A roundup of this week’s Funding Insight articles

This week, Funding Insight profiles UK Research and Innovation’s Policy Fellowships, which are open to researchers in a variety of disciplines. We feature an overview of the global ‘big beast’ of biomedical research funding, the US National Institutes of Health, alongside an interview with the agency’s grants chief. And we round off with a profile of the Swiss grant-giving foundation that specialises in healthy ageing, ophthalmology and themes related to daylight.

This week in Funding Insight

After a pilot round in 2021 (profiled in Funding Insight), UKRI’s Policy Fellowships have returned with a wider scope. A greater number of government departments—and the What Works Network—have put themselves forward to host fellows, and the Arts and Humanities Research Council and Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council have joined the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC), which piloted the scheme, as partners for the call.

Fellowships are worth £170,000 (for those working with government departments) or £210,000 (for those engaging with the What Works Network), funded at 80 per cent of that full economic cost by UKRI. The fellowships run for 18 months. The deadline for applications is 20 April.

James Canton, deputy director of public policy and engagement for the ESRC, says that applicants should be cognisant of the needs of their prospective host departments to impress the panel.

The National Institutes of Health is in many ways in a league of its own as a public research funding agency. With a budget of $45.1 billion in 2022, it is the largest non-military government research spender in the United States and claims to be the largest public funder of biomedical research in the world.

This week, Funding Insight publishes two articles about this exceptionally important funder pulled from Research Professional News’ Special Report: Research Funding’s Big Players, published last year as a flipbook. First, we profile the NIH, paying close attention to where its awarded funding—which accounts for 80 per cent of its funding spend—goes. Second, we feature an interview with the man overseeing the NIH’s external grant programmes, Mike Lauer, who reflects on the agency’s history, present and possible future.

Archive selection: Velux Stiftung is a grant-giving foundation that is perhaps less well known than it should be, especially by researchers in fields linked to light, vision and healthy ageing whose interdisciplinary ideas may not easily find favour with national funders. Ophthalmology researchers with ideas for projects in low- and middle-income countries should also be aware of this funder.

The 2023 round of the foundation’s Research Grants is open now, with up to CHF100,000 (€101,000) for applicants to the daylight and healthy ageing stream, and up to CHF400,000 available in the ophthalmology stream. Projects in both can last for up to four years. The deadline for daylight and healthy ageing applicants is 30 April and for ophthalmology it is 7 May.

In this article from April 2021, the foundation’s senior scientific officer, Kirstin Kopp, shone a light on these grant programmes.

Elsewhere on Research Professional News

Outrage as Treasury claws back £1.6bn in unspent R&D funds—Government urged to reinvest funding originally destined for EU programmes or alternatives back into R&D

Angela McLean appointed chief scientific adviser—Top Ministry of Defence adviser will replace Patrick Vallance as UK’s most senior scientist

Aria and science department ties based on ‘partnership and trust’—Framework agreement sets out funder’s relationship to parent department and UK Research and Innovation

Switzerland’s exclusion from EU research begins to bite—Government shocks sector by cancelling budget for Horizon membership

First minister, next steps—Iain Gillespie looks at what Nicola Sturgeon’s resignation could mean for Scotland’s universities

If you have comments, feedback or suggestions for Funding Insight, or if there are other people within your institution who would like to receive this weekly email, please contact [email protected].

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How the NIH uses the US government’s billions to shape the world of biomedical research

The National Institutes of Health is in many ways in a league of its own as a public research funding agency. With a budget of $45.1 billion in 2022, it is the largest non-military government research spender in the United States and claims to be the largest public funder of biomedical research in the world.

Its history begins in 1887 and the establishment of the US Marine Hospital Service, which was originally tasked with checking passengers arriving at ports for disease. Since then, it has grown into a behemoth that has supported over 150 Nobel prizewinners, along the way becoming first the National Institute of Health in 1930 and then expanding to multiple institutes in 1948.

While the NIH conducts its own in-house research, more than 80 per cent of its funding is awarded externally, largely through competitive grants. These are channelled through 27 separate institutes and centres, covering all areas of medical research and public health.

Rising tide

Except for a moderate decline between 2012 and 2013, the NIH’s budget has steadily risen since the turn of the millennium and has increased more rapidly since around 2015. While external grants are awarded across a variety of categories—including career development fellowships, training awards and business R&D contracts—research project grants consistently account for between 50 and 60 per cent of the NIH budget.

However, the picture of inexorable rise looks somewhat different from the perspective of individual researchers who win grants. When inflation is taken into account, there has been little difference in the average size of research grants since 1998.

Big spenders

The NIH does not spread its spending evenly across its various centres. The five top-spending centres together account for over 50 per cent of spending in recent years. Those centres cover cancer; allergies and infectious diseases; heart, lung and blood; general medical sciences; and ageing.

At the other end of the scale, the institutes with the smallest research budgets are the National Library of Medicine, the National Institute of Nursing Research and the John E Fogarty International Center, which focuses on global health.

The majority of centres spend more than 95 per cent of their budgets on research project grants, but there are some exceptions. The National Institute of General Medical Sciences, for instance, spent nearly 7 per cent of its budget on research training grants in 2020, while the Office of the Director reserves around half of its budget for special awards.

Higher education focus

The NIH is a hugely important funder for the expansive US academic community, with medical schools around the country relying on it hugely. In line with this, higher education institutions win the largest share of NIH grants compared with independent research institutes, hospitals, non-profits and companies.

Higher education institutions won nearly three-quarters of research project grants in 2019, the last year for which data are available. They claimed an even higher proportion of career development fellowships and training grants.

Institutions attracting the most NIH funding are located in the research heartlands of the east and west coasts of the US. The north-east cities of Boston and New York—home to world-leading research institutes including Harvard and Columbia—came out top in geographical concentration of funding in 2020. But when it comes to individual institutions, Seattle’s Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center and Baltimore’s Johns Hopkins University top the leaderboard.

Most NIH awards go to US institutions, with those overseas winning less than 1 per cent of the total grant funding in 2020. Even so, non-US grant funding amounted to more than $290 million and over 600 grants were parcelled out to 66 countries. Top among these were South Africa, Canada, Australia, Germany and the UK.

Win or lose

Since 2016, success rates for research project grants at the NIH have been fairly static, at about 20 per cent, having fallen from nearer 30 per cent around 2000. When the NIH budget dropped between 2012 and 2013, success rates hit their lowest level—about 17 per cent—but they have since improved moderately.

The gap between men and women, in terms of the proportion of grants won, has shrunk considerably since the turn of the millennium. In 2000, men won around 75 per cent of research project grants and women took around 25 per cent, but in the past three years, men have won around 65 per cent of grants, with women taking around 35 per cent. Success rates, too, have improved, and have mostly been fairly even since around 2003, although it is notable that the success rate for women dropped further than that of men when the NIH budget was restricted in 2013.

In other areas, funding is much more even between genders. For instance, women were awarded at least 50 per cent of career development fellowships from 2016 through to 2020.

Diversity gap

When it comes to race and ethnicity, the NIH has made it clear it wants to see the proportion of non-white award-winners rise, but there has been only a small amount of movement in this area in recent years.

In 2016, the proportion of non-white  winners was 23 per cent, rising to 25 per cent in 2020.

Outside non-white winners, by far the largest proportion of grants are won by people of Asian origin: consistently around 20 per cent since 2016. In contrast, only around 2 per cent of research project grant winners have been Black or African American. Hispanic researchers have consistently made up 5 per cent of research project grant winners in recent years.

Looking forward

The NIH occupies a critical position at the centre of US research—and therefore, to a large extent, at the centre of world research. Even small shifts in how much it has to spend and what it chooses to spend it on can have huge consequences for entire disciplines, let alone individual researchers.

As well as a change in leadership, with former director Francis Collins stepping down in late 2021 after 22 years at the helm, another major change on the horizon is that the NIH will be housing the Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health, a new funder geared to deliver medical breakthroughs.

While lawmakers have set aside an extra $1bn for the agency, known as Arpa-H, in 2022, it remains to be seen whether its creation could put pressure on core NIH funding in the long term.

Originally published as part of Research Professional News’ Special Report: Research Funding’s Big Players in April 2022

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Velux Stiftung offers project grants in an eclectic range of subjects linked to daylight

Velux Stiftung is a grant-giving foundation that is perhaps less well known than it should be, especially by researchers in fields linked to light, vision and healthy ageing whose interdisciplinary ideas may not easily find favour with national funders. Ophthalmology researchers with ideas for projects in low- and middle-income countries should also be aware of this funder.

The 2023 round of the foundation’s Research Grants schemes is open now, with up to CHF100,000 (€101,000) for applicants to the daylight and healthy ageing stream, and up to CHF400,000 available in the ophthalmology stream. Projects in both can last for up to four years. The deadline for daylight and healthy ageing applicants is 30 April and for ophthalmology 7 May.

In April 2021, the foundation’s senior scientific officer Kirstin Kopp shone a light on these grant programmes.

Top tips

• Connecting different fields is strongly encouraged in bids, especially when this isn’t supported by other funders
• Velux Stiftung likes to see the transfer of results from previous research
• Grants applications in ophthalmology should focus on low- and middle-income countries

For researchers with ideas for projects a little different from the norm, Velux Stiftung might provide a welcome ray of light. The Swiss funder, founded by the inventor of Velux windows, awards grants on an annual basis for projects lasting up to four years. It specifically asks applicants to explain why their project is not eligible for funding by other sources.

Velux Stiftung awards grants in three specific areas: ophthalmology, daylight research and healthy ageing.

The funder recently held a strategic review that led to some important changes in its grants programme. Senior scientific officer Kirstin Kopp tells us more.

How long has Velux Stiftung had a research grants programme?

Velux Stiftung was founded in 1980 and it’s been giving out grants ever since. From the early 2000s it really took off. The Danish engineer Villum Kann Rasmussen had the idea that people needed to have more light and air within built environments. With his Velux roof windows, he made a fortune and founded several foundations.

Tell me a bit more about the three funding areas.

First, there is daylight research, as we call it, which brings together many different disciplines, including chronobiology, psychiatry and architecture—considering the built environments where we spend 90 per cent of our time—but also topics in daylight and nature as well as daylight technology. Second, there is healthy ageing, where we also try to focus on this interdisciplinary approach. The third area is ophthalmology.

Are you open to applications from any country?

We give out international grants but I should point out that as a charitable Swiss foundation, we are tax exempt and that requires us to spend 50 per cent of our money in Switzerland. So 50 per cent of our funding is open to international research grants. Broadly, we receive more applications from within Europe, but we have also been getting applications from overseas.

How many grants do you award each year and what are your success rates?

In the past five years, it’s been around 20, with an average success rate of 23 per cent. It does vary. In 2019, we had over 100 applications, so the funding rate was below 20 per cent, but usually it’s around 20 to 25 per cent.

Is there a total budget?

In the past couple of years we gave out around CHF7 million in total, but it depends on the financial markets.

Do you tend to fund more projects in any one of the three main areas?

No, it’s actually quite variable. When you look at our funding history, in some years there is more money going to healthy ageing and in other years there is more into daylight research. There is no fixed quota, and it’s not split into equal parts for the three different funding areas—it really depends where the best ideas come in.

Are all three areas distinct or do you like to see some crossover?

We are genuinely quite fond of interdisciplinary approaches. This might be within one of these areas but reaching out to another discipline which is not in our funding portfolio, but it also might be an interdisciplinary project at the intersection of the three areas we fund, and these projects are of particular interest.

You ask for applications not to be eligible for funding by other sources. How should applicants show this?

Not all national funding agencies have programmes for proof-of-concept studies, for example. So that’s something where you could demonstrate that you’re not eligible for funding. Another example would be interdisciplinary projects that fall between categories. And some funding agencies continuously fund a certain research stream but once you start to reach out and want to try something new or apply your work to a different field, it becomes more difficult to find funding.

Can people apply with proposals that have been turned down by their national funders?

Well, you need to be within our funding areas and your research question should be relevant but also neglected in that nobody else wants to fund it. And then scientific quality is important, of course. It’s not like if you have fallen through your national funding agency’s selection procedure then we will cover you—that’s not the case.

Could you give an example of a project that would be the right fit for Velux Stiftung?

It could be that you have a great idea and a great research partner, but this partner is in a country that is not supported by other funding sources. We’re also interested in how much applicants are invested in transferring research results. Obviously, if you’re doing basic research, the next level might not be developing a product, but you might want to go on and see who else is interested and who you could collaborate with. I think that this kind of transfer step is very important.

Velux Stiftung has recently had a strategic review—has this changed your funding priorities in any way?

When we did a bit of background research on where funding for ophthalmology went in general, we saw that there was a lot of funding for diseases that were common in high-income countries but that the majority of visual impairment was actually in low-income and middle-income countries and was due to diseases for which solutions existed. Often these solutions work well in high-income countries but are not adapted to the local situation in low-income and middle-income countries. As we are a rather small foundation, we wanted to know where we could make a difference, so the focus is now set on ophthalmology research in the context of low-income and middle-income countries where there is less funding available.

And are there any other changes to your funding programmes on the horizon?

As a sneak peek I can tell you that the foundation is actually looking at starting a funding programme in forestry and climate change. But we’re still at the very beginning and at the moment we are considering what we should focus on. We’re trying to set it up this year so by next year there should be some more details.

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UKRI Policy Fellowships give researchers from multiple disciplines access to the corridors of power

Top tips

• Don’t treat this like a regular research grant—it’s more like a job application.
• A good application will demonstrate the relevance of the researcher’s interests to policymaking in an accessible manner.
• Don’t go into great detail outlining a research project; demonstrating an interest in the policy area is more important.
• The scheme is open to researchers who work outside the remit of the sponsoring councils if they show how their input would be relevant within those disciplines.

After a pilot round launched in 2021 (profiled in Funding Insight), UK Research and Innovation’s Policy Fellowships have returned with a greater scope. A greater number of government departments—and the What Works Network—have put themselves forward to host fellows, and the Arts and Humanities Research Council and Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council have joined the Economic and Social Research Council, which piloted the scheme, as partners for the call.

Fellowships are worth £170,000 (for those working with government departments) or £210,000 (for those engaging with the What Works Network), funded at 80 per cent of that full economic cost by UKRI. The fellowships run for 18 months. The deadline for applications is 20 April.

James Canton, deputy director of public policy and engagement for the ESRC, says that applicants should be cognisant of the needs of their prospective host departments to impress the panel.

What’s the background to this call?

UKRI has seen a big increase in demand from policymakers for evidence and expertise from a range of scientific disciplines, at national, devolved and local levels. There is also an increased focus in research communities on policy engagement, knowledge exchange and impact. At the same time, as a country we are investing a significant amount in our R&D system and we could do more to make the most of that asset.

The ESRC launched its original policy fellowship pilot call in 2021 to inform decision-making on the most pressing policy problems, through collaboration between policy makers and academics, and to increase policymakers’ access to research. 

It also supports the career development of academics by giving them direct experience of engaging with policymakers and the policy environment. Our pilot call saw 24 early and mid-career academics placed in government departments across Whitehall and the devolved administrations.

How successful was the pilot?

It was a real success and we’ve had fantastic feedback from government hosts as well as the fellows. Since then it’s become clear to us that there is a demand for other disciplines as well, which is why we’re partnering with BBSRC and AHRC as co-funders this time. 

In fact, we can only see this demand increasing further with civil service modernisation and reform. The government’s chief scientific adviser Patrick Vallance has talked about the need to increase scientific literacy in government and there are now government targets for secondments into and out of government.

What do the fellowships involve?

Researchers will work closely with policy and analytics teams to co-produce and collaborate in creating research projects that respond to pressing matters and global challenges. 

They will work on policy areas as broad as—and this is not exhaustive—fiscal sustainability, economic growth and productivity, online regulation, climate change and net zero, education policy, urban transport, the social security system, crime and justice, the impact of future technologies, cultural placemaking, the creative industries, natural science and agronomy. Please do look at the call for the full list.

How are they structured?

The fellowships last 18 months and start with an inception phase of up to three months. Those first few months are about building a relationship with the host and starting to co-design the projects so that when they get to their main placement phase they can really hit the ground running and have a research project ready to go.

During the main placement—which lasts 12 months—they will be delivering research projects they’ve co-designed but also thinking about how they can build the capability of the policy team and create connections between academia and policy.

The final three months of the fellowship is what we call the knowledge exchange phase, which is about maximising impact and sharing learnings from the fellowships. During this phase, they will no longer be embedded in the department and can focus on conferences, publications, and sharing learnings about what collaborating with policy is like. This is a crucial part of the scheme for us, in terms of sharing learnings from the fellowships with the academic community more broadly.

What has changed since the pilot?

Yes, we engaged with both fellows and hosts throughout the pilot to look at how we can develop the programme. We’ve expanded the number of disciplines and the number of host departments, including some exciting new opportunities working with the HM Treasury and Competition and Markets Authority, among others. 

The amount of research areas of interest has also expanded so there are, for example, more opportunities for economists compared with the 2021 scheme.

Has the structure of the scheme changed?

Yes. We’ve increased the time available in the inception phase for the fellow and host to collaborate on the co-design on the main fellowship. And we’ve made it easier for fellows to access additional funding to support their research, training or capability building. We will also be strengthening our ‘cohort offer’, which includes bespoke training, mentoring and networking opportunities.

Who are the host organisations in this round?

There are 22 government hosts in this round, including the Cabinet Office, the new Department for Science, Innovation and Technology, the Number 10 Data Science Team and all of the devolved governments. There are also opportunities to work in the five What Works Network centres.

How many fellowships are you awarding this time around?

A total of 49 fellowships are available. All fellows will become part of a cohort to build longer-term networks across research and policy.

What’s the eligibility criteria?

Applicants must be researchers in a relevant discipline who hold a PhD. We’ve also added a clause that says that if someone can demonstrate that they can generate interdisciplinary insights through combining those disciplines with other recognised academic disciplines then we will consider their application. 

For example, you might be a computer scientist with expertise in coding or computational modelling. If you can show you can apply those skills to economic, social science or biotechnological questions then you will be eligible.

