UK NCP Events on Marie Skłodowska-Curie Individual Fellowships

Posted on March 31, 2015 by Esther KNIGHT

Individual Fellowships event

In its capacity as UK National Contact Point for the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions, the UK Research Office is holding information events for researchers who are interested in applying for the 2015 MSCA Individual Fellowships, which opened on 12 March 2015 and has a deadline of 10 September 2015. The events are scheduled as follows:

Leeds Beckett University, Tuesday 5 May 2015
University of Westminster, London, Wednesday 6 May 2015

Aim of the MSCA Individual Fellowships

Individual Fellowships support the mobility of researchers within and beyond Europe – as well as helping to attract the best foreign researchers to work in the EU. The grant covers salary, research costs and overheads for the host institution. Individual researchers submit proposals for funding in liaison with their planned host organisation. Proposals are judged on their research quality, the researcher’s future career prospects, and the support offered by the host organisation. Fellows can also spend part of the fellowship elsewhere in Europe as a secondment if this would boost impact, and those planning to return to Europe or restarting their research career in Europe benefit from special eligibility conditions.

Who should attend?

The sessions will give a general overview of participation rules and the submission and evaluation processes. Therefore, the sessions are aimed at researchers based in, or moving to, the UK who are planning to submit a proposal to the Individual Fellowships call. Places will be allocated on a first-come, first-served basis.

Programme outline

The event at Leeds Beckett University on 5 May will start at 11:00 and finish at 15:30 (with registration from 10:30).

The event at University of Westminster on 6 May will start at 9:30 and finish at 13:00 (with registration from 9:00).

Please note that lunch will not be provided at either session.

http://www.ukro.ac.uk/Lists/MCA1/NewForm.aspx?RootFolder=/Lists/MCA1&Source=http://www.ukro.ac.uk/Pages/140326_mca1.aspx

RootFolder=/Lists/MCA1&Source=http://www.ukro.ac.uk/Pages/140326_mca1.aspx

British Science Association Media Fellowships

Posted on March 26, 2015 by BENNETT Margaret

The British Science Association Media Fellowships provide a unique opportunity for practising scientists, clinicians and engineers to spend three to six weeks working with a media organisation such as the Guardian, the BBC or Nature News.

Every year up to ten Media Fellows are mentored by professional journalists. They learn how the media operates and reports on science, how to communicate with the media and to engage the wider public with science through the media.

The Media Fellowships aim to give scientists, engineers and their colleagues, the confidence and willingness to engage with the media, to tackle issues of mistrust and misrepresentation and to give journalists access to new scientific expertise.

After their media placement, Fellows attend the British Science Festival in September, which provides an opportunity to gain valuable experience working alongside a range of media organisations from all over the UK in the dedicated Press Centre. The Festival also offers opportunities to learn from a wide range of public engagement activities and network with academics, journalists and science communicators.

The application deadline is 3 April 2015.

For further information go to: http://www.britishscienceassociation.org/media-fellows

EU Prize for Women Innovators 2016 Launched

Posted on March 24, 2015 by Esther KNIGHT

The European Commission, has recently launched the third edition of its contest for women innovators. Suitable female applicants can submit their proposals through the Participant Portal by 20 October 2015.

After the success of the forerunners of the competition in 2011 and 2014, the Commission intends to continue its drive to spotlight women researchers who have brought outstanding innovations to the market.

The prizes will boost the public awareness of the contributions that female researchers bring to the field of entrepreneurship and will encourage entrepreneurial women to become innovators.

Although women are more and more active in research, there are still too few women creating innovative enterprises.The Commission plans to award up to three “EU Prizes for Women Innovators” following a European-wide contest.

Three prizes will be awarded in Spring 2016:

1st prize: €100 000
2nd prize: €50 000
3rd prize: €30 000

The prizes are addressed to women who have founded or co-founded a company and who themselves or through their company have benefitted from EU funding related to Research and Innovation.

The prizes will not reward research or innovation proposed for the future, but only successes that have been already achieved by the candidate

Please, find more information in the link below.

http://www.ukro.ac.uk/subscriber/Pages/150311_wiprize.aspx

ESRC: Research seminars and Strategic networks competition 2015/16

Posted on March 20, 2015 by Marie PANDOLFO

The Economic and Social Research Council is supporting Research seminars and Strategic networks through its 2015/2016 annual competition.

Seminars and networks will address groups of academic researchers, postgraduate students and non-academics users from different organisations and sectors (public & private sectors, civil society and research bodies).

It is expected to advance research, to generate and to develop innovative and interdisciplinary collaborations, especially with overseas researchers and stakeholders from Newton countries.

A number of steer are focused on Civil society / Education and Neuroscience / Biosocial research / big data.

Seminar series grants are limited to a maximum justified costing of £30,000 and network grants are limited to a maximum justified costing of £100,000. The closing date for proposals is 16.00 on 8 April 2015.

To apply, please click here.

Event: Open Innovation 2.0 Conference 2015

Posted on March 16, 2015 by Esther KNIGHT

Open Innovation 2.0 Conference 2015

07/06/2015 to 09/06/2015

The European Commission, is organising the 2015 Open Innovation Conference.
Like the previous editions, the conference will be organised by the European Commission, DG Connect Open Innovation Group (OISPG) together with Intel Labs Europe, Kindly supported by Aalto University, City of Espoo and other partners.

