paper India 2015

Congratulations to FHSS Ph.D. student Mr. Jib Acharya, whose paper ‘Study of nutritional problems in preschool aged children in Kaski District in Nepal’  has just been published in the Journal of Multidisciplinary Research in Healthcare [1].  The academic paper, based on his Ph.D. thesis, reports on his mixed-methods Public Health study addressing attitudes and knowledge of mothers of young children (pre-school aged) in one particular district in Nepal.  The research comprises a quantitative survey and qualitative focus groups.   Jib Acharya, who is originally from Nepal, compares and contrasts the attitudes, knowledge and behaviour of poor rural and poor urban women (=mothers) in that district.   The research is supervised by Dr. Jane Murphy, Dr. Martin Hind and Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen.

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Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen

CMMPH

Reference:

  1. Acharya, J., van Teijlingen, E., Murphy, J., Hind, M. (2015) Study of nutritional problems in preschool aged children in Kaski District in Nepal, Journal of Multidisciplinary Research in Healthcare 1(2): 97-118.

GeoNet cultural heritage landscapes and deathscapes

Awarded & submitted bids, Fusion, Fusion Investment Fund, Knowledge Exchange, REF Subjects, Research themes

In our last GeoNet seminar Craig Young and Tim Darville discussed cultural heritage landscapes and deathscapes, followed by Anne Luce who examined the presentation of suicide in the media.

Craig Young introduced the seminar discussing the evolving patterns of death and the changing social attitudes towards death. The physical absence of the dead body is becoming significantly apparent when illustrating the changes in the memorialisation of the dead. For example, new ways of scattering ashes such as sending in to space, converting it in to diamonds as a permanent keepsake and using social media to contact others to help spread ashes to different continents. An increase in the memorialisation at the site of death in the form of roadside shrines indicates a shift away from official ceremonies to more informal and open displays of grief.

Tim Darville, who has recently published on life, death, ritual and regional identity in Britain c. 1600 BC, discussed the relationship and practices between the living and dead. He used Stonehenge as an example. I found it interesting to discover that Stonehenge originated as a burial ground, and as a monument to the dead. Darville went on to explain links between the spatial orientations of the stone structures with the celestial calendar.  The landscape changes from contained to dispersed, each holding its own celestial meaning as a burial site.

Anne Luce carried on the discussion talking about suicide in the media. Changes in attitude towards suicides have resulted in more high profile suicides reported in the media. For example, the Bridgend suicides in Wales 2008 were presented by the media as a suicide cult, therefore being picked up by the international press. The growth in social media sites, such as Facebook, has led to personal and public displays of remembrance in the form of memorial pages, which in some instances has led to an increased awareness of online bullying as a main cause of suicide.

Charlotte Unwin, GeoNet Intern

WAN speaker event: ‘Inspiring our futures: High profile women at BU’

Research themes, Women's Academic Network

A lunchtime Women’s Academic Network (WAN) event on the 4th June to participate in a panel composed of three senior, high profile BU women proved to be one of our most popular WAN events. This drew in a wide audience of female academics of all ranks from across all the Faculties of the University. We were additionally honoured to have in the audience our VC, Professor John Vinney and the PVC for Global Engagement, Dr Sonal Minocha.

The panel included Sue Sutherland (OBE) Chair of the University Board, Professor Gail Thomas, Dean of the Faculty of Health & Social Sciences and Head of Centre Excellence Learning and Professor Christine Maggs, Dean of the Faculty of Science & Technology.  The seminar topic focused on an interactive discussion of career progression, achievements and dealing with potholes, cul-de-sacs, obstacles and speeding highways along the way from the personal and professional perspectives of our three eminent speakers.

Professor Sara Ashencaen Crabtree opened by the event by welcoming the audience, introducing the speakers and warmly acknowledging all the support provided by panel members and her fellow co-convenors, Associate Professor Dr Heather Savigny and Professor Chris Shiel– not forgetting every member of the WAN community, whose numbers across BU grow weekly. This has helped to make WAN a powerful and exhilarating vehicle for achieving equality in diversity at BU.

The honesty, humour, courage and grit of the speakers in talking so candidly about their road to success was a revelation to the audience who were both moved and liberated to engage fully in discussions with the panel, plying them with questions, comments and sharing their own stories. This was the opportunity to demonstrate that strength in leadership lies in being able to reveal human vulnerabilities and aspirations – a lesson that was deeply inspirational to everyone in the room.

The VC closed the event with his own account – personal, unembellished and moving, staying on to discuss with WAN members his own vision for the future in respect of our shared aims. We, co-convenors, were delighted that the success of this event as another step towards assisting our fellow female colleagues on their paths to progress where the superb examples offered by our outstanding panel received a myriad of compliments from our enthralled WAN participants.

Reminder:  Next WAN event Chaired by VC Professor John Vinney, 7th  July, 5pm   TAG02, Tolpuddle Annexe, Talbot Campus.

 Topic: Getting to the top: A grand plan or serendipity?

Speaker:  Professor Judith Petts, CBE, Pro Vice-Chancellor Research & Enterprise, University of Southampton

Please note: this is an Open WAN Seminar – all academics, irrespective of gender, are warmly invited to attend.  For full details of, and registration for Event: Prof Judith Petts, PVC Southampton, please see https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/getting-to-the-top-a-grand-plan-or-serendipity-tickets-17003423698

 

Professor Sara Ashencaen Crabtree, Dr Heather Savigny & Professor Chris Shiel,

WAN Co-convenors