What career stage is this scheme relevant to?

Policy fellowships with a UK or devolved government host are aimed at early to mid-career academics while fellowships with a What Works Network centre host are open to all career stages. We’re particularly keen to encourage early career researchers to look at the guidance we’ve included about how they can strengthen their application. For example, they can bring in mentorship from their academic institution.

What tips do you have for applicants?

It is not just about demonstrating the depth of your academic expertise, but you also need to demonstrate that you can listen, understand and respond effectively to the particular questions and challenges that policymakers face. 

During the interview the hosts will be asking themselves, “Is this someone we can work with? Is this someone we can trust?” Collaboration and engagement are key principles of this programme. Also, show you’re passionate and enthusiastic about applying your experience to that policy area.

What did winning applicants to the pilot scheme do well?

They made their depth of expertise relevant to policy questions accessible to people working in a policymaking environment. Winning applicants tended to be good communicators, who are also willing to listen and learn.

What common mistakes were there in applications?

The main mistake was thinking that this is a regular grant where you must put forward a research project with detailed methodology. That’s not what we are looking for. It’s much more like a regular job application. Yes, you need to demonstrate your academic rigour and you can show that you’ve thought about what a potential project might look like, but we don’t want to see pages of planning for a project but nothing on your interest in the policy area and the softer skills like communication.

How are the applications assessed?

Applications will be assessed and shortlisted by a panel of academic and non-academic experts. A shortlist of applicants will be invited to attend an interview with representatives of the host department.

What have previous fellows gone on to do?

Two examples come to mind—both of whom are still in their placements. One of our 10 Downing Street Data Science fellows, Robin Lovelace, from the University of Leeds, has in the last few months been appointed as interim director of data and analysis at Active Travel England, an arm’s-length body in the Department for Transport. He came in as a mid-career researcher and this shows how his skills were highly valued in the civil service.

Another I would pick out is Rowena Hill, who is a fellow in the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities. She had a lot of impact within the department and the fellowship was an important part of her being appointed as a professor at Nottingham Trent University.

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A roundup of this week’s Funding Insight articles

This week Funding Insight gleans some dos and don’ts from the Natural Environment Research Council’s public engagement programme manager for those considering applying to its annual Engaging the Public with Environmental Science call. 

We consult a current non-clinical postdoctoral fellow and the administrator of neuroscience charity Guarantors of Brain on what makes for a strong application there. We learn about the Beyond Borders PhD scholarship run by Zeit-Stiftung Foundation in Germany. And we revisit a profile of the Rosetrees Trust’s Interdisciplinary Award ahead of this year’s deadline for the scheme.

This week in Funding Insight

The Natural Environment and Research Council has rung the changes for the third annual call of its Engaging the Public with Environmental Science scheme. Eligibility criteria have been widened to admit non-academic applicants. Researchers can also apply for funding for sections of public engagement projects—for example, for just the networking—with the amounts adjusted as a result.

Grants are now worth between £3,000 and £10,000. All applications must include a researcher who is eligible for UKRI funding and working within NERC’s remit, but this can be as a lead or co-applicant. The deadline for applications is 27 March.

Grace Macmillan, public engagement programme manager for NERC, explains the changes to the scheme and what separated the winning bids from the rest in the first two rounds.

The Guarantors of Brain is the charity arm of the Brain and Brain Communications journals. The charity has funded clinical fellowships for decades and launched a Non-Clinical Postdoctoral fellowship in 2017 (profiled in Funding Insight at the time).

The fellowship provides salary support of up to £65,000 a year for up to three years to researchers within six years of the award of a PhD. The deadline for applications this year is 20 March.

Merete Bergmann, an administrator at the charity, and Mansoureh Fahimi Hnazaee, a researcher at University College London who was awarded a Non-Clinical Postdoctoral Fellowship in 2021, discuss how the application process works and what aspiring fellows can do to boost their chances.

Beyond Borders is a scheme for PhD students run by the Zeit-Stiftung Foundation in Hamburg, Germany. It supports research on borders and boundaries in the social sciences and humanities. This year, following the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the foundation is looking to support projects that cover borders, contestation and conflict.

A total of €500,000 is available through the scheme, which includes conferences and workshops for winners. The foundation expects to award 15-20 scholarships. The deadline for applications is 1 March. Anna Hofmann, academic director of the programme, tells us more.

Archive selection: The Rosetrees Trust should be on the radar of all biomedical researchers with interdisciplinary interests—and this year to infectious disease researchers in particular. That is because the Rosetrees 2023 Interdisciplinary Award will support research on “the complex interactions between the human host and infectious agents, ranging from the microbiome to pathogens that include viruses, bacteria and fungi”.

Awards—usually only one or two are given—are for up to £300,000 for projects of up to three years’ duration. The deadline for applications is 28 April, but as only one application per institution is allowed, each university will operate its own internal deadlines.

In February 2020, Vineeth Rajkumar, the charity’s head of research, laid out the essentials of this scheme and stressed that precision and detail were watchwords.

Elsewhere on Research Professional News

Sunak and Gates launch clean technology investment initiative—Coalition of investors aims to plug gaps preventing translation of UK research into green companies

Barriers to post-study visa have ‘detrimental impact’ on graduates—Report urges policymakers to back post-study visa amid tepid government support

EPFL warns Swiss research being ‘eroded’ by EU freezeout—Swiss institute reports reduced collaboration resulting from loss of access to Horizon Europe

Wellcome Sanger Institute appoints new director—Institute’s human genetics boss, Matt Hurles, to take over from Mike Stratton later this year

Support for applications will make research more equitable—British Academy scheme will target hidden costs that block access to funding, says Simon Swain

If you have comments, feedback or suggestions for Funding Insight, or if there are other people within your institution who would like to receive this weekly email, please contact [email protected].

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This year the Zeit-Stiftung Foundation’s Beyond Borders scheme is for PhD students interrogating conflict

Top tips

• These scholarships serve to supplement the work of doctoral researchers by means of joint activities and conferences
• This is a scheme which requires tailored proposals—do not copy and paste
• Having the right language competencies to enable the project to be carried out is important
• Mention what you will gain from the scholarship beyond financial resources

The Zeit-Stiftung Foundation is a private charity based in Hamburg, Germany. The foundation runs several fellowship programmes, conferences and exchanges throughout the year, mostly aimed at PhD students.

One of those programmes is Beyond Borders, a scheme for PhD students that supports research on borders and boundaries within the social sciences and humanities. This year, in light of the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022, the foundation is looking for projects that cover borders, contestation and conflict.

A total of €500,000 is available through the scheme, and projects will last for up to three years. The foundation expects to award 15 to 20 scholarships. The deadline for applications is 1 March and applications are accepted from any country.

Anna Hofmann, academic director of the programme, tells us more.

What is Beyond Borders?

It is an international PhD scholarship programme that has been running for three years. Every year we focus on a particular aspect of border and boundary studies. We started with a programme on borders, democracy, and security for the first generation of scholars. They were dealing mostly with national borders, and the whole question of negotiating democracy or statehood at the border.

Last year we focused on borders, migration and knowledge, looking at the production of knowledge about boundaries and border-making, and how different perceptions influence the way we learn about borders. This year the focus is much more on conflict and physical borders. We hope to get more projects on history and inter-ethnic relations. What happens in everyday life and everyday border management, and in the everyday experience of borders for different people?

Why was it set up?

The decision to focus more on borders and boundaries came out of our previous research funding programmes, where we noticed more and more emphasis on transnational aspects of research. At the same time, the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic in Europe highlighted a rising awareness of borders. We turned away from the process of reducing barriers and having borders dismantled in the process of European integration; for example, with free movement. But with Covid, those borders came back very quickly.

For this call, what type of support is available?

Three types of scholarships are available: Dissertation Completion scholarships for advanced PhD students; PhD scholarships for PhD students at any stage of their studies; and Start Up scholarships for advanced master’s students or PhD students who are at an early stage of their studies.

Are there restrictions on who can apply?

They must be doctoral students, or, for the Start Up fellowships, master’s students. Applicants also must work in social sciences and humanities in a broad sense, and their work has to involve the study of borders or boundaries. In the past we have accepted some people from a law background because their research goes beyond classical law.

Do applicants need to move to Germany for the scholarships?

No. They stay at their home institution and we will bring them together at least twice a year for a conference with everybody on the programme. They will present their project and discuss it with the advisory board and their peers from the programme. During the pandemic we moved communication online, and now that we are back doing physical conferences students still want to keep more regular online communication.

We also try to have one additional workshop or field trip, or another meeting during the year, and this is smaller and the offer is more diversified. For example, we might offer our Start Up scholars a workshop on proposal writing and research design development. For those who are much more advanced, we might propose a workshop on science communication, so going beyond the research work and thinking about how they may have more impact with their research. These are tailor-made to the needs of the individual group and people can register for them and apply if they want to participate.

Do participants work alone on their projects?

Yes and no. Participants work on their own projects, but they will also work with other members of their cohort for group discussions and so on. We try to create diverse groups with an interdisciplinary focus, but to have some kind of framework for productive work in the group discussions, we focus one overall topic or theme so that people can get into discussions with each other.

How many people do you expect to fund?

For this call we estimate we will select between 15 and 20 people. Our overall budget is around €500,000 for all participants, and that includes conferences, travel, workshops and so on. The funding covers the projects for up to three years.

What makes a good application?

The first thing we look at is the research question. Then we look at the candidate and their skills, their preparation for this research. For example, we look at language competencies, which are always a big factor in international projects. Can you access the literature in the archives? Are you prepared in terms of academic qualification? We consider whether this person can deliver on the topic they are proposing.

What advice would you give to applicants?

I would also say that applicants should make their proposals as specific as possible to this programme. In my experience, people often apply with a standardised research proposal that is more suitable to a graduate school. But usually for us it is much too long; we deal with a huge number of applications, so we are looking for a maximum of seven pages. The application for the Start Up fellowships is even smaller at five pages.

It is also very important to explain why you want to join the research programme and how it will be beneficial to you beyond the financial support.

Is Zeit-Stiftung the organisation that runs this scheme?

Financially speaking, we are a classical endowment charity. The founders, Ebelin and Gerd Bucerius, donated their wealth to the foundation after they died in the 1990s. As an institution, we are linked to the Die Zeit newspaper, which Gerd Bucerius founded in 1946.

Do you run any other calls throughout the year?

Yes, several. This is the only fellowship programme for PhD students, but we regularly advertise workshops or summer schools for interdisciplinary exchanges. Currently, the call for our Hamburg Summer School in Social Research is open. We also run a fellowship programme for international postdocs at the HafenCity University Hamburg in Germany which covers urban research.

The post Opportunity profile: Crossing borders, breaking boundaries appeared first on Research Professional News.

Guarantors of Brain administrator and fellow discuss what makes a good non-clinical fellowship application

Top tips

• No direct clinical experience is necessary, but the fellowship project must take place within a clinical neurology or psychiatry department
• Although the application form is only two pages long, a lot of thinking will have gone into a successful project beforehand
• Demonstrating passion and commitment to a proposed project at interview is important
• Obtain and show strong support from your host department

The Guarantors of Brain is the charity arm of the Brain and Brain Communications journals. The charity has funded clinical fellowships for decades and launched a Non-Clinical Postdoctoral fellowship in 2017 (profiled in Funding Insight at the time).

The fellowship provides salary support of up to £65,000 a year for up to three years to UK-based researchers within six years of the award of a PhD. The deadline for applications this year is 20 March.

Merete Bergmann, an administrator at the charity, and Mansoureh Fahimi Hnazaee, a researcher at University College London who was awarded a Non-Clinical Postdoctoral Fellowship in 2021, discuss how the application process works and what aspiring fellows can do to boost their chances.

What is the Guarantors of Brain?

Merete Bergmann: We are the charity arm of the journals Neurology Brain and Brain Communications. Our income comes from the two journals. Brain goes back over a hundred years and the charity was set up in 1955. Basically, all our income from publishing these two scientific journals goes into the charity. We then use that income to support teaching, education and research in neurology and related clinical applications. The people involved in the charity are UK-based neurologists, psychiatrists, neurosurgeons and neuroscientists.

How long have the non-clinical fellowships been running?

MB: The non-clinical fellowships are a more recent addition. They were started in 2017.

How would you summarise them?

MB: The fellowships bring the non-clinical scientist’s expertise into the clinical setting. Computing and artificial intelligence and other technology is changing science and there is potential patient benefit. So we recognised that we needed not just our clinical fellows but other scientists. For example, Mansoureh is not a doctor but her expertise can really further knowledge and bring patient benefit. The fellows must already have a connection with neuroscience and generally, they have done a PhD in the field.

Mansoureh, what is your background?

Mansoureh Fahimi Hnazaee: I studied electrical engineering for both my undergrad and graduate degrees. I then did a PhD in cognitive neuroscience.

Can you give a brief overview of your research for the fellowship?

MFH: I want to develop a non-invasive approach to studying the human brainstem and uncover what role it plays in the physiology of Parkinson’s disease. In many neurodegenerative disorders, the brainstem is the first structure to be affected but it is quite hard to access in humans with any neuro-imaging tools. So, my hope is to develop an approach using all the latest tools available, both in computational methods and cognitive experiments. I will combine that with patient recordings where I look at the interaction between the basal ganglia and the brainstem. This is one of the missing links in the mechanism of how Parkinson’s disease operates.

Do fellows have to have worked in a clinical setting before?

MB: Not necessarily. Generally, if they are within neuroscience, they tend to work in a team with supervisors and other principal investigators who have the connection to a clinical setting. But it depends on a fellow’s project because you also have people who work on the very basic science side. They might not work with humans, they might work with petri dishes.

Did you have experience in a clinical setting?

MFH: I had experience working with patients in my PhD, but it was not necessarily Parkinson’s disease before. I already had experience working with human recording, but this was with patients with epilepsy.

What are the main eligibility criteria?

MB: You must have a PhD, be based in the UK, and do your fellowship within a clinical neuroscience setting. Basically, you need to be within a clinical neuroscience department. You could also be in psychiatry as there tends to be an overlap between the two subjects.

How many fellowships do you award in each round?

MB: It varies. When we started, it was one or possibly two a year. From 2017, around 10 per cent of the applicants would receive an award. We have tried to increase that. We have made the decision to increase our funding overall as the guarantors see there is a need for it. In 2021, we had a record year of applications and awarded six non-clinical fellowships. We also awarded a lot of clinical fellowships too.

In the pandemic, there were some funding bodies that cut funding, and we thought we needed to step up a bit to try to give people a chance. There has been a policy decision by the board to increase funding for training and research. It will not continue at that level but I think we will probably aim to have about three non-clinical fellows per year.

What is the overall success rate across all your fellowships?

MB: Up until 2020, it was about 15-20 per cent, depending on the number of applications each year. The policy change to increased funding pushed the success rate up to around 40 per cent in 2021 and 2022, but this is likely to go down again. We will aim to award around 8-10 fellowships, in addition to the three Association of British Neurologists Fellowships we also support.

How are the non-clinical applications assessed?

MB: Once the applications are received, we then send them out to various guarantors. We do this to lighten the burden on the panel and so that the applications are first seen by people in a similar specialist field. So, Mansoureh’s application would have gone to someone who had knowledge of Parkinson’s disease. Sometimes, there might not be a guarantor in a similar area. But there is broad ranging expertise, so we try to find them. The applications are then scored by the guarantor and the panel will also score them. From that scoring, we then create a shortlist. The shortlisted candidates are then contacted for interview. We do try to interview as many as we possibly can during one day to give everyone a chance.

What would make an application stand out?

MB: You need to be quite pithy in the two-page project report. We have now also started making sure people do a Gantt Chart [a graphical depiction of a project schedule] to make sure they have a clear plan for the three-year project. It needs to be feasible and have clear deliverables. We are invested in making sure these fellowships are successful.

Mansoureh, what do you think made your application stand out?

MFH: It is hard to say but I think it was partially my commitment to my project. We spent over a year before developing it and before that I spent a few years just building up to the idea. I think that showed in the interview.

MB: I remember Mansoureh was very passionate and dedicated in interview. The other thing beyond scientific excellence we need is strong support from supervisors and the institution. The letter of support from the head of the department in which the fellowship will be held is important.

Mansoureh, how did the department and university help with your bid?

MFH: They helped both with the project bid and interview preparation. I had a whole team behind me so it was not just my achievement. I think it can be easy to underestimate how much preparation goes into the interview. My supervisor really helped me there. And I had several practice interviews with people with more experience than both of us.

MB: I would say that the interview practice shows because you have a very short time allocated. You get five minutes to pitch what is going to be a three-year project and then there is a discussion. So, you must be prepared.

Who conducts the interviews?

MB: We generally have a panel that is drawn from the charity’s guarantors. The chair, treasurer and secretary are always present with some of the other guarantors as well.

What mistakes do applicants normally make that should be avoided?  

MFH: Not starting early enough, I think. A proposal is not just the writing; the proposal itself is just two pages. There is a lot of thinking and preparing that is necessary. For something like this, I think it’s helpful to start thinking about what your niche and passion is two years before you apply. It does not have to be consistent working for those years, but it is good to let it sit and think it through. When I first thought of my idea, I was not working with my current supervisor. I got input from lots of different directions and then one worked. But I reached out to as many people as I could, and I got a lot of feedback.

Do you have any other advice for applicants?

MFH: It is incredibly useful to see examples of applications for a specific grant. Every different application has a different style and preference. For the Guarantors of Brain, I did not have an example in fact, but it would have been helpful.

Might this be remedied in the future?

MB: Possibly, yes. Our website is rather old and we are in the process of revamping it. It will be relaunched later this spring. We will showcase all the fellows and it will be helpful for potential applicants to see their project title and lay summary. At present, applicants sometimes reach out to me for this and I try to help. We are a very small charity, but we are very receptive and very reactive. Although I am not a scientist and cannot give advice specifically on the research project, I am always very happy to help with the process.

The post Opportunity profile: Picking the brain of a neuroscience funder appeared first on Research Professional News.