The OI2 Conference will be hold from the 07th until the 09th of June 2015 in Espoo (Aalto University Campus), Finland.
The conference will discuss the implementation of the Dublin Declaration and topics such as student entrepreneurship, open innovation digital platforms, regional information modelling and digitalized services.

The recently published High Level Group report on European Innovation Ecosystems will also be a basis for discussions at the event.

For more information on the event, please follow the link below.

http://ec.europa.eu/digital-agenda/en/news/save-date-open-innovation-20-conference-2015

Royal Academy of Engineering Enterprise Fellowships

Posted on March 5, 2015 by BENNETT Margaret

Royal Academy of Engineering logo large

The Royal Academy of Engineering invites applications for its Enterprise Fellowships. These enable aspiring entrepreneurs to commercialise technology-based business ideas from academic institutions into spinout companies.

Applicants must be working in engineering departments or engineering-focused research areas at UK higher education institutions, at postdoctoral level or above. PhD students may apply, but must have received their PhD before they start the fellowship. The proposed technology must be an innovation or invention in engineering or technology.

Each Fellow is provided with up to £85,000 to enable them to spend 12 months establishing their own business. In addition to the financial support, training will be provided to develop business skills. Mentors will be allocated to each fellow to provide additional support, advice and access to their entrepreneurial and venture capital networks during the enterprise fellowship.

Closing date 01 Sep 15 (Forecast)

(The information on the website relates to last year’s scheme but remains available for reference until the 2015 call is announced: http://www.raeng.org.uk/grants-and-prizes/support-for-entrepreneurs/enterprise-fellowships).

A New Start for Europe – Opening Up to an ERA of Innovation

Posted on February 25, 2015 by Esther KNIGHT

A conference to discuss EU policies on Open Science, the European Research Area and Innovation is due to take place on 22-23 June 2015.

Organised by the European Commission in Brussels, the conference is expected to bring together 500 participants to discuss a broad range of issues, including:

the results and outcome of the ‘Science 2.0: Science in Transition’ consultation;
the European Research Area Roadmap;
open labour market for researchers;
building up an innovation ecosystem;
future markets.

The Commissioner for Research, Science and Innovation, Carlos Moedas, will also be present at the event.

Further information can be found via the link below though registration is not yet open.

http://ec.europa.eu/research/index.cfm?pg=events&eventcode=5B17594F-90C0-840A-1CCBAFF7F0E6D9D7

Smart specialisation… Quid est?

Posted on February 20, 2015 by Marie PANDOLFO

Definition:

Smart specialisation is an innovation policy concept designed to identify the unique economic characteristics and assets of an area (usually a region, or a country) to address emerging opportunities and market developments in a coherent manner….Basically? It means developing and matching the research and innovation strengths of a geographical area to the business needs Rather than being a strategy imposed from above, smart specialisation involves businesses, research centres and universities working together.

EU Legislation:

Smart specialisation is not new, it is in the continuity of the previous funding period (2007-2013). What is new is that the European Commission makes such strategies a pre-condition for ERDF funding. It will be the basis for European Structural and Investment Fund (ESIF) interventions in R&I, as part of the Cohesion Policy’s contribution to the Europe 2020 jobs and growth agenda (see Regulation (EU) 1301/2013 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 17 December 2013).

In England:

A Smart Specialisation Strategie (S3) has been developed at a national level, but has to be informed locally by the LEP ESIF strategies which need to focus on specific actions in support of innovation. The Government also asked LEPs to consider the development of a specific strategy of Smart Specialisation and particularly encouraged the use the Joint Research Centre’s (JRC) RIS3 guide, available on the Smart Specialisation Platform: http://s3platform.jrc.ec.europa.eu/wikis3pguide

EPSRC Autonomous Manufacturing research call

Posted on February 17, 2015 by Esther KNIGHT

The EPSRC invites Expressions of Interest to bid into the call for research proposals in Autonomous Manufacturing. The aim of the call is to support research that addresses the research challenges that underpin autonomous manufacturing.

The expected outcome of this call is a diverse set of research programmes that span manufacturing applications, processes, and value sectors, that exploit novel and adventurous research for the advancement of autonomous production technologies and systems in the factory environment.

EPSRC are committing up to £10M for this call to support multidisciplinary research programmes of up to five years with flexible funding (similar to that provided through EPSRC platform and programme grants) that can be used for a mixture of multidisciplinary research projects, feasibility studies and networking and outreach activities.

This first stage of the call seeks expressions of interest to submit a full proposal. The submitted expressions of interests will be assessed at a short-listing panel in May 2015 and those that align appropriately with the scope for this call will be invited for the full proposal stage. The deadline for full proposals will be in July 2015 and funding decisions are expected to be made in November 2015.

http://www.epsrc.ac.uk/files/funding/calls/2015/autonomousmanufacturing/

This call invites Expressions of Interest (EoIs) which will be assessed at a short-listing panel. Short-listed applicants will then be invited to submit full proposals.

Activity	Date/Time
Call launched on web (EoI stage)	02 February 2015
Closing date for EoIs	16:00, 16 April 2015
Short-listing panel	Early May 2015
Call opens in J-eS (Full proposal stage)	End May 2015
Closing date for full proposals	End July 2015
Postal peer review	Aug-Oct 2015
Assessment (interview) panel	November 2015

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