Welcome to the The AHSN Funding Newsletter. This is a special updated newsletter to provide additional information on news and funding opportunities related to COVID-19.

Dr Mark Elliott, Principal investigator on the project at WMG, University of Warwick added: 

“There is huge potential for consumer VR technologies to be used for both providing guidance to physiotherapy exercises, but also to make the exercises more interesting. This study has focused on the crucial question of how well people can follow a virtual guide.”

The BBSRC Collaborative Training Partnership call is open with a deadline of 5^th May:

 https://bbsrc.ukri.org/funding/filter/2020-bbsrc-doctoral-training-partnerships/

The UKRI-BBSRC Collaborative Training Partnerships (CTP) scheme is a doctoral training programme directed at industrial research challenges and delivered by consortia led by businesses in collaboration with Research Organisations. Its ambition is to build capacity and address strategic skills challenges in the UK bioeconomy^[1] at doctoral level and provide candidates with the research, innovation and transferable skills needed to be competitive for high-quality jobs in the labour markets of the bioeconomy, academia and beyond. Bioeconomy is defined as:

“All economic activity derived by bio-based products and processes which contributes to sustainable and resource-efficient solutions to the challenges we face in food, chemicals, material, energy production, health and environmental production.”

CTPs must be led by industry and have a UK research and/or manufacturing base and the lead applicant should not be eligible for UKRI-BBSRC grant funding.

It is anticipated that up to 10 CTPs will be awarded. Total funding of £22.5M is available to support up to 75 four-year studentships per annum, for three consecutive intakes, the first being in 2021-2022 and the final cohort commencing in 2023-2024.

If you are involved in a bid for this call, please let the RIS team know at WMSgrantssupport@warwick.ac.uk .

Rosetrees Trust Enterprise Fellowships are aimed specifically at recently qualified postdoctoral researchers primarily in the fields of engineering, computer science, maths and physics who wish to develop a long-term programme of biomedical research within a UK university or research institution. Successful projects will be truly innovative and not merely an extension of your current research. Find out more.

Call for applications for Translational Fellowships and Translation and Innovation Grants

Warwick has been awarded £600,000 from the Wellcome Trust for a Warwick-Wellcome Trust Translational Partnership award. Warwick is supporting the Translational Partnership with £180,000 from HEIF. The Warwick-Wellcome Trust Translational Partnership will focus on investing in fellowships and projects aimed at exploiting emerging impact in the science of early life, tissue models of human disease and disease control and prevention. The Warwick-Wellcome Trust Translational Partnership will provide supporting expertise in impact delivery and will strengthen links to partner institutions in industry and the local hospital network.

Funding Programmes  

Two funding programmes are available to support people, translational funding and embedding of a biomedical translational research culture and are now open for applications: 

Translation Fellowships to provide the opportunity for researchers to engage with translational research activities and take forward opportunities. Longer term funding (1-2 years) is available for a dedicated researcher to drive forward translational research arising from their own research or that of the research group. It is anticipated that around 3 awards will be made.

Translation and Innovation Grants to provide project-focussed pump priming awards to overcome specific barriers and/or directed towards later stage projects that need support to move to the next technology readiness level. Applications to buy out UHCW clinician’s time for a translational project would also be welcome. It is anticipated that around 8 awards will be made.

Eligibility

Applicants should normally be a University academic employee, or be the holder of a personal research fellowship awarded competitively, with a contract lasting the duration of the project. UHCW-employed clinicians are also eligible and applications must provide an accompanying letter from the Clinical Director confirming support for the project. If funding is requested for buy-out time for clinicians a signed letter of support and commitment to the dedicated research time from the Clinical Director is required. 

How to Apply

Applications must be submitted on the Warwick-Wellcome Trust Translational Partnership Application Form to Wellcome-Translation@warwick.ac.uk by 1 February 2020. 

Further information can be found on Wellcome Translational Partnership

This event brings together AHSNs from across the Network and key organisation that we work with, to provide a range of insights, 1:1 confidential advice sessions, workshops and networking opportunities.

Latest news, event and funding information from the West Midlands Academic Health Science Network.

UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) will shortly announce a call for research to fundamentally transform the UK food system, by placing healthy people and a healthy natural environment at its centre. Proposals will be invited for interdisciplinary consortia to take a food systems approach, linking healthy and accessible diets with sustainable food production and supply to help drive food system transformation.

This challenge will require collaboration across multiple disciplines and across multiple stakeholders, for example government, industry and civil society. This programme will address health, environmental and social challenges simultaneously, and will bring together researchers and stakeholders to provide evidence for multi-pronged and simultaneous action across the food system.

Announcement of Call will be launched in the coming weeks.

Workshops

Two workshops will be held to communicate more details about the research call and facilitate networking.

• Manchester (city centre) Monday 21^st October

• London (central) Friday 25^th October

  Attendance at these workshops is limited therefore to find out more and to express your interest in attending see here.

The Global Challenges Research Fund (GCRF) is a £1.5 billion fund announced by the UK Government in late 2015 to support cutting-edge research that addresses the challenges faced by developing countries.

Take a look at the latest NIHR funding opportunities here.

The UKPRP funders have announced that a second funding call will be launched on 3 September 2019 for proposals for new Consortium and Network awards.

Under the second call, UKPRP are looking to complement the current portfolio of UKPRP investment and anticipate proposals in the areas listed below

• preventing poor mental health and promoting mental wellbeing

• reducing health inequalities (where this forms the primary focus of the application)

• social and economic determinants of health and wellbeing

• food systems, unhealthy diets and obesity (We are aware of existing research funding schemes on food systems and influences on diet. Given the importance of this research challenge, the UKPRP would welcome proposals addressing this area.)

• developing interventions in specific ages including on issues relating to ageing, and in occupational settings

• fostering the use of evidence in decision making in local government

• urban environment, including transport systems and air quality

• using green and blue space for improving population health and preventing NCDs

• using digital technologies and social media to deliver interventions, and exploiting large-scale datasets and linkage to routine datasets.

This month we're pleased to open bookings for a new suite of NCCPE training opportunities, aimed at supporting the development of high quality engagement. We've also just published a blog post outlining our thoughts on the new Concordat for the Advancement of Knowledge Exchange - we'd love to know what you think.

Read on to find out more about the Engage Researchers' Academy, Engaging Libraries funding and our school-university Perspectives on Partnership tool, as well as a blog post by Heather Doran on how she shares her expertise with researchers...