Careful targeting—of both audience and aims—is important in environmental public engagement scheme

Top tips

• This scheme can now be used for researchers who are testing the waters for a public engagement project
• Public engagement novices are welcome to apply but should consult guidance before doing so
• Clarity of aims and target audience is essential in applications
• Think about building impact beyond any intervention

The Natural Environment and Research Council has rung the changes for the third annual call of its Engaging the Public with Environmental Science scheme. Eligibility criteria have been widened to admit non-academic applicants; also, researchers can apply for funding for sections of public engagement projects—for example, for just the networking—with the amounts adjusted as a result.

Grants are now worth between £3,000 and £10,000. All applications must include a researcher who is eligible for UKRI funding and working within NERC’s remit, but this can be as a lead or co-applicant.

All bids must aim for at least one of four objectives, summarised as follows: trialling a novel approach; bringing people together; learning by doing, and responding to new opportunities to engage the public with environmental science. The deadline for applications is 27 March.

Grace Macmillan, public engagement programme manager for NERC, discusses the changes to the scheme and what separated the winning bids from the rest in the first two rounds.  

How many rounds of this scheme have there been?

This is the third round. We started two years ago, in 2021. At the time, we wanted to create a funding opportunity that was different to other UKRI and NERC grants and more equitable in funding organisations and partners outside academia. This scheme is public engagement-focused, and the eligibility criteria are also more flexible for researchers and non-academic organisations.

Has anything changed in this round?

In the first two rounds, we focused on funding small public engagement projects that included planning, delivery and evaluation stages. In this round, we’re shifting that emphasis to include more exploring, trialling and finding a safe space for projects to make mistakes and learn from them.

While we will still fund full public engagement projects, we will now also fund individual sections of engagement projects such as the planning stage, work to help build relationships, or for applicants with existing relationships and a co-designed idea, just the delivery and evaluation stage.

Should projects be based on research originally funded by NERC?

The projects must be based on environmental science research, and ideally it would be either previously or currently NERC-funded, however this isn’t a requirement.

What are the hallmarks of an entry that fits this scheme well?

We want all the applications to really have thought about their purpose, audience, outcomes and impacts. Often, researchers may be excited about their research and might not have thought about why it’s good for public engagement and why it could be co-beneficial for the partner. While the research that underpins these public engagement projects is important, applications must have carefully considered how their activities can be mutually beneficial to their partners and their chosen audience.

Also, sometimes we see applications that just say their audience is “the general public”. This is not very helpful in public engagement, especially if you are trying to develop quality interventions and interactions.

How much public engagement experience do you expect?

Applicants could have none. We want to give people who maybe have not had a chance to try public engagement to give it a go. As long as they’ve thought about their purpose, audience, intended outcomes and impacts, we’re happy to trust that it is a trial—it might not work even if they have the best-laid plans. We want people to take learnings if it doesn’t quite go to plan, and we’re happy for this to be an educational activity for what works well or not so well.

Is there anything that relative public engagement novices can do to improve their chances?

We provide links to helpful websites. Applicants should look at those resources and see what makes a good public engagement project. They should outline and use a two-way process that involves interaction and listening to all those involved in the project; this way, the project will be mutually beneficial and help the novices to develop and learn. Even if you’re a novice, it shines through if you have thought through who the audience is, who you want to be co-partnering with—and if you intend to build or maintain that partnership in an ethical and equitable way.

In the previous rounds, what did the winning bids do right?

They made it very clear and succinct in their application form what they wanted to do and why. They stated what they wanted to achieve from that public engagement and what they hoped the impact would be. For example, you don’t want to be in a situation where you’ve gone to a school, talked to the children and that was it. It’s important to think about how can you have a conversation with schoolchildren, interact with them, how can you inspire them to be the next environmental science researchers—what other impact might the activity have.

How many bids do you think will be funded in this round?

We’ve been getting about 60 to 70 applications and have funded between 15 to 20 on average so far. For this round, we are providing between £3,000 and £10,000 for projects, which is the widest range we’ve made available for this funding opportunity, so that might have an effect on the number that get funded, even if we’re not sure in which direction.

The post Opportunity profile: Know your audience for NERC success appeared first on Research Professional News.

A clear clinical question is critical in bids to the Rosetrees Trust’s Interdisciplinary Award

The Rosetrees Trust should be on the radar of all biomedical researchers with interdisciplinary interests—and this year to infectious disease researchers in particular. That is because the Rosetrees 2023 Interdisciplinary Award will support research on “the complex interactions between the human host and infectious agents, ranging from the microbiome to pathogens that include viruses, bacteria and fungi”.

Awards—usually only one or two are given—are for up to £300,000 for projects of up to three years’ duration. The deadline for applications is 28 April, but as only one application per institution is allowed, each university will operate its own internal deadlines.

In February 2020, Vineeth Rajkumar, the charity’s head of research, laid out the essentials of this scheme and stressed that precision and detail were watchwords.

Top tips

• Applications are first administered by universities via internal competitions, so find out about the procedure at your own institution if you are interested in applying.
• These bids should normally be led by mid-career or more senior researchers.
• Applications should not scrimp on detail; bids that are otherwise strong are often knocked back for vagueness.
• The panel must understand the significant clinical question that the research seeks to address.

The Rosetrees Trust is a medical research charity that funds basic and translational research across specialties with a range of seedcorn, project and fellowship grants. Its Interdisciplinary Awards are among its largest and offer £300,000 for a three-year research project. This year, the award is for collaboration between medicine and chemistry.

Vineeth Rajkumar, the charity’s head of research, explained the scheme for those unfamiliar with it.

What are the top-line things applicants should know about this scheme?

The remit of the grant is to foster new collaborations between different scientific disciplines. We’re trying to break down the traditional silos that exist within scientific research and facilitate the movement of people and ideas between the life sciences, chemistry, physics and so on. More broadly, our aim as a charity is to promote research that will bring benefit to patients.

Is the focus on medicine and chemistry just for this year?

Yes, while there’s an annual grant call for interdisciplinary projects, we change the theme every year. So we’ve had a year for physics, then chemistry. There’s also been engineering and mathematics. We tend to cycle through those. This year we decided to go back to chemistry again.

Was there a particular gap in chemistry?

We’d had several discussions with senior academics who were advocating that there’s a need for increased funding for chemistry being integrated in life sciences, so we thought we’d move it up the rota. This year, the theme was supposed to be engineering and medicine. However, over the last year, we’ve put a lot of funding into a variety of engineering projects, so that was another reason for promoting chemistry.

How does it differ from other Rosetrees-funded grants, beyond the focus on interdisciplinarity?

It differs in a couple of ways. For one, the universities themselves will manage the internal triage—so, we put out a call to universities and they select best applications from that institution. We only get one application from each major institution. The Interdisciplinary Award is our flagship—it’s the largest award we give out. Also, unlike for other grants, we stipulate that interdisciplinary research has to be a condition of the grant.

How many of these grants do you usually give out?

It varies. We have a budget that allows us to fund a maximum of one or two awards. In the past, we have had a couple of years when the number of fundable applications was higher than what we could fund. Two years ago, for example, we identified five projects that we thought were worthy of funding. As a smaller charity, we could only fully fund two projects, so we contacted universities and said that for the remaining projects, we’d fund them as large project grants and put up half of the award—then £250,000—if the universities could foot the other half.

What is the success rate like?

Last year we had approximately 30 to 35 applications and funded two grants ourselves fully. There were an additional two grants we funded at 50 per cent. So, in the last two years roughly four or five grants were funded out of about 30 applications. That means you’re looking at a 12.5 to 15 per cent success rate.

Do researchers need to be at a particular point in their career to apply for these grants?

We’re looking for experienced academics—the level and calibre of academics is normally self-selecting, so these tend to be applicants from tenured positions.

Can applicants be from different institutions?

That’s less common, but we have had a few inquiries where applicants have been from different institutions. Where there’s a genuine collaboration in place, we don’t want to be prohibitive—in a case like that, we would consider an applicant from life sciences to be the primary applicant, representing one institution’s application. 

What would make a bid ineligible?

We’re not looking at existing projects that have already received a lot of funding. What we’re trying to do with this grant is focus more on inviting new interdisciplinary projects to flourish. For this round, projects will have two principal investigators—one from life sciences and one from chemistry. So, we’d likely be looking at applications from two principal investigators who have perhaps generated some preliminary data.

What does the application process look like?

We issued a call this year slightly later than normal. Universities who partner with us then disseminate the call internally and arrange internal selection panels to select the best of their applications. University research officers get in touch with us to apply online. We’re moving to an online application system this year, whereas previously universities emailed in their submissions.

What has to happen then on Rosetrees’ side?

We know the quality of applications is generally higher than in a standard open call, but we still do a check to make sure all the boxes have been ticked for eligibility. We then send applications out for external peer review. Once we have those back, we select the best applications for the academic panel. They assess applications alongside reviews from the external review and make recommendations. 

What are the panel’s main criteria?

First, is it an important and significant clinical question that needs to be addressed? We look at the project itself. Then we look at the applicant profile—their CV and track record. These grants are a stepping stone on the way to clinical translation, so we’re looking at academics who have a profile that convinces us they can take this forward. Ideally, between the two principal investigators, they will have sufficient contacts and networks in the industry. And, of course, these should be genuinely interdisciplinary projects as well—we want to make sure these are not just paying lip service to the idea.

What tips would you give researchers regarding content?

There’s a case for making sure you give us as much information as you possibly can. Many grants miss out on funding because even though they propose a great idea and have very strong applicants, an important research question is not being addressed; reviewers will pick up on this vagueness in an application. Applicants should ensure they include as much information as we can possibly digest. We’re very much about identifying grants with potential for longevity, but you’ve got to convince us you can deliver.

What kind of vagueness have you seen before?

For example, if we ask how long it’ll take to develop or translate a project into something that benefits patients and what the next steps are, we’re more convinced by details than if someone just says ‘five years’ but doesn’t give us a plan. We’d favour the more detailed description over a one-sentence answer.

Have you ever funded more than three years of research?

In certain circumstances, researchers have come back to us and said: ‘We’ve got to this point—can we have an additional year of funding?’ We look at each on a case-by-case basis. For instance, our first award for engineering went to Imperial in 2014. The researchers ultimately got an additional year for the project.

How can grant money be used?

Normally, the bulk of the grant is spent on salaries, but there’s no restriction on how applicants can spend it. We do fund animal research and consumables, too—these can be small bits of lab equipment, as long as it’s integral to the project and not large infrastructure. 

Do you fund travel?

We will listen to requests, and if we feel we can make a small contribution, money could be used for that.

Any final tips for future applicants?

Read the application guidelines carefully. Call or email with queries before putting in an application. The university should be the researcher’s first port of call, and if they can’t address a query, the researcher can come to us.

The post From the archive: Growing a prize Rosetrees grant appeared first on Research Professional News.

A roundup of this week’s Funding Insight articles

This week, Funding Insight profiles a specialist dermatology funder with enviable success rates and looks at two UK Research and Innovation schemes in manufacturing—one for social scientists new to the area and one for physical scientists and engineers who are already engaged.

This week in Funding Insight

For dermatology researchers, the Denmark-based Leo Foundation is a particularly valuable funder. The philanthropic organisation manages financial assets of around €2.3 billion and is accelerating its annual research funding upwards of €20 million.

As part of its funding portfolio, the foundation offers Research Grants of around €270,000 to €540,000 (£239,000 to £479,000), lasting one to three years to researchers in any country. The next deadline is on 28 February, followed by 23 June and 31 August. Projects in basic, translational or clinical dermatology are welcome.

Chief scientific officer Anne-Marie Engel discusses what applicants should pay attention to in their proposals, and also what lies behind the foundation’s enviable success rates.

“We want to get people—particularly from the social sciences, business, psychology, geography, politics and so on—thinking about working within digital manufacturing and bringing their knowledge and research to a new context,” Jillian MacBryde, InterAct co-director, explains in our second opportunity profile this week.

InterAct’s Early Career Fellowships are one mechanism by which the network, which is funded by UK Research and Innovation, seeks to achieve that. The fellowships support networking activities rather than research by social science-oriented researchers with the manufacturing research and innovation community. Fellowships are worth up to £5,000 and are funded at 100 per cent of the costs. The next deadline for applications is 6 April and the call will be repeated later this year.

Archive selection: The Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council’s Manufacturing the Future panel (previously referred to simply as the ‘manufacturing priority’ panel) meets every quarter and has up to £3 million available per panel meeting. Bids to the panel follow the council’s normal Standard Grant format but focus on research challenges facing the manufacturing industry, both now and in the future. Collaborations with businesses and the public sector are encouraged.

The next deadline for applications is 30 March, and this will be the last round before the scheme—as with all EPSRC schemes—moves to the new Funding Service application system. However, those who are now pulling their bids together might be minded not to rush too much to make that deadline. As Dana Ofiteru, senior lecturer in the school of engineering at Newcastle University, told us in 2020, these proposals often involve multiple partners and require patience and persistence.

Elsewhere on Research Professional News

UK reshuffle raises questions, encouragement and eyebrows—Policy experts say changes send clear signal about R&D’s importance but spark concerns over resources

Donelan to head new science and innovation department—Former higher education minister to become secretary of state for science, innovation and technology

Aria seeks scientific leaders to direct its programmes—Programme directors will get £50 million to develop a vision, fund projects and direct progress

Research council leadership depleted as third chief departs—Duncan Wingham to step down from Natural Environment Research Council after 11 years

Universities urged to form £7.4m Clean Maritime Research Hub—Call comes as UK government releases £77 million fund to cut maritime emissions

If you have comments, feedback or suggestions for Funding Insight, or if there are other people within your institution who would like to receive this weekly email, please contact [email protected].

The post Leo Foundation, InterAct fellowships, EPSRC Manufacturing the Future appeared first on Research Professional News.

Leo Foundation offers skin disease grants with enviable success rates and is increasing its funding

Top tips

• Read and check eligibility requirements and requests for supporting documentation—this often catches people out.
• Familiarise yourself with the Leo Foundation’s philanthropic scope and show how your bid is in tune with that.
• Feasibility is an important criterion; partner with other groups if you do not have the necessary experience in-house.
• Skin cancer is out of scope for applications, but skin cancer models can be used in methodology.

For dermatology researchers, the Denmark-based Leo Foundation is a particularly valuable funder. The philanthropic organisation manages financial assets of around €2.3 billion and is accelerating its annual funding upwards of €20 million.

The Leo Foundation owns the pharmaceutical company Leo Pharma, which focuses on dermatology.

As part of its funding portfolio, the foundation offers Research Grants of around €270,000 to €540,000, lasting one to three years. The grants are available to researchers in any country and there are three funding rounds per year. The next deadline is on 28 February, followed by 23 June and 31 August.

Projects in basic, translational or clinical dermatology are welcomed but the Leo Foundation does not fund projects on skin cancer.

Chief scientific officer Anne-Marie Engel says the Leo Foundation is upping its funding and planning new options for clinical and translational researchers. Engel explains more about the Research Grants scheme and its encouraging success rates.

How much funding is the Leo Foundation expecting to award this year?

For this year, we expect to give altogether around €27m, and our aspiration and ambition is that by 2025, it will be €33.5m. We are also increasing the number of different grant-making instruments.

What is the aim of the Research Grant scheme for the foundation?

The idea behind a scheme like this is to give an opportunity to as many researchers as possible. The grants are not very large, but they are there to help and support researchers with excellent ideas and innovative ideas within dermatology research, in a very broad sense, going from basic to clinical.

How many grants are you expecting to award this year?

Somewhere between 25 and 30 grants. That, of course, depends on how many excellent applications we get.

Is there a fixed amount of funding or does it depend on the quality of applications?

We have an agreement with our board about how we expect to distribute funding across the different grant-making instruments we have. But it also depends on the applications we get, so for this particular instrument we can agree with the board of directors that if there’s more quality than expected, we can add a bit to the budget. And if there’s not enough quality, we won’t award as many grants. We usually get around 30 applications per round.

With three rounds a year and an estimated 25 to 30 grants, that’s a pretty good success rate.

Yes, although the success rate was quite high in 2022, but it may vary. The average success rate over the past five years is 19 per cent. But our scope in the foundation is very clear: it’s dermatology research, from basic to clinical, so it’s important for us to see that we are still getting a fairly high number of highly qualified applications within this field.

Is it possible to apply more than once, potentially in the same year?

If you do not get funding for your application, you can reapply once, and you’ll have to add a page or two explaining how you have worked on the project since you first applied. If it still doesn’t get funded, you can apply to the foundation again but with a different project.

Do you give feedback on applications that aren’t successful?

Regrettably not. We do give an indication to people of whether they were in the top, middle or bottom third of the applications when it came to ranking by our international expert committee.

Why are projects about skin cancer not eligible for funding?

As it’s easier to get funding from other agencies for cancer research than for other kinds of skin disease-related research, it’s been decided here to focus on the other skin diseases to give them a chance of getting funding for good projects. However, we do permit applications where skin cancer is used as a model to look into other mechanistic hypotheses and ideas for other skin diseases. So you can use skin cancer models in your skin research applications, but if it’s fully focused on skin cancer, you will have to apply elsewhere.

Grants are open to researchers worldwide, but do you get more applications from any particular country or region?

We do get most of our applications from Europe and from North America, but we’re seeing increasing numbers of applications from the Asia-Pacific, specifically Australia, which we’re thrilled about.

What proportion of grants awarded are for basic research against clinical research?

It’s not level, let me put it like that. We get more applications for basic research and thus we’ve also given out more grants for basic research, but we very much invite applications from people who do translational research and clinical research as well. In the future, as we increase our grant amounts, we will also have some thematic grants that invite, in a more focused way, researchers within translational and clinical research.

What level of ambition are you expecting to see in applications?

We’re really looking for excellence, and whether a project is something that can potentially jump to a whole new stage of knowledge within an area. Our board asks us about the potential for leaps forward every time we meet with them. At the same time, it’s also important to make sure that really good research groups and research environments can continue on course towards new knowledge and, hopefully, new treatments.

Are there any common mistakes that applicants should avoid?

A common mistake is that people fail to read the small print in the instructions to applicants. They sometimes forget to attach some of the mandatory documents so that when we screen the applications for eligibility, we have to reject them for administrative reasons, which is really a pity because there can still be a great idea in there. Also, we have a very clear scope for our philanthropic activities, so if people are very far away from that scope in what they’re applying for, the likelihood that they’re getting funding is close to zero.

Is there a minimum level of experience required to apply?

People must have PhDs or equivalent experience, and what we see is that we mostly award grants to people who are assistant professors and above that. Your experience as a research leader is, of course, something that is part of the evaluation.

Are there any elements that would make an application stand out?

What’s important for us is that when people apply they have some kind of feasibility analysis of the project that they are suggesting. So if they don’t have all the expertise and infrastructure in-house, within their group, it’s important for us to see in an application who they are teaming up with, to make sure that they cover all the expertise needed.

What would your top advice be to applicants?

The main advice would be: read the application guidelines carefully, then ask us if there’s something you think is unclear. It’s a pity if people think they are a fit for the Leo Foundation and it turns out that they are not, and that kind of question can very easily be clarified by an email or a phone call.

The post Opportunity profile: Danish funder delivers for dermatology appeared first on Research Professional News.

Take your time working up a bid to the EPSRC’s manufacturing stream

The Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council’s Manufacturing the Future panel (previously referred to simply as the ‘manufacturing priority’ panel) meets every quarter and has up to £3 million available per panel meeting. Bids to the panel follow the council’s normal Standard Grant format but focus on research challenges facing the manufacturing industry both now and in the future. Collaborations with businesses and the public sector are encouraged.

The next deadline for applications is 30 March, and this will be the last round before the scheme—as with all EPSRC schemes—moves to the new Funding Service application system. However, those who are now pulling their bids together might be minded not to rush too much to make that deadline. As Dana Ofiteru, senior lecturer in the school of engineering at Newcastle University, told us in 2020, these proposals often involve multiple partners and require patience and persistence.

Top tips

• For Standard Grant applications, take your time finessing the application; if the grant is not ready, do not submit.
• Gaining buy-in from industrial partners not only benefits your project but can impress upon reviewers that a fundamental research project has potential to be applied.
• When paring back a bid, keep the list of the key points you definitely want included to hand.
• When you have taken time to build a strong team, showcase it.

Up to £2 million per proposal is available from the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council’s manufacturing priority panel, but smaller-value and short-term grants are also possible. The next deadline for applications is 31 March, with the following batch of applications likely to be taken in on 2 June, although this date is yet to be confirmed. The panel meets every quarter to discuss proposals.

Dana Ofiteru, senior lecturer at Newcastle University, tells Fiona McIntyre about her £600,000+ win with the EPSRC.

How did you come up with the idea for this project?

My background is in biochemical engineering and my colleague at Newcastle, Enrico Masoero, is the one who works in concrete. Both of us had applied to the EPSRC with separate projects, which hadn’t won through. But we started talking and we came up with this joint idea on how to take forward what we had originally proposed.

What are you trying to achieve?

We saw a gap in research between the microscale simulation and understanding of concrete cracks and bacteria biomineralisation, and the macroscale. Biomineralisation is where material created by microorganisms helps cracks in concrete to close or ‘self-heal’. It is a very slow process; it takes eons to develop. But in the last two decades, different groups have been looking at how to create biomineralisation with bacteria, and they are looking at how this natural process can be used to fill the micro-cracks in concrete.

Why do micro-cracks form?

They form when concrete is curing, because of the impact of rain, wind and so on. There is some autogenous healing, when the cement itself can fill the cracks naturally. However, that can only take you so far, and one way to heal cracks more completely would be to put bacteria to work in the concrete.

How big is a micro-crack?

You don’t see them. When you see a crack in concrete with your naked eye, it’s already too late and the water can reach the metal rods that reinforce the concrete, which makes them rust. But if you could fill the micro-cracks at the moment they appear, you would increase the lifespan of the concrete. 

What are the benefits of doing that?

We have an estimate from 2017 that repair and maintenance costs in the UK construction sector are around £47 billion. That’s a lot of money, and repairing old infrastructure also comes with a lot of greenhouse gas emissions.

If lots of people are already researching self-healing concrete, how is your project different?

What we add with this project is computing and simulations. We have this digital approach to self-healing concrete using bacterial design. If we can simulate how the process happens then we are better informed in choosing the type of bacteria appropriate for a certain type of cement, before actually going and trying it in the lab. You would save time and money by doing this. These experiments are expensive: what you put in the concrete is bacterial spores, which are quite expensive. So there is only so much you can do by trial and error. What we want to have is a tool we can use together with the lab to have a more efficient process. 

Do you have any partnerships in this project?

We have an industrial partnership with Northumbria Water. Newcastle University is coordinating the project but there are two university partners: Cardiff University and the University of Bath. Each has its own budget but the overall project budget is almost £1.2 million. 

And how much funding did you get from the EPSRC for your part of the project?

We received £604,550. That’s 80 per cent of the full economic cost. Newcastle put in the rest.

How did working with Bath, Cardiff and your industrial partners help your bid?

This is a complex project and there is not one person who can do everything, so having partners who have the expertise is definitely helpful. And having industrial support showed the reviewers that it is not just a blue-sky idea and that over the long term it has the potential to be applied. I think this gave credibility to our application.

What has Northumbria Water committed to the project in terms of resources?

They have committed in-kind value of £24,000 through access to their pilot plant research facility, operational expertise and data management and technical support. A representative for them also sits on our steering committee.

Was your technology transfer office involved in your bid?

No, not at this stage.

How many drafts did you go through?

Lots. You only have a limited number of pages—the first draft was probably double what we needed. It was a case of refining and expressing ourselves in the best way possible without losing the main idea. Six pages is not a lot.

How did you decide which sections to keep in your final draft?

We made a list of the ideas that have to be there and then made sure they stayed there after each iteration. You have to be careful that any shortening of the text is not affecting the core ideas you want to present.

How did you make your application stand out?

Because we had identified this gap in research, we stressed this and made the case for it. And we are a good team, we complement each other—sometimes you can have a good idea but you cannot convince reviewers that you are able to deliver. But everyone in the project had the appropriate background to do what they promised.

What advice would you give to anyone looking to apply to this scheme?

Take the time to finesse your bid and write the best project description you can, because you only have one shot—you cannot apply with the same idea again. Although people advise you to just submit, waiting for feedback from people outside the project can help you improve either the format or the way you deliver the message. At Newcastle, the research office offers mock panel exercises, and this is very helpful for giving you an idea of the process.

The post From the archive: Constructing a solid EPSRC bid appeared first on Research Professional News.

A roundup of this week’s Funding Insight articles

This week we profile UK Research and Innovation’s first fully cross-council scheme for research on artificial intelligence in healthcare. We also talk to the director of the Sir Jules Thorn Charitable Trust about its equipment grants and to a winner of the Human Frontier Science Program’s prestigious Early Career Grants scheme. And we dig out Adam Golberg’s eight top tips for funding-call information sessions.

This week in Funding Insight

The first UKRI-wide scheme on potential uses of artificial intelligence in health research has opened with a total fund of £13 million available. UKRI is looking for projects of 18 months’ duration, involving expertise from several disciplines, with a total cost of up to £750,000 (which UKRI will fund at 80 per cent of the full economic cost). The deadline for intentions to submit is 28 February, with full proposals due by 28 March.

Yan Yip, data science programme manager for the Medical Research Council, and Katherine Freeman, a senior portfolio manager for healthcare technologies at the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council, discuss how applicants can tune in to the thinking behind the call.

The Sir Jules Thorn Charitable Trust runs several schemes, including for equipment grants under its Research Infrastructure Fund. Research-active universities and NHS trusts may apply for between £100,000 and £500,000, and this year’s deadline for outline proposals is 28 February.

Richard Benson, the trust’s director, explains that applicants looking to replace old kit used in routine research activities are likely to be disappointed, as the excellence and novelty of the research underpinning the application is the trust’s primary concern.

The Human Frontier Science Program is an international organisation dedicated to boosting collaboration in biomedical research. Founded in the late 1980s, it comprises the G7 nations and Australia, India, Israel, South Korea, Singapore, Switzerland, New Zealand and the non-G7 members of the EU, which are represented by the European Commission.

The HFSP’s Early Career Grants—formerly known as Young Investigators Grants—are for researchers who want to kick-start an interdisciplinary, international collaborative project that would advance research on fundamental health challenges or biological issues. This year, the deadline for letters of intent is 30 March (and applicants must obtain a letter of intent ID number by 21 March).

Following a January archive selection, we spoke with Christine Cheung, an assistant professor at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore, who won a Young Investigators Grant in 2019, to hear how her bid came together.

Archive selection: Major funders, be they national or international, seem to have been pushing towards larger and more strategic grants for a few years now. And these are often attended by town-hall meetings and sometimes networking sessions that aim to inform researchers of what the call is about and, in the latter case, facilitate partnership-building.

In August 2018, Funding Insight columnist Adam Golberg gave potential attendees eight tips on getting the most out of such events. His first is somewhat unlikely, bearing in mind his day job in research management and his having written this article after a UKRI call workshop: “Don’t send research development staff.”

Elsewhere on Research Professional News

Funding: On the cliff edge—Researchers fear for jobs as the government finally rolls out its replacement for EU support

Fears for research jobs as EU funding ends—One-thousand university roles at risk in Wales alone as dozens of projects face closure

Aria chair uses ChatGPT to write his speech—Matt Clifford says new agency has “amazing opportunity to fund the breakthroughs of the future”

ERC urged to remove ‘academic age limits’ on grants—Petition argues PhD-based eligibility windows do “not make sense” and discriminate against unconventional career paths

Sunak’s first 100 days: mixed review from R&D sector—UK prime minister has brought “stability” for R&D but concern grows over tax-credit reforms

If you have comments, feedback or suggestions for Funding Insight, or if there are other people within your institution who would like to receive this weekly email, please contact [email protected]. 

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The Human Frontier Science Program is an international funder focused on the new

Top tips

• Novelty and innovation are watchwords for this funder
• Consider how you can leverage novel technology in your project
• Be proactive in networking—strong bids are likely to grow out of organically generated partnerships

The Human Frontier Science Program (HFSP) is an international organisation dedicated to boosting collaboration on basic research into fundamental biological problems. Founded in the late 1980s, it comprises the G7 nations and Australia, India, Israel, South Korea, Singapore, Switzerland, New Zealand and the non-G7 members of the European Union, which are represented by the European Commission.

The HFSP invites research proposals that take novel approaches to problems via interdisciplinary and international projects. It offers two types of research grants: Early Career Grants and Program Grants.

The Early Career Grants were previously known as Young Investigator’s Grants. Candidates must be within five years of recruitment into an independent position in academia, and they must have finished their PhD no more than 10 years ago.

The Program Grants, meanwhile, allow teams of independent researchers to conduct research through new international collaborations. Each project needs two to four members and there are various amounts of funding available depending on the size of the team.

The deadline for submitting letters of intent for both programmes—which were profiled in Funding Insight in 2022—is 30 March (and applicants must obtain a letter of intent ID number by 21 March).

Christine Cheung, an assistant professor at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore, won a Young Investigator’s Grant in 2019. She discusses her project and how she won funding through the HFSP.

What is your background as a researcher?

My own research programme is around vascular disease biology. We are biologists trying to address the basic mechanisms of endothelial dysfunction, which underlies vascular abnormalities in many inflammatory conditions or degenerative aging conditions.

What does your HFSP project involve?

For the HFSP, the project actually takes a different flavour. The funder requires us to work with investigators from other continents, and the reason for that is because they want investigators to be funded who would otherwise not be supported by local public funding. They value that creativity and that convergence of different disciplines, so it is not just a continuation of our own research programme.

While I am a vascular disease biologist, my co-principal investigator is from a developmental biology background. The funded project looks into developmental aspects of the brain, and how the intertwined relationship of blood vessels and brain development inform and guide each other’s development during our lives. In the project, we use mice and human pluripotent stem cells as our experimental models.

What’s the overall aim of the research?

Whether it’s for regeneration or as part of disease progression, blood vessels are very plastic. There’s a concept called foetal reprogramming that suggests that even in disease, or when the tissue is stressed or vulnerable to trauma, blood vessels can kickstart regeneration and the cells actually enter a foetus-like programme. They actually go back in development and reactivate to help the tissue rebuild. By understanding the early beginnings of the brain and blood vessel development, it may inform other mechanisms that may interplay during disease as well as regeneration and offer some insights for tissue regeneration.

What is the grant’s duration and size?

Young Investigator’s Grants usually run for three years, but we have a one-year extension because of the pandemic. It finishes at the end of this year. Teams are usually between two and five people; we had two people. In total we won US$750,000 (€690,400).

Would the project be difficult to fund locally without the HFSP?

I can’t speak for other countries but in Singapore, our public funding cannot be used outside of the country. Another funding mechanism that allows both myself and my international collaborators to be funded is usually thematic grant calls co-funded by both institutions—say, if my university had an agreement with another university.

It’s very hard to run an international collaboration where all the principals can be funded appropriately to do the research programme together. This is where the HFSP has been very valuable.

So you found your international collaborators before you applied for the HFSP grant?

Yes. We knew each other beforehand, but this grant facilitated us working together. Without it, we would still try to collaborate within our own means. But we would probably only be able to run a pilot project because of funding restrictions.

Was it the first time you applied to the HFSP?

No, I applied once and failed, but it was several years ago. Then in 2019 we tried again but I went in with no expectations. For a winning proposal, maybe one ingredient is to adopt really advanced or emerging technology. Whether you are the developer of a new platform or not, you should be bold enough to leverage new technology.

How far did you mould your research to fit in with the HFSP grant requirements?

In terms of the research scope they’re broad, as long as it’s in life science or biomedicine. We didn’t feel constrained in what we wanted to research. I didn’t give up my fundamentals—my passion is doing vascular biology, and my colleague is into developmental biology. But the research must be interdisciplinary; they want to see novelty and creativity.

How long did it take you to put together your proposal?

For us, the initial conceptualisation stage was around four months. There were two stages: the letter of intent and the full proposal. The letter of intent is a shorter format; they use that to shortlist candidates for the full proposal. With the letter of intent, they look at the scientific merits of the project and also the idea itself—whether it is a novel idea and whether it adheres to the criteria. If you are shortlisted, you have to write something longer and more detailed with your methodology, your implementation plan.

What advice do you have for people considering an application this year or next?

Be proactive. We need to develop our networks and hone our skills—the more applications we make, the better we get. The pandemic has really made us slow down in networking, so maybe it’s time to start again. Go to conferences, build a network, meet other investigators. Because there are many opportunities, and the opportunities lie with the people who have the will to succeed together.

Would you apply to the HFSP again?

Yes. When this project has finished, we want to go for one of the Program Grants but we are still deliberating whether it should be an extension of this current proposal. We could go in as a brand new proposal altogether, because the science has evolved in the three years since we won the previous grant.

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Multidisciplinarity is the lifeblood of a call pushing forward the frontiers of health research

Top tips

• Your team should reflect the multidisciplinary nature of the call.
• Think about more than just the technology you are developing and consider its social, ethical and possibly regulatory aspects.
• Provide evidence of potential usefulness for the technology.

The first UK Research and Innovation-wide scheme on potential uses of artificial intelligence in health research has opened with a total fund of £13 million available.

UKRI is after projects of 18 months’ duration, involving expertise from several disciplines, with a total cost of between £500,000 and £750,000 (which UKRI will fund at 80 per cent of the full economic cost).

The deadline for intentions to submit is 28 February, with full proposals due by 28 March.

Yan Yip, data science programme manager for the Medical Research Council, and Katherine Freeman, a senior portfolio manager for healthcare technologies at the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council, discuss how applicants can tune in to the thinking behind the call.

What is the background to this scheme?

Katherine Freeman: This call is different to previous AI calls as it focuses on health. Challenges in different health areas are unique; therefore, tailored solutions are needed for a particular context. AI technologies need to be developed to meet these challenges and will require collaboration between multidisciplinary team members who can develop suitable solutions and build new capability at the intersection between health (including wider dimensions such as wellbeing), research and AI. Before, we would run more focused disciplinary calls. This is the first time we’ve run a call with such a broad remit.

Yan Yip: There have been other AI-for-health funding opportunities within and outside UKRI, but for UKRI this is the first time we’re offering something that spans the remit of all the research councils. There are still significant barriers in AI in health and innovation, such as health data access, storage and use, understanding societal acceptance of the use of AI in health, and the professional skills to enable this potential.

This funding opportunity is not only about applying AI to understand health problems but also how to create a suitable ecosystem that will enable the use of AI to improve health research. For example, how would you create technology that is effective and trustworthy enough so that it is adopted by clinicians? To do this, AI researchers will have to work closely with end users such as clinicians and patients to develop this technology.

How many projects do you expect to fund?

YY: The funding allows for a maximum of 16 to 17 projects, but the final number of awards made will depend on the quality of the projects and their fit to the call aims.

The call outline says that teams should work across “the nexus of challenge spaces”—could you elaborate on this?

YY: We want people to propose ambitious projects that address multiple aspects of particular health challenges. For example, if you’re creating a piece of technology, is the technology responsible, is it ethical and is it effective? As a development and application project, this isn’t so straightforward. Sometimes there are challenges around data, such as how you are going to ensure that the data you’re using is a suitable resource to develop your algorithm.

For this scheme, applicants have to think about all pieces that fit together to answer a specific health challenge. This is why projects must involve multidisciplinary teams to bring different expertise together.

KF: An example of confronting a challenge would involve working with users of technologies, for example with patients, to ensure they would accept any technology developed. For example, a decision support tool where AI gives diagnoses—would patients approve of that?

What stage of development should ideas be at when researchers apply? Are you looking for identification of a health problem amenable to tackling with AI or do you want teams to bring tech that could potentially do that?

KF: The latter, but any project does need to have a clear health need. We’d consider funding more risky, quite early-stage AI tech but the applicants would have to have the right people in the team and a well-chosen application area in health. I’m not 100 per cent sure how much pilot data is necessary but there would need to be an idea of what you would want to do and some evidence of the potential usefulness.

YY: I wouldn’t say you need to have something that already works, though. You can develop something.

What should applicants know about ethics approvals?

KF: For ethics, we ask applicants to fill out a data management plan, which will cover any data they’re going to use. They also need to spell out what ethical approvals are needed within the project. The panel members that are experts will also be looking at these responses as evaluation criteria and thinking about whether applicants are addressing any possible issues.

What about regulatory issues?

YY: The focus of these projects should be development of innovative technology. This usually means the project would be quite far away from a working prototype and regulatory approval. But what we want applicants to do is think about what is needed, maybe by involving people who have relevant expertise, to help them consider ethical and regulatory concerns so they are prepared when the technology is ready to apply for regulatory approvals.

One of the key problems in this area is that there’s a lot of development but a lot of ineffective technologies are being developed and at certain stages end up failing regulatory assessment. Instead of thinking of the regulatory component when you’ve got a prototype that’s fully formed, we want the applicants to think about it much earlier.

What do applicants need to know about the first phase of application—the intention to submit?

YY: To submit a full proposal, applicants do need to fill out an intention to submit. It helps us gauge the types and number of applications. This way, the office can get the review panel ready and manage the applications. However, it is not used to evaluate applications. It is really just the name of the principal investigator, a couple of keywords, who their co-investigators are and a short abstract.

Is there anything else you would like to mention?

KF: We are running a webinar on 8 February that people can sign up for, and they can always get in touch with us to discuss this opportunity.

The post Opportunity profile: UKRI shows healthy interest in AI appeared first on Research Professional News.

Eight tips for funding-call information sessions and networking workshops

Major funders, be they national or international, seem to have been pushing towards larger and more strategic grants for a few years now. And these are often attended by town-hall meetings and sometimes networking sessions that aim to inform researchers of what the call is about and, in the latter case, facilitate partnership-building.

In August 2018, Funding Insight columnist Adam Golberg gave potential attendees eight tips on getting the most out of such events. His first is somewhat unlikely, bearing in mind his day job in research management and his having written this article after a UK Research and Innovation call workshop: “Don’t send research development staff.”

Nowadays many major grant calls include workshops or networking events, and this is increasingly true of calls from UK Research and Innovation. These typically aim to do two things: first, to publicise the call and answer questions from potential bidders; and second, to facilitate networking and develop consortia, often including non-academic partners.

Space is often limited. There’s an application process to gauge demand and to allocate or ration places (if required) between disciplines and institutions. These events are different from ‘sandpits’, which have a more rigorous and competitive application process and which may result in direct research funding. They’re also distinct from scoping meetings, which define and shape future calls. The advice below focuses on the call-information day, but could also be applicable for sandpits and scoping meetings.

I recently attended my first UKRI call-information event and have come up with hints and tips that might help other first-time attendees.

1.       Don’t send research development staff

Research managers like me are more experienced at recognising how different calls vary, and understanding the specific focus of each, but we can only go so far when it comes to networking and representing academics. Regardless of how well we are briefed, there will come a point at which we can’t answer further questions because we’re not academics. Send an academic if you possibly can.

2.       Hone your pitch

A part of me dies inside every time I use a phrase like “elevator pitch”, but you’re going to be introducing yourself, your team and your ideas many, many times during the day. Prepare a short version and a long version of what you want to say. It doesn’t have to be crafted word for word, but prepare the structure of a clear, concise introduction that you can comfortably reel off. 

3.       Be clear about what you want and what you’re looking for

If you’re planning on leading a bid, say so. If you’re looking to add your expertise on X to another bid to be confirmed, say so. If you’re not sure yet, say so. I’m not sure what possible advantage could be gained about being coy. You could finesse your starting position by talking of “looking to” or “planning to” lead a bid if you want, but it’s much better to be clear.

4.       Don’t just talk to your friends  

Chances are that you’ll have friends or former colleagues at the event who you may not see as often as you’d like, but resist spending too much time in your comfort zone. It’ll limit your opportunities and will make you appear cliquey. Consider arranging to meet before or after the event, or at another time to catch up properly. 

5.       Be realistic about what’s achievable

Although these events shape the composition and focus of bids, I doubt that any collaboration starting from ground level at one of these events has a realistic chance of success.

6.       Do your homework

Most call meetings invite delegates to submit information in advance, usually a brief biography and a statement of research interests. It’s worth taking time to do this well and to read the information submitted by others. Follow up with web searches about potential partners to find out more about their work and, of course, what they look like. Follow them on Twitter too: it’s not stalking if it’s for research collaboration.

7.       Brush up on your networking skills 

If networking is something you struggle with, have a quick read of some basic networking guides. The best tip I was ever given was to regard networking as a process to identify “how I can help these people” rather than “how I can use these people to my advantage”. Also, I’ve found that saying “I think I follow you on Twitter” is an effective icebreaker.

8.       Don’t expect any new call info

There will be a presentation and a Q&A, but don’t expect major new insights. As not everyone can make these events, funders avoid giving any unfair advantages. Differences in nuance and emphasis can emerge in presentations and through questions, but don’t expect radical additional insights or secret insider knowledge.

If your target call has an event along these lines, you should make every effort to attend. Send your prospective principal investigator if you can, another academic if not, and your research development staff only if you must. Do a bit of homework: be clear about what you want to achieve, prepare your pitch and identify the people you want to talk to. In this way you’ll have a much better chance of achieving your goals.

Adam Golberg is research development manager in the faculty of social sciences at the University of Nottingham. He tweets as Cash4Questions and blogs at www.socialscienceresearchfunding.co.uk

The post From the archive: Getting the most from town-hall meetings appeared first on Research Professional News.

The Sir Jules Thorn Charitable Trust’s infrastructure funding scheme is fully focused on translational research

Top tips

• The fund will not normally support replacement of equipment used in routine research activities.
• The excellence and novelty of the research underpinning the application is a primary concern.
• All applications must be within translational research.
• Coordinate with your research office; only one application per calendar year per institution is allowed.

In 1964, businessman Jules Thorn set up a grant-making trust for medical research. Today, the Sir Jules Thorn Charitable Trust runs several schemes, including equipment grants under its Research Infrastructure Fund.

Research-active universities and NHS trusts can apply for between £100,000 and £500,000. Applications can be from any medical discipline or disease area, but the trust requires applicants to demonstrate that the investment will translate into improvements in healthcare for patients. Charities can also apply in partnership with a university.

This year’s call from the fund is now open, with a deadline for preliminary proposals of 28 February. From these, four or five applicants will be shortlisted and asked to submit a more detailed proposal for peer review. Richard Benson, the trust’s director, explains what applicants need to know.

Can you give a brief overview of the trust?

It was established by Sir Jules Thorn, who had created a hugely successful business, mainly in electronics. He had a lifelong interest in medical research and health and care more broadly, and that focus guides our programmes.

Does all your research spending come from the endowment?

Yes, it’s from the endowment.

Where do you focus your activities within healthcare?

Within research, we have a particular focus on translational research. We have a major research award called the Sir Jules Thorn Award. We have an annual competition for that, which normally opens for applications in the late summer. It is worth £1.7 million over five years for a programme of translational research. And we also have the Research Infrastructure Fund.

How would you summarise the fund?

Essentially, its purpose is to support investment in equipment or facilities that will accelerate translational research. Most of the grants go to research-intensive universities. We have also supported some projects in the NHS and some that are partnerships between charities and universities.

How much funding is available?

We typically make two or three awards each year. The number that we make in any given year depends partly on the funds that we have available and partly on the profile of applications that are shortlisted.

What is the success rate?

Because of the focus, we do not get a huge number of applications, but that is fine as we are aiming for quality rather than quantity. Typically, we receive 12 to 15 applications a year. Of those, we probably shortlist four or five and then we might fund two or three.

Do you ever make awards outside the range?

In the past, we have gone outside that range. But after refining the programme in the past few years, that is the scale of projects that we are aiming to support.

Why do you operate a two-phase application system?

Partly because it mirrors the two-stage process that we have for the Sir Jules Thorn Award. For the Research Infrastructure Fund, initial proposals are shortlisted by the trustees. Shortlisted applicants then submit a more detailed proposal, which we send for external peer review. Another reason that we have that two-stage process is because we are very conscious of the amount of work that is involved in putting a full application together. The two-stage system also reduces the burden on reviewers if we are only seeking reviews for a shortlist of four or five rather than 15.

How long is the preliminary proposal?

It is quite short. There is an online application form on our website with set questions. In total, it is about 2,000 words and also asks for some top-line information about the budget and timescales.

What do you look for in a proposal?

The first thing to say is that we are not focused on any particular discipline or disease area. In recent years, we have funded quite a diverse range of projects from things like neuroscience, prototyping neuroprosthetic devices, to haematology and targeted protein degradation.

What the trustees look for is that the proposal should be underpinned by research that is of outstanding quality. The research also has to be translational. Any investment made by the trust should accelerate research and advance translation. The trust is unlikely to support routine replacement of lab equipment or something to enable a research team to keep doing the good things they are doing already. It is looking for projects that are really going to make a difference and help teams accelerate the research they are doing. In addition, the trustees would also look to the principal investigator and their track record.

What mistakes do applicants often make that need to be avoided?

Most applications are strong. We are very happy for people to approach us about potential projects, partly because it is helpful for us to know what may be submitted but also because we are very conscious of the amount of work that goes into putting together even an initial application. We are very happy to have that initial conversation before an organisation puts time and effort into something that may not quite fit or perhaps is not at the right stage.

How important is the part of the application regarding the organisation’s commitment to supporting the maintenance of the equipment?

It is important. The trustees are looking for the underpinning research to be internationally competitive. As well as the quality of the science, the trustees would want to see that it is sustainable. There should be institutional commitment and a pipeline of research funding underpinning the proposal.  

Do you have any other rules or criteria that people should be aware of?

Organisations can only make one application to either the Research Infrastructure Fund or the Innovation and Improvement in Health and Care Fund per calendar year. So if researchers are thinking of applying, they need to coordinate with their faculty office or fundraising team before doing so. And we only fund organisations in the UK. If organisations are successful, they cannot reapply for capital funding from the trust for two years after the award date.

The post Opportunity profile: Get yourself equipped appeared first on Research Professional News.

A roundup of this week’s Funding Insight articles

This week, our columnist Adam Golberg suggests a way to sell yourself effectively on fellowship applications without “nearly cringing to death”, UK Research and Innovation’s challenge director for healthy ageing tells us why applicants to the next round of catalyst awards should be problem-focused, and a former winner of the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science’s Postdoctoral Fellowships scheme tells us how he secured a stay at Saitama University.

This week in Funding Insight

Talking ourselves up or self-promoting is difficult for most people, says Adam Golberg, but there are ways to make it easier and do it better without nearly cringing to death. He presents these—together with a brief lesson in how not to go about it, courtesy of ‘The Donald’—in this week’s Know How column.

Established by UK Research and Innovation and venture capitalists Zinc in 2020, UKRI’s Healthy Ageing Catalyst Awards, which are returning for a fourth annual call this year, will open to applications on 31 January, with a deadline of 21 February. They offer up to £62,500 (at 80 per cent of the full economic cost) and a package of support for those with ideas for a product, service or intervention to improve wellbeing for people as they age.

George MacGinnis, challenge director for healthy ageing at UKRI, explains why the best applicants are often those most likely to “fall in love with a problem rather than its solution”.

Archive selection: The Japan Society for the Promotion of Science works with funders and agencies around the world to bring early career scientists to Japan via its Postdoctoral Fellowships scheme. These are available for researchers of every discipline and in the UK are administered and assessed by the Royal Society (for the natural sciences, with the next deadline on 8 March) and the British Academy (for social science and arts and humanities, with the next deadline in December).

Fellowships provide a subsistence allowance of 362,000 yen (£2,250) a month and offer a settling-in allowance of Y200,000, as well as a return air ticket and insurance. Japanese hosts may also apply for a research grant to cover cooperative research-related expenses.

As Luigi Germinario, a heritage science specialist and 2018-19 postdoctoral fellow, told us in January 2020, these fellowships are always competitive and liaison with potential hosts can be difficult, but most applicants will find a department interested in collaborating quite easily.

Elsewhere on Research Professional News

Research in the NHS ‘on a precipice’, government warned—Peers raise alarm over declining numbers of clinical academics and limited time for research

Curtain rises on Aria as funder formally established—Former vaccine tsar Kate Bingham among those recruited to Advanced Research and Invention Agency board

‘Shameful’ drop in UK foreign office spending on health R&D—New government figures show funding of global health research in 2021 halved from pre-pandemic levels

ResearchFish tweets again with ‘updated social media processes’—But critics claim not enough has changed following Twitter row and want service abandoned

European Commission launches China fellowship programme—Scheme will “foster strategic cooperation with think tanks and universities on China-related issues”

If you have comments, feedback or suggestions for Funding Insight, or if there are other people within your institution who would like to receive this weekly email, please contact [email protected].

The post Talking up your achievements, Healthy Ageing Catalyst Awards, postdoc fellowships in Japan appeared first on Research Professional News.

Flexibility on solutions, but doggedness on a problem, helps in the Healthy Ageing Catalyst Awards

Top tips

• This is a scheme that particularly values input from social sciences and arts and humanities
• Identifying a genuine problem for healthy ageing first and remain flexible regarding your proposed solution
• Ensure the problem you identify is important for ageing people, don’t just assume so
• Demonstrate ambition and motivation at all stages of the process

Established by UK Research and Innovation and venture capitalists Zinc in 2020, UKRI’s Healthy Ageing Catalyst Awards, which are returning for a fourth annual call this year, will open to applications on 31 January, with a deadline of 21 February.

Although highly technical innovations will be welcomed if they hold the possibility of improving health for people as they age, other potential ways of bringing about healthier ageing are very much included. The guidance for the 2023 call says the scheme welcomes in particular “applicants from the arts, humanities and social sciences”.

Awards are worth up to £62,500 (funded at 80 per cent of the full economic cost by UKRI) and come with a package of support from Zinc, including workshops, talks and coaching sessions, to help awardees get their ideas of the ground. Awards are held for 12 months, with the support programme running for nine months.

George MacGinnis, challenge director for healthy ageing at UKRI, gives some advice for those considering an application.

What’s the background to the call?

This call is part of UKRI’s healthy ageing challenge, which aims to enable people to remain active, productive, independent and socially connected for longer as they age. It’s quite a broad agenda, and our investments recognise that this is quite a complex domain.

When we set up the challenge, we aimed to catalyse what I would call an ‘innovation pipeline’, recognising the need not just to help existing innovations to scale up but to bring in new ideas at an early stage.

The Healthy Ageing Catalyst Awards are for that very early stage. The awards were, in fact, inspired by a global partnership led by the US National Academy of Medicine, which aims to incubate high-risk, high-reward innovations in something they call the Healthy Global Longevity Grand Challenge.

What do you hope to achieve through these awards?

We want to take a fresh approach to innovating in this area, in particular helping spinout innovations that are not STEM-based. We wanted to foster spinouts with a difference with potential for impact in the seven themes we identified for our healthy ageing challenge. These range from helping people to remain active through to health at work and managing the common complaints of ageing such as balance, continence and hearing loss.

I imagine there is a strong focus on impact.

That is correct, but the awardees may have different end points in mind for their participation in the scheme. For example, to develop their research, to build a business such as a social enterprise or a charity, or even create a social movement. We are looking for the brightest and the best ideas coming from people with a drive to take risks and become entrepreneurs. In particular, ideas that would not have attracted funding from established funding schemes.

How many awards are you planning to make in this round?

The budget is for 20 awards at £62,500 each. That’s at 100 per cent full economic cost, of which the Economic and Social Research Council will cover 80 per cent.

What support do innovators get through the programme?

They get support both to apply as well as throughout the programme. That comes via our partners, Zinc, a social purpose enterprise accelerator, which helps researchers to translate their knowledge to create new products and services and to develop an enterprise strategy to get those into people’s hands.

What are the eligibility criteria?

The programme is open to innovators with a PhD or equivalent professional experience from any discipline or career stage. We particularly encourage applicants from the arts, humanities and social sciences,as long as their work fits within the scope of the healthy ageing challenge. We’re particularly interested in researchers with diverse backgrounds who bring different perspectives on ageing.

Applicants must be hosted by a UK university or eligible research organisation for the duration of the award. To get the funding they must have support from their research organisation, for example from their tech transfer office and head of department.

I should point out that this scheme has limits on how much international co-investigators can be used—and only a maximum of 30 per cent of the budget can go towards that. We typically expect principal investigators to commit at least 30 per cent of their time to the programme.

Do you welcome early career researchers?

Yes, in fact we positively encourage early career researchers, as they are more likely to consider alternative career pathways to achieve impact for their research. We also see this as a great opportunity for them to have their first grant as a principal.

What are your tips for first-time applicants?

We have a resource hub where people can view some workshops that we held about the call. There are also materials on taking an entrepreneurial approach to translational research. We recommend that people take a look at those.

My second tip would be to leave space in your bid for flexibility in how you develop a solution, so you can adapt as you learn what works through early experimentation. In other words, we encourage people to fall in love with the problem, rather than the solution.

Third, make sure there is a clear link between the problem you want to solve, the people you want to serve and the solutions you propose. That sounds obvious, but one of the reasons why we emphasise the importance of the arts, humanities and social sciences is it is very easy to assume that people have a need when actually it’s not what people want. Understanding the context within which your innovation would be employed is vital.

Any pitfalls applicants should avoid?

First and foremost, don’t treat this as a standard research grant. This is an opportunity to take an entrepreneurial approach and to use your skills and knowledge in a new way to develop and deliver solutions for people.

The scheme has three stages—what do you look for at the expression of interest stage?

We’re looking for a convincing description of the problem you want to address, and ideas for the solution that are innovative and could create a significant impact. That being the case, it’s important to know what innovations are already out there. We also want evidence that the person applying has the motivation and experience to drive the project forward.

Who are full applications assessed by?

There will be a panel who bring relevant expertise both in the broad discipline area as well as in managing innovations. In addition, the panel will consider views put forward by a panel of people who bring lived experience. The final stage of the assessment—the Dragon’s Den-style pitch—is where applicants get a chance to help the panel to really understand your ambition. We hold those online to ensure travel is not a barrier to participation.

What do you expect the success rate to be like?

In our early workshops, we attracted several hundred researchers interested in these awards. At the end of February, we expect that to convert into the region of 100-150 expressions of interest, which are relatively light-touch proposals. After the expression of interest phase, people will be run through some further development workshops and, by the time we look at full submissions, we’d expect to be working with around 40-50 applicants for the 20 awards on offer.

Are you planning future rounds of this scheme?

Yes, but in a subtly different form. ESRC and the Arts and Humanities Research Council are currently collaborating to develop a follow-on scheme based on this, which will be more broad-based to support innovation from the arts, humanities and social sciences. But this won’t just be focused on healthy ageing.

The post Opportunity profile: Be problem-focused to help healthy ageing appeared first on Research Professional News.

Japanese universities can be excellent bases for research in many fields

The Japan Society for the Promotion of Science works with funders and agencies around the world to bring early career scientists to Japan via its Postdoctoral Fellowships scheme. These are available for researchers of every discipline and in the UK are administered and assessed by the Royal Society (for the natural sciences, with the next deadline on 8 March) and the British Academy (for social science and arts and humanities, with the next deadline in December).

Fellowships provide a subsistence allowance of 362,000 yen (£2,250) a month and offer a settling-in allowance of Y200,000, as well as a return air ticket and insurance. Japanese hosts may also apply for a research grant to cover cooperative research-related expenses.

As Luigi Germinario, a heritage science specialist and 2018-19 postdoctoral fellow, told us in January 2020, these fellowships are always competitive and liaison with potential hosts can be difficult, but most applicants will find a department interested in collaborating quite easily.

Top tips

• Success rates on these fellowships are low but do not be put off; the application is not onerous and much will be handled by the host university.
• Japan-based researchers in fields that are less of a strategic priority in the country may be particularly welcoming of collaboration. Do not be afraid to reach out.
• Be prepared for difficulties liaising with your host university, as many university administrators and staff will not speak English.
• The fellowship is often generous but be aware that it will be administered by the university and you are unlikely to be given much autonomy in managing your funds.

For postdoctoral researchers keen to gain experience working in Japan, the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science’s (JSPS) Postdoctoral Fellowships are a lifeline. 

The fellowships are open to early career researchers in any discipline and can be held for up to two years. 

Applications are often via national agencies and this is the case in the UK, where the Royal Society oversees applications for the natural sciences and the British Academy for humanities and social science applications.

Luigi Germinario, a 2018-19 JSPS postdoctoral fellow, is researching stone weathering in underground heritage at Saitama University. He applied via the Italian Ministry of Education, Universities and Research.

In a few words, what do you study?

My research field is midway between geology and cultural heritage. I study stone materials—their deterioration, interactions with the environment, aspects fundamental to preserving them. In Japan, I am studying historical man-made caves. These are artificial caves dug for specific reasons. For instance, one was made by Buddhist monks because they wanted to build an underground temple where they could meditate and pray. Another was created for underground burials for aristocrats and emperors 1,500 years ago.  

How did you hear about the fellowship?

At the beginning I did some research online, since I was trying to move abroad for my postdoctoral studies and was thinking about going to east Asia. I then started emailing with a professor, who would eventually become my host researcher. Later we met at a conference—this was in spring 2017. But I waited a bit before applying to the fellowship because I had a short-term position in Hungary, which I had to finish before I could consider myself free. 

What was the application process like?

I applied in August 2017 and the fellowship started in December 2017. The process itself wasn’t too difficult—as for similar applications, there’s a little paperwork to deal with. There’s a structured form you need to fill out with your qualifications, and the most lengthy part was the research project section, which was two pages long. They give you that page limit, so you need to condense all your ideas. The project description is pretty brief but, of course, it needs to be organic and your thoughts need to be clear. 

Did you need to make a presentation to the committee?

There was no interview for this application. When you’re a JSPS researcher, the management of your research funds is made through the professor. So, the professor I’m working with dealt with the paperwork and sent everything with JSPS through the university.

How did you find a professor to work with?

After coming across the professor’s work, I simply sent her an email. Later, we met up at the conference. At the early stage it was a very informal chat—I just said I’d done my PhD and I’d like to go to Japan, and I’d seen that not many people in my field were doing this work. So we began to have a chat. We didn’t really get any further because I was about to move to a different country for a short-term postdoctoral degree.  

Did you find building that partnership was quite easy?

Yes. In general, at least, my field is not well represented in Japan and as a result Japanese researchers tend to be very enthusiastic about collaboration. International collaborations are vital to them. 

What sorts of expenses does your JSPS fellowship cover?

Of course, I get a stipend. I use research money for field trips to do things such as rock sampling and environmental monitoring, since I study the microenvironment at caves—factors such as temperature, humidity and water quality. I also use research funds for lab analysis—for example, studying chemical composition of rocks. Labs at my university are not free and you need to pay by the hour for machines, which the fellowship covers. A large part of research funds are for conferences.

Where is your work based?

I live near Tokyo, in Saitama—roughly 30 kilometres away. My work is based more or less in the same area. The caves I’m studying are within a day’s trip from Tokyo. 

Will your fellowship contribute to funding travel further afield?

Yes, this year I’ll be in India, Austria and Portugal. Travel for conferences requires quite a lot of money because most scholars in my field are generally in Europe and I need to present my research.

Were there any limitations to the fellowship?

Very often you cannot communicate directly with university offices in Japan because the English level is usually very low. That’s one of the limitations in working in Japan. You’re not very autonomous in managing your funds. So your professor directly asks for refunds and writes paperwork that justifies money they need for conferences and trips. Of course, you agree upon expenses together, but you don’t have a webpage that you can check to see you’ve got Y100,000 left for next month and plan what you’re going to do with that money.

Is it your first time working in Japan? Would you recommend it?

Yes. I’ve been here one and a half years out of my two-year fellowship now. I’d recommend a short-term stay like this. It’s a good taster to living in Japan, and if you’re studying Japanese culture, there’s no substitute for actually working here.

What tips might you give someone applying for the fellowship?

One of the things that discouraged me was the success rate on JSPS calls—it’s pretty low. But a professor told me, Luke, don’t let it get you down if you don’t pass in your first application—in general, you need a few tries before you get it. And I wound up getting it on my first try. I would say: just don’t think about it.

Anything else?

The next deadline is in March, so depending on your professor’s schedule, it would be a good idea to start as soon as possible—also, every university has an internal deadline to submit documents before the official deadline. So be mindful of internal deadlines.

The post From the archive: Uncovering a postdoc in Japan appeared first on Research Professional News.

Tips on overcoming modesty to present your achievements in the best light

Talking ourselves up or self-promoting is difficult for most people. But there are ways to make it easier and do it better without nearly cringing to death. Some involve writing techniques—of which more later—but others involve ways of thinking that may give you permission to write about yourself.

Talking about her successful bid to the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council Discovery Fellowship in Funding Insight last year, Amanda Warr, who is based at the University of Edinburgh, advises future applicants to “remember that the people you work with know what you can do, but the people who read the application know nothing about you”.

This is a great point. If you are writing for people who know nothing about you, it’s your responsibility to them to tell them what they need to know. We are rarely called upon to give a full account of our career and accomplishments to a stranger, which is partly why it feels odd when we are. Modesty in front of people you know is all well and good—they will often already be aware of the broad outline of your story—but strangers do not.

Leaving aside the cringe factor, it’s often difficult for us to identify our strengths. That is because we are prone to taking our own strengths and achievements for granted and not properly recognising them. This is what’s at the heart of imposter condition—sometimes called imposter syndrome). 

We undervalue or discount what we can do, wrongly thinking that everyone has those skills. We then focus on the skills we don’t have—again, wrongly assuming everyone else has them. There is an excellent diagram by US software consultant David Whittaker that explains this.

It’s also worth knowing about the Johari window—a psychological model developed by Joseph Luft and Harrington Ingham in 1955. For current purposes, it’s sufficient to note that there’s a subsection of things about me which are not known to me—or at least are not obvious—but which are known and more obvious to others. Which is why you should always ask people who know you well for feedback on fellowship or job applications. I want to know what they know about me that I don’t, or that I’ve overlooked or taken for granted.

Cultural cringe

Modesty and understatement are highly valued in several cultures, including, I would argue in the UK and other places in Europe. In the UK this cultural preoccupation can lead to a false or (better) performative modesty. Perhaps it’s partly a result of a puritanical Christian tradition that values humility among its subjects, and partly something about academia. But there’s a taboo about seeming boastful or engaging in self-promotion that can extend even to talking about one’s own achievements at all.

To take things back to pre-Christian philosophy, Aristotle didn’t regard modesty or humility as virtues. More than that, he argued they were vices. Claiming that your worth and value and achievements are less than they are is an offence against sincerity and truth, he argued. Of course, so is boasting and overclaiming, with the treasured ‘golden mean’ being a full and honest account of your achievements and abilities.

So, when you come to write a job application, fellowship application, or a resume for researchers, you should do so knowing that if you’re giving a full and honest account of your achievements and abilities, you’ll have the spirit of Aristotle in your corner, cheering you on, urging you towards virtue.

Show and tell

I could tell you that I’m an experienced, effective research development professional with outstanding communication skills and a network and profile beyond my own institution.

Or… I could tell you that I’ve got over 17 years’ experience in research development. That I’m a former UK Association of Research Managers and Administrators research development special interest group co-chair, and that I co-developed a new ‘advanced’ research development peer-learning training course. That I’m an occasional Research Professional columnist.

The first paragraph is telling. The second is showing. Even in the restricted space above, the latter is more effective than the former. But, because of a lack of space, I haven’t even martialled the ‘showing’ properly by ‘telling’ the reader why I’m citing these examples, what they demonstrate and why that matters.

I’ve written before about the cut and paste error in grant writing, which is when there is text so generic that it could be cut and pasted into any other applicants’ proposal with a minimum of editing. Such generic text doesn’t help your case unless it’s supplemented by specifics—by evidence and examples. Not only is this more effective, but it’s also easier to write because you’re just stating facts.

I can’t leave this topic without mentioning what we might call Trumping: telling but not showing, assertion without evidence. Matt Crawford wrote this exquisite parody of the kind of academic paper that Donald might have Trumped out. Read it and let it be a warning to you.

Lawyer up

One writing technique I’ve experimented with involves channelling your inner barrister. Your inner barrister is a paid advocate whose role is to make the strongest possible case for their client, which is you. As a responsible legal professional, they are not allowed to lie or argue in bad faith. However, they are allowed to assemble the best possible case and put the best possible spin on your skills and achievements. Not only are they allowed, they are professionally obliged to do so. It’s literally their (imaginary) job.

If your mind works in such a way that it can accommodate this slightly odd construction, then try it. Try channelling your inner barrister and let them take over the writing. Just as a game, as an exercise. Don’t censor, don’t try to reassert control. Just let them write and see what comes out.

And even if this conceit doesn’t work for you, there’s something to be said for just allowing yourself to write without trying to edit as you go. Tough out the cringe and keep writing. You can always edit later, but at least you’ll have material to edit.

Adam Golberg is research development manager (charities) at the University of Nottingham. He tweets @Cash4Questions and blogs at socialscienceresearchfunding.co.uk

The post The hard sell appeared first on Research Professional News.

A roundup of this week’s Funding Insight articles

This week, we profile two calls focused on environmental science—the Arts and Humanities Research Council’s Green Transition Ecosystems call and the British Ecological Society’s Research Grants—and take a second look at a pair of schemes from the Human Frontier Science Program.

This week in Funding Insight

Following on from its recent Design Exchange Partnerships call, which focused on small, local projects, the AHRC is now looking to fund large-scale projects to translate design-led research into real-world benefits. The Green Transition Ecosystems (GTE) call will fund four projects worth a total of up to £18.5 million. The deadline is 28 March.

AHRC’s Samantha McGregor, head of artificial intelligence and design, and Katherine Mansfield, senior investment manager for design, outline the key features of the call and the steps applicants can take to give their bids a fighting chance of success.

The British Ecological Society is now into its 110th year of existence and its Research Grants are an important part of its work. It holds two rounds of funding each year with three types of Research Grants on offer. Its Small Research Grants are worth up to £5,000, Large Research Grants support projects up to £20,000, while the Ecologists in Africa Grant is worth up to £8,000, and is open to citizens of specified African countries.

The first round for all three grants is open now and closes on 15 March. Outreach Grants—open to members and worth up to £2,000—are also available. BES chief executive Hazel Norman and grants and community engagement officer Dylan Byrne describe how the grants work and key elements reviewers like to see.

Archive selection: The Human Frontier Science Program (HFSP) has been in the business of encouraging international, interdisciplinary collaboration on fundamental health challenges since the late 1980s. Its main mechanism for doing this is via its annual research grant schemes: its Early Career Grants and Program Grants, which provide funding for three years for teams of two to four people from a mix of countries.

This year, those applying to either of these schemes must obtain a letter of intent ID number by 21 March and submit the letter of intent on 30 March. Full proposals for invited teams will be due in mid-September. The application system will open later this month.

Last year, Almut Kelber, director of research grants at the HFSP, explained the funder’s rationale and gave advice on how applicants can curry favour.

Elsewhere on Research Professional News

Fresh group of ERC winners leaving UK—More leading researchers departing as delay over joining EU R&D programmes continues

Funders must dismantle ‘many barriers’ to access, says report—“Systematic, coordinated approach” needed from universities and funders to break down barriers for marginalised groups

AI campus and ‘learning theatre’ among Levelling Up Fund winners—Second funding round provides boosts for locations including Blackpool and Derby

‘No optimism’ on resolving UKRI pay dispute, says union—Prospect union plans to ballot members at the end of the month over pay

A room booking of one’s own—Adam Golberg looks at what procedures for booking seminar rooms reveal about university culture

If you have comments, feedback or suggestions for Funding Insight, or if there are other people within your institution who would like to receive this weekly email, please contact [email protected].

The post AHRC’s £18.5m green design scheme, British Ecological Society, Human Frontier Science Program appeared first on Research Professional News.

Be bold to have your international life-sciences collaboration funded by the Human Frontier Science Program

The Human Frontier Science Program (HFSP) has been in the business of encouraging international, interdisciplinary collaboration on fundamental health challenges since the late 1980s. Its main mechanism for doing this is via its annual research grant schemes: its Early Career Grants and Program Grants, which provide funding for three years for teams of two to four people from a mix of countries.

This year, those applying to either of these schemes must obtain a letter of intent ID number by 21 March and submit the letter of intent on 30 March. Full proposals for invited teams will be due in mid-September. The application system will open later this month.

Last year, Almut Kelber, director of research grants at the HFSP, explained the funder’s rationale and gave advice on how applicants can curry favour.

Top tips:

• Think carefully about whether you need two team members from the same country: you will have to work hard to convince the reviewers that this is necessary.
• Emphasise the fact that your question is new and fundamental, rather than the next step in your existing research.
• Interdisciplinarity is strongly encouraged and each team member should be integral to the project.

The HFSP is an international organisation designed to push the boundaries of research in the life sciences. Founded in the late 1980s, its comprise the G7 nations and Australia, India, Israel, South Korea, Singapore, Switzerland, New Zealand and the non-G7 members of the European Union, who are represented by the European Commission.

The HFSP offers funding for basic research into fundamental health challenges or biological issues, with an emphasis on interdisciplinary research. It runs two annual grant programmes, one for early career researchers—Early Career Grants—and another for academics at any stage of their careers—Program Grants. Both provide funding for three years for teams of two to four people, who must be from a mix of countries.

The deadline for submitting a letter of intent to either scheme this year is 24 March. Almut Kelber, director of research grants at the HFSP, talks about the need for interdisciplinary and international collaboration to push the boundaries of biology.

What is the aim of the HFSP?

Today you would call it science diplomacy: to bring people together to study basic life science questions in an international context, where people collaborate between the many different countries that are members of the HFSP. Since it began in 1990 we have funded about 7,000 scientists.

Why are the grants split into Program and Early Career categories?

Initially, the early career researchers may have been intimidated. What the organisation wanted to achieve is that people who have just started their own labs feel encouraged to apply for an HFSP grant.

The Early Career category has been renamed. It used to be called Young Investigator Grants, but ‘young’ sounds like it’s linked to age, which is not the point. The Early Career scheme is restricted to five years after each team member started their own lab, and 10 years after their PhDs

Can early career researchers apply for the Program scheme too?

Yes. We do have many early career members in the Program grants. The average age is below 50.

Are you looking to fund a specific area of research with the grants?

It’s about fundamental questions. There is no need to have an applied aspect to the project. It doesn’t hurt if there is an applied aspect to the project, but the funding will be awarded for the originality and the character of the basic scientific question asked. We are not that interested to hear about the next step in the laboratory, which is what the national funding agencies usually fund.

Are you looking for interdisciplinarity in research teams?

We say ‘interdisciplinarity’ loudly, but we don’t want it for its own sake. What we want to achieve is that scientists from other research disciplines come to the project with a completely different view to a question.

What kind of interdisciplinarity is encouraged? Is there a role for humanities?

It depends on the question. There has been a project that is pretty far from what you usually read or write about, which was on climate control in termite mounds. There was an architect involved, because the termites built their mounds in a way that was air conditioned and inside the mound was cooler than outside.

But often team members which are not biologists are in physics, engineering, mathematics, computational sciences. Occasionally they are in social sciences, but that’s rarer. Humanities are not excluded—there have been projects funded on cognition, and they can have a member from a completely different discipline that comes from the humanities.

How many teams are you looking to fund through the calls?

That depends on the budget for 2023, which isn’t set yet. Normally, around 30 projects are funded. The number of applications is in the range of 700, sometimes 800, so the success rate is not extremely high.

We have a two-step application process. The first step is to send a letter of intent, which is what we are asking for now. The success rate to be invited to send a full application is about 10 per cent. In the second step, which is the full application, about half or a third of the proposals are funded.

How much teams can expect to win?

The amount of money they win is set by the team size. It used to be $250,000 (£184,000) per year for a two-member team, $350,000 for three members and $450,000 for four members. That is increasing. People who start writing the application in the next round and will have their funding awarded in 2023, they will get $300,000, $400,000 or $500,000 per year for the team. We expect them to divide that more or less evenly between team members. But they can decide that.

What does the funding cover?

It can cover everything except studentships. They can pay for PhD students, but not for study fees. They cannot pay the principal investigator’s or any senior colleagues’ salaries. That should come from institutions. But it can cover the salaries of PhDs, post-docs, lab assistants.

What are you looking for in the letter that would make you want to see the full proposal?

There are a few things to do, and a few things to avoid. Do not apply with what would be the next logical step for research in any team members’ lab. The reviewers will see from the CV that is sent in, or the publications, whether what they suggest as an HFSP project is actually just along the lines of what they are already doing, or whether it’s new. Of course, they have to have the knowledge and the methods of their field, but they should step out of their current research.

For the letter of intent, it is important that the reviewers can see that the competence of all team members is required, and that close collaboration is planned between the team members—not four team members working in parallel on similar projects.

Any more tips?

It shouldn’t be teams of good, old friends and collaborators; it should be new teams and new collaborators. And it should be an international team. It’s interesting, if you talk to people who have been collaborating, say, in the US and Japan, the way of thinking is different even within the same field.

Are teams with two members from the same country eligible to apply?

Yes, but teams with two members from the same institution are not. It’s still possible to have more than one team member from the same country, unless it’s a two-member team. But if there is more than one team member in the same country, we ask teams to explain why that second member from the same country is needed.

Is it hard to convince reviewers why two people from the same country are needed?

I’m not 100 per cent sure how our reviewers determine this. Really, if it’s a national partner, it should be someone who has got such a specific and competence for the project, and a method and knowledge that you can’t easily find it somewhere else.

The HFSP is funded by 14 nations and the European Union. Of course, each of them wants to see international collaboration, so there should be as little national collaboration as possible. We know that if you are a team of four, it can be easier to have a fourth member from the same country, but they need to argue it a bit.  They also get a little less funding if they have two members in the same county.

They count as 1.5 members rather than two, don’t they?

Yes. They get 50,000 USD less in the team if two members are from the same country.

Can people who have previously applied put in another application?

Yes. In contrast to many organisations, we don’t have a formal re-application procedure. We do give feedback at the full application stage.

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AHRC’s Future Observatory: Design the Green Transition programme continues with a major call

Top tips

• This call is about realising the green transition through arts and humanities design research, so make sure the main thrust of your bid reflects that
• Engage with the Future Observatory at the Design Museum when putting together your bid
• Be ambitious but focused
• Ensure you have engaged the right partners to reflect the outcomes you want to achieve

The Arts and Humanities Research Council is further expanding its work on environmental issues with its Green Transition Ecosystems (GTE) call, which will fund projects worth a total of up to £18.5 million. Following on from its recent Design Exchange Partnerships (profiled in Funding Insight), which focused on small, local projects, it seeks to support large-scale projects to translate design-led research into real-world benefits.

The AHRC expects to make four awards of 19 months’ duration. Each can have a full economic cost of up to £4.625m of which up to £4m would be funded at 80 per cent of full economic cost, while a ringfenced amount of £625,000, paid at 100 per cent, will support activities to be delivered by the Future Observatory engagement hub at the Design Museum. The deadline for applications is 28 March.

AHRC’s Samantha McGregor, head of artificial intelligence and design, and Katherine Mansfield, senior investment manager for design, outline the key features of the call.

What’s the background to this call?

This call is part of our £25m Future Observatory: Design the Green Transition programme, led by the AHRC in partnership with the Design Museum. The programme was set up in response to the Design Council’s Design Economy report, which acknowledged the role that design research can play in addressing different policy priorities, including around net zero and the transition to a green economy. We’ve been working on design in various guises at AHRC for a long time now and we’ve got quite a breadth of different types of investment, from PhD studentships right through to these much larger-scale investments.

What are GTEs?

They are large-scale projects which aim to translate the best design-led research into real-world benefits. The idea is that each GTE will address its own distinct challenge posed by the climate crisis. This could include realising the UK’s net zero goal but is not limited to this. The GTE will then develop a programme of research and innovation activity tailored to address that challenge through multi-disciplinary research.

What kind of challenges could projects focus on?

Projects might focus on a challenge relating to a particular sector or region, or both. It might include low-carbon and carbon-neutral product design, circular service design to drive environmental sustainability/climate adaptation, new policies and business models that support skills development, or new modes of engagement that drive adoption and behaviour change that contributes to the green transition.

Is there still the usual requirement that the focus for the project falls mostly within the AHRC’s remit?

We expect this to be a multi-disciplinary project and project team but, yes, the overall portfolio of proposed activities has to be at least 50 per cent within AHRC’s disciplinary remit.

What does the funding cover?

Unlike some of the other calls we are running as part of the programme where the costs are more limited, this funding opportunity offers a breadth of opportunities. We expect to be supporting salary costs, some equipment, outreach activities and events, as well as your standard research costs and researcher time. It’s worth mentioning that we are piloting a slight adjustment to our co-investigator policy for this call. Similarly to the Economic and Social Research Council, we will be offering the opportunity for businesses and third-sector co-investigators to receive funding. This can be up to 30 per cent of the total cost of the grant.

Why are projects limited at 19 months’ duration?

We are only able to commit funding under the programme during the current spending review period. We anticipate a longer-term funding horizon for the programme, but this will be subject to further financial approvals. We’d encourage all applicants to think about and detail, where possible, their plans to safeguard the longevity of the project. That might include seeking further UK Research and Innovation funding but could equally be about building in structures and mechanisms from the outset that support the legacy of work and the relationships that will have developed.

What do you expect project teams to look like?

These are large-scale projects, both in terms of the money involved and in terms of the project team. There must be at least six partners involved, including two UK research organisations, two UK-based businesses, one public sector organisation, and one third-sector organisation. In terms of the GTE director (principal investigator) role, they must have a relevant and robust academic track record. Job share applications for the director role will be considered provided they meet the criteria set out in our call guidance.

Are you encouraging involvement from early career researchers?

There are opportunities for early career researchers to be involved as part of the project team, although we probably wouldn’t expect them to lead a GTE. Due to the size of these awards, the project teams will inevitably be quite large, meaning there should be opportunities for early career researchers. We would recommend that those interested in the scheme first talk to their research office to see if their university is submitting a bid and how to get involved.

What tips do you have for applicants?

Our top tip would be to engage with the Future Observatory at the Design Museum. They are an important part of this call. It’s vital that prospective applicants speak to them and find ways to engage throughout their project if they are successful.

Another tip is to be ambitious. This is a large grant with the potential for amazing impact. Think about the legacy and opportunity beyond the scope of this project and the 19 months you have. At the same time, don’t try to boil the ocean. We would rather awardees did some tightly focused work and produced impressive outcomes rather than spread themselves too thinly to produce excellent work.

Also, think about getting the right partners involved. Think carefully about what outcomes you want to realise from your work and make sure the partners reflect that.

What common errors to these kinds of calls should applicants avoid?

This is not specific to design-related calls but it can be tempting on larger calls for researchers to take an idea that is tangentially related and then try to shoehorn that idea into the call. There’s some fuzzing around the edges people can do to their idea to make it fit, but ultimately the core of this is about realising a positive green transition through arts and humanities design research.

How are the bids assessed?

Firstly, the bids go out to our peer reviewers. The principal investigator will then get a chance to respond to their comments. Then all bids are sent to our standard AHRC moderation panel. We’ve got five main areas of assessment criteria: strategy and vision; collaboration and partnerships; building research capacity; management and governance; and delivery.

How many applications do you expect for this call?

Because of the size of the award and the scope of the specification, we wouldn’t expect more than 10 applications.

What will happen after this funding round?

We’ve got two more rounds of Design Exchange Partnerships and Design Accelerators, which we’ve funded through our Impact Acceleration Accounts. We’re not expecting another ecosystems call – at least not in the current funding period. But that doesn’t mean there won’t be another call in the future.

Is there anything else applicants should know?

We’ve got a town hall meeting on 31 January, which will be organised by the Design Museum’s Future Observatory. We would strongly encourage people to attend. We also have some application development surgeries in mid-February. These will be a good opportunity to speak to AHRC and Future Observatory staff about any issues that have arisen as applicants prepare their bids.

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The British Ecological Society’s funding is open to scientists all around the world

Top tips

• The society only supports projects where it can be the majority funder.
• Grants are open to all members, regardless of career stage.
• Track record is considered but is balanced by assessment of impact an award would have on the applicant’s career.
• Grants are relatively small so ensure your proposal is realistic.
• Show evidence-based impact and clear methodology—these are highly valued by reviewers.

The British Ecological Society is now into its 110th year of existence—but this is its first profile in Funding Insight. The BES’s Research Grants are an important part of its work and ensure not only that the society maintains an active role in ecological science but also that it supports the next generation of ecologists as they build their careers.

The society holds two rounds of funding each year offering three types of Research Grants

• Small Research Grants of up to £5,000, open to members of the BES.
• Large Research Grants of up to £20,000, open to those who have been members for at least two years prior to application.
• Ecologists in Africa Grant of up to £8,000, open to citizens of African countries classed as a ‘low-income economy’ or ‘lower-middle-income economy’ in the World Bank categorisation, who are working in Africa, with no membership restrictions.

The first round for all three grants is open now and closes on 15 March. Outreach Grants—open to members and worth up to £2,000—are also available. The second annual round of funding will open in early July. With the exception of the Ecologists in Africa Grants, all schemes are open to ecologists in any geographical location.

BES chief executive Hazel Norman and grants and community engagement officer Dylan Byrne describe how the grants work and key elements reviewers like to see.

How would you summarise the call?

Hazel Norman: We invite ecologists from around the world to apply for our Research and Outreach Grants. We usually award about 50 grants per year and try to help early career ecologists in particular because they struggle to get funding. But the grants will support any ecologist who wants to advance ecological science and the understanding of ecology via a project. The BES sees funding as a crucial way to support a thriving ecological community and thriving ecological science.

How many are given out for each type of grant typically each year?

Dylan Byrne: We usually award about six to seven Large Research Grants each year. For the Small Research Grants, it is around 14. Similar for the Outreach Grants. For the Ecologists in Africa it is around seven to eight awards per year. Our success rate is around 15 per cent across all our grants. Overall, we have got £400,000 of funding that we award every year.

Can grants be used as bolt-ons to larger projects?

DB: If you apply for a BES grant, we must fund the majority of the project. If you have already got a project in the works and you require some additional funding, we would not fund that. We basically fund projects where people have an idea but they need funding to be able to do it. We do not want to act as a top-up fund and so we have to be the majority funder.

HN: People often build projects from different funding pots, but we don’t like to fund that kind of research. We are much more interested in being a main funder on a particular project.

If a researcher wants to get money from elsewhere, should they make that clear in the application?

DB: When someone applies, we have a budget table that breaks down all the costs. For example, equipment and accommodation if they need it. If it is a Large Research Grant, for example, and their costs came to £26,000 and they can only request £20,000—the maximum we award—they would have to justify where the other £6,000 would come from, and there is space to do that. But, again, we would still need to be the majority funder.

Who are the grants primarily intended for?

DB: Our grants are open to most people in membership although there are some eligibility criteria that must be met. One of the main ones is that we would not fund to complete a PhD project but we would fund a project that compliments a PhD. It generally tends to be early career researchers applying for the Small Research Grants especially but those are still open to anyone.

How much is track record considered on bids and is it balanced by other criteria for early career researchers?

DB: Track record is scored so we do look at evidence of what a researcher has done in the past. But we also look at impact as part of the scoring criteria, which includes how much of an impact would this funding have on a person’s career.

What would make a proposal stand out in the calls?

DB: For all our grants, evidence-based impact with a strong understanding of methodology will always make an application stand out. That is, make sure that whatever you are doing has an impact that you can evidence, that you understand the methodology you are using and that your evidence can be achieved in a realistic timeframe.

Beyond that, we always look for a good, clear breakdown of your costs in the budget table. Being realistic about how much a project will cost is also important. For example, the Small Research Grant, which is maximum £5,000—what can you do with that £5,000?

You need to know and show what you are going to do, how you are going to do it, why you are going to do it and the impact that it is going to have. On the BES website, we have examples of successful grant applications that can help in understanding what a high-scoring grant looks like.

HN: I’d second that the peer review college is always interested in seeing that the proposal is realistic within the time frame and the resources asked for.

Are there any geographical restrictions on where the research can be carried out?

DB: Apart from the Ecologists in Africa scheme, there are no geographical restrictions either on location for the research or the researcher’s home base. We see ourselves as supporting the global ecological community.

How do you assess applications?

DB: Our review college is made up of 350 members who have completed a PhD or are undertaking one. We match up the topics of the application with the topics of the Review College members. Three members review and comment on each grant. 

If a person is successful or not, they get to see those reviewer feedback comments. We also have a grants committee made up of 12 members who will review the highest scoring grants and have the final say on what projects get funded. 

This committee also regularly reviews our grant application process and eligibility criteria to ensure our grants meet the needs of the global ecological community and align with our society’s values and strategy.

What are the available topics for BES grants?

HN: Our grants can cover over 30 topics, all relating to different branches of ecology, from agroecology to urban ecology. Selecting three topics relevant to your grant application helps us ensure that the most relevant members of the review college assess and score your application.

Do you have any other advice for potential applicants?

DB: Don’t be afraid to apply even if the competition is tough. We use Flexigrant, which is a user-friendly online grants platform. Starting the process helps to understand the process and what type of questions are asked.

All applicants get feedback whether their grant is successful or not. We accept modified reapplications; the original proposal should be 80 per cent different and they must take the reviewers’ feedback on board.

If potential applicants have questions, is it easy to get in touch with you?

DB: I am the BES grants and community engagement officer. If anyone ever has any questions, they come directly to me. They are not dealing with multiple people, they are just dealing with one person through the whole process.

HN: I would really encourage anyone with eligibility or any other questions to reach out to BES and Dylan before they put their application. One question can often save a lot of time and effort.

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A roundup of this week’s Funding Insight articles

This week, Funding Insight enters 2023 in customary fashion—by relaying the failsafe prophecies of Phil Ward, director of the Eastern Arc consortium. In addition, we take a look at Moderna’s Global Fellowships scheme, and give a special heads-up to any early-career vets looking to get pilot research projects off the ground.

This week in Funding Insight

After the endless political and social tumult since the Brexit referendum, many of us may long for a period of relative “certainty and calm”, and that is what Ward is predicting in his look ahead for 2023. He knows that’s what he said last year, but this time, it must be true—mustn’t it?

The US biotechnology firm Moderna’s Global Fellowship programme has returned for a second round and once again has a wide remit, covering a wide array of disciplines and therapeutic areas alongside a focus on mRNA science. Fellowships are awarded for between one and three years to support salary costs, which should not exceed $75,000 per year, and research expenses not exceeding $100,000 per year. The deadline for the current round is on 31 January.

Alfred Pappo, director of global operations, medical affairs, who manages the programme, answered some questions about the scheme for potential applicants.

Archive selection: When Georgios Oikonomou checked the list of winners of Academy of Medical Sciences Starter Grants for Clinical Lecturers he couldn’t see another vet, he told Funding Insight in May 2017. Applicants to the next round of this longstanding scheme will not have the same experience—the list in the June 2022 round includes one veterinary researcher—but it is fair to say that those researching animal health are less well represented than you might expect.

Don’t let that put you off, Oikonomou, now a professor of cattle health and welfare at the University of Liverpool, told veterinary researchers. Focus on honing your research idea and presenting your track record clearly, and you have every chance of winning through.

The next round of Starter Grants for Clinical Lecturers will open later this month with a deadline likely in early March. The grants provide up to £30,000 over 1-2 years to help cover research costs.

Elsewhere on Research Professional News

UK’s Horizon plan B is on PM’s desk for sign-off, says Freeman—Science minister suggests details of domestic alternative to EU programmes could be unveiled in March

Wellcome to ramp up spending, despite financial loss—Charitable health funder sees investments drop six per cent but vows to spend £16 billion

UKRI staff ‘at breaking point’ as strike ballot looms—Union hits back at government proposals to limit strikes ahead of vote at funder

UK to press on with ‘galactic gateway’ plans after launch fail—Operators behind doomed satellite launch focus on achievements and pledge new orbital launches

Chinese talent scheme success ‘is a warning to US and EU’—Programme giving money and independence to young researchers suggests stagnant careers could drive scientists abroad

If you have comments, feedback or suggestions for Funding Insight, or if there are other people within your institution who would like to receive this weekly email, please contact [email protected].

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The new year promises to deliver all that 2022 didn’t

Looking back at my predictions from 12 months ago, I am tempted to deploy Jean-Baptiste Alphonse Karr’s famous epigram, “the more things change, the more they stay the same”, at the top of this article.

That is, for all the political chaos and tumult of 2022—or perhaps because of it—many of its events-in-waiting never actually happened. So 2023 should bring some certainty and calm. A lot of reviews and promises will finally bear fruit, and we’ll have a clearer indication of the road ahead. Of course, I said that last year, and to a certain extent the year before. But this year I’m convinced I’m right. So here are, I very much hope, some waymarks for 2023.

We’ll know what the future Research Excellence Framework (REF) will look like.

After the publication of REF2021 in May, the government commissioned the Future Research Assessment Programme, or Frap (no sniggering at the back). Among its nine ‘open questions’ were whether the current objectives of the REF were fit for purpose, how bureaucracy could be reduced, the use of new technologies, and what could be learned from global practice in assessing research. We’ve had some early indications of the outcome of Frap around the use of AI and machine learning, and a warning from the authors of Harnessing the Metric Tide to… well… be cautious in any assessment using metrics. The final outcome and recommendations are due in late spring. 

We’ll know the future direction of Research England.

With its new executive chair in place, Research England can now prepare and publish its delivery plan. It’s the last part of UK Research and Innovation to do so, and I’m not expecting any surprises. Jessica Corner’s pitch for the job, published by the Science and Technology Committee in July 2022, gave an early indication of her priorities: mission-driven, interdisciplinary research, diversity and inclusivity, and more of a role for innovation and public engagement. All unsurprising.

Innovation is clearly a passion for her (it’s mentioned several times in her pitch), and her announcement of the latest round from the Expanding Excellence in England (E3) Fund is a statement of intent: she wants to support research that makes a difference. She nails her colours to the levelling-up mast, which brings me to…

We’ll see more funding and concrete action around levelling up.

Liz Truss seemed lukewarm on her predecessor’s centrepiece policy. However, the return of Michael Gove as the levelling-up secretary suggests that Rishi Sunak still believes it has legs. The report from Labour’s Commission on the UK’s Future just over a month ago shows that the opposition is equally keen to promote localism, so levelling up—in whatever form—will be here to stay.

The publication of the levelling-up white paper in February gave us a hazy idea of what the government had in mind, but there’s been little action or funding since then. I believe this will change in 2023. All the research councils’ delivery plans mention support for place, so expect significant funding—or at least a demand for universities to show that they’re taking it seriously. 

We’ll have a better idea of support for international engagement.

Every year I promise some certainty around the UK’s association with Horizon Europe. Every year I’m disappointed. I really believe this is the year I’ll get it right. We can’t continue to have piecemeal patch-ups and promises. Researchers need to know whether we will have full access to Horizon Europe or not. If not, the government’s ‘plan B’, announced in July last year, will kick in, and we should know more about it following the budget in March. In the meantime, a somewhat lacklustre and under-funded international scheme was announced at the end of last year—and it ain’t no Horizon Europe. It offered a relatively small (though, of course, welcome) £119 million, and some openly political strategic overtures in cosying up to “R&D powers like Japan”. Still, the International Science Partnerships Fund (ISPF) does at least show the government’s research focus turning outwards. 

We’ll have two new funds on the block.

Speaking of new funding, this might be the year we finally see Advanced Research and Invention Agency (Aria) take off (again, this is something I predicted for 2022). I can’t help feeling that Aria’s moment has been and gone. The moon has well and truly been shot. The policy paper setting out Aria’s principles is almost two years old now. Progress has been achingly slow, which puts paid to the idea of boldness, braveness, unfussy, unbureaucratic action.

Ilan Gur and Matt Clifford were appointed as CEO and chair of Aria in August, so 2023 will, I hope, see the first flowering of this new funder. Meanwhile, the research council delivery plans were all excitedly trumpeting a new interdisciplinary fund. I know, I know: funders have been talking about the importance of interdisciplinarity for most of the two decades I’ve been in research management, but having a dedicated scheme shows a serious commitment, and it will be interesting to see if it manages to work as a philosopher’s stone to convert aspirations to actuality. 

We’ll see an overhaul of UKRI and its way of working.

UKRI is creaking. It’s being asked to do more and more with less and less. The Grant and Tickell Reviews recognised the problems in the system, from UKRI’s governance structure to the heavy bureaucracy endemic in the system. Corner also recognised these flaws. But what will be the next steps in addressing this?

Kwasi Kwarteng, in thanking Tickell for his work, suggested that “a detailed government response to the specific recommendations in your report will follow later in the year”. UKRI is already taking matters into its own hands with its ‘simpler, better funding’ initiative, but is it enough? I think there’ll be a more significant change to come in 2023. Of course, all this may be moot with the long-anticipated Nurse Review of the R&D landscape. This has been promised for most of 2022, and was touted to arrive before Christmas, so expect it any time soon. 

We’ll be expected to share more.

It’s been more than a decade since the Wakeham efficiency review recommended “the more intensive use of existing and new assets”, or equipment sharing. Little resulted from this, despite the best efforts of N8 and other regional consortia. UKRI does demand that “all new equipment purchased over £138,000…be registered on the Equipment Data national database”, but the database is somewhat clunky and little used, and Jisc is currently consulting on how to overhaul it. Jisc’s report on this should come out this year, together with the steps to replace it. With this in place, I can imagine there being a stronger push, in tight budgetary times, to share equipment more meaningfully. It’s something we’re exploring across Eastern Arc, and I know we’re not alone in doing so.

Politicians may start making eyes at us.

Finally, with the next general election due in 2024, a cautious tango will begin: the politicians will start to court researchers and universities (remember, much mileage has been made by both the Conservatives and Labour of the value of R&D to the future prosperity of the country). Equally, the big universities and mission groups will be lobbying to make sure their desires are heard.

Who knows what promises will be made in 2023—by either side. To see that would take a crystal ball with greater sensitivity than mine can muster. Maybe this could be a topic for Aria’s first funding programme.

Phil Ward is director of the Eastern Arc consortium, a collaboration between the Universities of East Anglia, Essex and Kent.

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A roundup of this week’s Funding Insight articles

Funding Insight enters 2023 by profiling an Engineering and Physical Science Council quantum-technology call, identifying the articles from 2022 that will maintain—or even grow—in pertinence this year, and preparing for the forthcoming round of Economic and Social Research Council postdoctoral fellowships.

This week in Funding Insight

Quantum mechanics holds the promise of improving technology in all sorts of areas. With this in mind, the EPSRC’s Quantum Technologies for Positioning, Navigation and Timing scheme is open now for proposals of up to £1 million for projects of up to two years’ duration. The EPSRC expects to fund 8 to 10 projects and the deadline is 1 February.

Anke Davis, joint head of quantum technologies at the EPSRC, and Liam Boyle, a senior manager, explain the nuts and bolts of this scheme for foundational research which nonetheless carries an awareness of potential applications.

Next week, Funding Insight will see in the new year in traditional style by publishing the prophecies of occasional columnist Phil Ward, director of the Eastern Arc consortium. As Ward’s crystal ball has not always been 100 per cent reliable—sample prediction from last year’s article: “We will see Aria take off”—it is perhaps wise to ground ourselves in the certainty of the past before launching ourselves into the future.

This article, then, discusses 10 stories published in Funding Insight in 2022, selected both for their pertinence to the funding trends of the previous 12 months and also, hopefully, their continued relevance in 2023.

Archive selection: With the end-of-year break now over, many social sciences doctoral students will be focusing their attention on securing continued funding for their research from the Economic and Social Research Council’s postdoctoral fellowships scheme, for which the next deadline is 23 March.

For all those who are setting themselves on that path, we have unearthed our 2021 interview with Olivia Mason, then a lecturer in political geography at Newcastle University and now an associate research fellow at that institution. Here, she explains how she clinched her ESRC postdoctoral fellowship in October 2020.

Elsewhere on Research Professional News

Cautious optimism and questions for UK global R&D fund—Sector keen to hear how International Science Partnerships Fund will support collaborations with developing countries

Aria seeks operational leaders ahead of 2023 launch—Director of product, chief engagement officer and chief of staff among roles sought at funder

Wellcome Trust reveals predictions and priorities for 2023—Funder sets out ambitions for mental health, climate change, infectious diseases and discovery research

UKRI developing sustainability concordat for research sector—Research organisations will be “required to adhere” to agreement on sustainability of R&D practices

UK’s NIHR spending rose by 8% to £1.3bn—Funder spent £92m on Covid R&D in 2021-22, while £632m went to research infrastructures

If you have comments, feedback or suggestions for Funding Insight, or if there are other people within your institution who would like to receive this weekly email, please contact [email protected].

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A selection of articles from 2022 that may help plot a path into 2023

Next week, Funding Insight will see in the new year in traditional style by publishing the prophecies of occasional columnist Phil Ward, director of the Eastern Arc consortium. As Ward’s crystal ball has not always been 100 per cent reliable—sample prediction from last year’s article: “We will see Aria take off”—it is perhaps wise to ground ourselves in the certainty of the past before launching ourselves into the future.

Here, then, are 10 articles published in Funding Insight in 2022, selected both for their pertinence to the funding trends of the previous 12 months but also, hopefully, their continued relevance in 2023.

1. Attacking your first grant application (29 July)

Funding Insight columnist Adam Golberg produced a string of articles to help readers navigate the winding paths across the UK’s research funding landscape. He discussed the delicate art of internal selection, when funders put institutional limits on applications, and whether relocation is always advisable for a postdoc fellowship. But his most popular article was the one which started at the beginning—with advice for early career academics’ first ever bid.

2. My winning proposal: Best of both worlds (21 July)

Last year, several schemes that had been halted or curtailed by the pandemic got fully underway again. Among these was the Royal Society’s International Exchanges scheme. We spoke with Daniel Evans, a research fellow at Cranfield University’s Soil and Agrifood Institute, who succeeded in his bid in the stripped-back 2021 call. Evans voiced a vital tip for most exchange scheme bids—ensure your application shows there will be benefits for both parties involved.

3. Opportunity profile: Designing net zero with coastal communities (13 October)

The climate and ecological crises also came to the fore, with UK Research and Innovation among the funders launching an increasing number of schemes addressing this existential planetary threat. Academics may have been surprised by the frequency with which the Arts and Humanities Research Council led interdisciplinary calls in this area, as with, for example, this call hunting for solutions for the challenges facing UK coastal and island communities. The AHRC’s leadership of environmental schemes looks set to continue with the huge Green Transition Ecosystems call, which has £19 million to disburse.

4. The art of engagement (8 December)

How can universities help arts and humanities researchers take advantage of the new opportunities that come from greater involvement in interdisciplinary calls? Towards the end of the year, we explored Royal Holloway, University of London’s answer to that question: the creation of an Engaged Humanities Lab.

5. Opportunity profile: NERC pushes forward (5 May)

Important changes were afoot at the Natural Environment Research Council in 2022 as the council replaced its Standard and New Investigator Grants with two schemes aimed at encouraging more adventurous research from those working within the council’s remit. We discussed the larger of these schemes—called Pushing the Frontiers of Environmental Science Research—with two senior staff at NERC in May. (And we returned to discuss NERC’s new Big Ideas platform with the council in October.)

6. Opportunity profile: Collaboration key for UK-Irish co-centres (1 December)

One of the largest schemes of the year, the call for collaborative partnerships across Ireland, Great Britain and Northern Ireland, was backed by €74m (£63m) from Science Foundation Ireland, the Northern Ireland Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs and UK Research and Innovation. This is one funding call that will carry over into 2023, as expressions of interest remain open until 20 January and full proposals are due on 16 March 2023.

7. My winning proposal: Time is of the essence for Rutherford fellows (7 July)

The Science and Technology Facilities Council’s Ernest Rutherford Fellowship is a hardy perennial funding scheme that often supports researchers investigating some of the timeless mysteries of the universe. But, as Seshadri Nadathur, who started his Ernest Rutherford Fellowship in 2022 at the University of Portsmouth, found out, competition is fierce. It is essential that all applicants, even those investigating those timeless mysteries, answer the question ‘why now?’ in their bids.

8. Five common signs of an unhealthy bid (3 March)

When seeking inspiration before writing a bid, it can often be fruitful to consider not only what you are aiming to achieve but also what you aim to avoid. In this vein, Ferhana Hashem, site lead in Kent for the National Institute of Health Research’s Research Design Service South East, detailed the five most common signs of bids that fail at the NIHR (and probably, she reasoned, with other funders of medical research too).

9. Reducing the harm of harassment (4 March)

There is still a long way to go, but it is possible that 2022 marked something of a turning point in dealing with some of the most unwelcome aspects of research culture. Many agencies and funders around the world bolstered their policies on misconduct and the year ended with a roundtable organised by the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy on tackling harassment in isolated research environments. Toward the start of the year we reported on an event organised by the Science Media Centre that offered advice to public-facing scientists on how to reduce the risk of facing harassment.

10. Opportunity profile: Wellcome’s climate programme heats up (10 June)

Like UKRI, the Wellcome Trust turned to focus on the challenge of the climate crisis in 2022. We profiled the trust’s second call related to climate and health while that programme was still taking shape. The trust is now set to move ahead in this area, with Alan Dangour, the charity’s director of climate and health, telling Research Professional News last month that the charity was “determined” to improve evidence on the impacts of climate change on health as there is currently a “real shift” in understanding on how the two are linked.

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ESRC postdoctoral fellowships help build a firm base from which to launch a career

With the end-of-year break now over, many social sciences doctoral students will be focusing their attention on securing continued funding for their research from the Economic and Social Research Council’s postdoctoral fellowships scheme, for which the next deadline is 23 March.

For all those who are setting themselves on that path, we have unearthed our 2021 interview with Olivia Mason, then a lecturer in political geography at Newcastle University and now an associate research fellow at that institution. Here, she explains how she clinched her ESRC postdoctoral fellowship in October 2020.

Top tips

• Fellowships should be used to consolidate research carried out during your PhD rather than to create a new project.
• They should also be seen as an opportunity to develop skills for your career, so ensure you add components with that in mind.
• The application is hard work; break it up into manageable sections.
• Demonstrate the potential for your research to have a real-world impact beyond academia.
• Get as many people to read through your proposal as possible while maintaining your own voice and vision.

The Economic and Social Research Council’s postdoctoral fellowships enable those in the postdoctoral stage of their career to consolidate their PhD through developing publications, networks, and research and professional skills across a broad range of social science disciplines.

Applications are open to those who have completed their PhD at a research organisation that is part of a Doctoral Training Partnership or Centre for Doctoral Training, and who are within 12 months of passing their viva.

The amount of funding depends on the participating organisation. The next deadline for applications is 23 March.

Olivia Mason, a lecturer in political geography at Newcastle University, was awarded an ESRC postdoctoral fellowship in October 2020 for her project on a long-distance walking trail in Jordan.

Tell me about your research.

The fellowship is a development of my PhD thesis. My research sits at the interface of cultural and political geography and focuses on everyday cultural practices in the Middle East and how these can be used to understand broader questions about political geography. To do this, my doctoral research focused on the case study of a long-distance walking trail in Jordan that was developed to connect Jordanians to their country, but also as an international tourism project that would allow people to understand and connect to Jordan’s cultural heritage differently.

Did it feel like the logical next step after a PhD?

My PhD was funded by the ESRC, so it did feel like a natural progression. I like the fact that the scheme acknowledges the time restraints of a PhD. There is not necessarily that much time to publish research or to feedback your findings to the people you worked with. I had worked a lot with the organisation behind the Jordan Trail, so it was a really good opportunity for me to consolidate what I had done before moving on to another project. You can also apply for funding for further training. For example, training in academic writing, writing policy reports, or in filmmaking, which I am doing as part of my fellowship.

Did you consider any other funders at the time?

Yes. I also applied unsuccessfully to the Leverhulme Trust, as well as to some other ESRC schemes, for funding to develop a whole new project. But the ESRC postdoctoral fellowship was the only scheme that offered me the chance to consolidate my PhD findings and build up a bit of confidence through training in new techniques. It can seem a bit daunting going straight from a PhD to a new project, so it was quite a nice transition. After this fellowship I’m hoping I’ll be in a better position to apply to Leverhulme and other ESRC schemes again.

What does the funding cover?

As well as covering my salary for a year, it also provided me with an extra £10,000 for film training and a second trip to Jordan, where I did my fieldwork. This will give me the chance to feedback my findings and hold a knowledge exchange workshop, as well as to do some participatory pilot film work.

How did you find the application process?

It’s a fairly long process. The key thing is to break it up into smaller sections and work on them individually rather than seeing it as one big application to fill in. It was the first time I had ever had to do a detailed budget and to think about the impact of my research. It’s good practice for developing much larger funding applications in future.

Did you get any external input on the bid?

Yes. I got a lot of help from my university. Newcastle University has a very good research support team that gave me a lot of guidance on how to work out the budget, for example. I also contacted previous successful applicants to the scheme to see how they used the funding, how they created impact, and how they divided their time. A year is not a lot of time for a project such as this, and there’s a fine balance between wanting to show that you are going to get a lot out of it but also making it look really achievable and making them feel confident that you’ll be able to get it done. In other words, be ambitious but not too ambitious.

Did you find any feedback particularly useful?

This links back to my last point. One piece of feedback I received on my first draft was that I was trying to do too much. Remember that the fellowship is not about developing an entirely new and original piece of research, it’s about consolidating your PhD findings.

What did you emphasise in your proposal?

I wanted to show the potential for my research having a real-world impact beyond academia. So, as well as having an academic benefit in terms of the articles I would publish, it would also benefit the wider public by providing wider public knowledge about an area of the Middle East that’s often understood through stereotypical lenses. I also emphasised the policy impact in terms of how heritage projects could better engage with local communities in the Middle East and the important role of heritage projects in telling histories about place.

Do you have any tips for potential applicants?

Getting as many people to read through your proposal as possible is really important. I was really grateful that lots of colleagues and my mentor read through numerous drafts for me. Often applicants don’t want to bother someone and ask them to read it—especially if it’s quite a long application. But the worst that happens is that someone says: ‘No, I don’t have time to read it.’ However, it’s also important to retain your own voice and vision of what you want the project to be. If a lot of people read it, not everyone is going to have the same opinion. Take their advice and read what others say, but make sure you remember what you want to do and why the project is important to you too.

Any more tips?

Think about what training you need and what training you didn’t manage to get during your PhD that you thought would be really helpful. Finally, be creative and try to think of exciting ideas. In my case, the participatory film was seen as something a bit different and exciting.

What do you think made your project stand out?

I think it had a good balance between academic publications and policy work that was going to reach to non-academic audiences. Also, it wasn’t trying to move on too much; it was mainly about consolidating my existing research.

Has Covid had an impact on your project?

I was hoping to make a trip to Jordan to feed back my findings and do the participatory film, but now I’m not sure I’ll be able to go. However, I’m still hoping to be able to do some film training and perhaps some outreach work virtually. The knowledge exchange workshop—where I was going to feedback to key policymakers—can also be done virtually.

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