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  • Department of CS newsletter

    Published: Tuesday, 29 October 2019

    Weekly newsletter for the Department of CS

    [ top ]News and announcements

    £519.20 for Christies from retirement collection

    Jim Miles & John Latham very kindly donated a total of £519.20 to Cancer Research from their retirement collection. Thank you to everyone who gave, and for coming to the retirement party last Friday. 

    gravatar Karon Mee

    Article published in Jaxenter.com

    One of the largest Java magazines published an article regarding work by Christos Kotselidis and team in TornadoVM

    https://jaxenter.com/tornado-vm-java-162460.html

    gravatar Karon Mee

    Report from the Senate

    I was recently elected to the University's Senate. As part of this, I want to give you updates on what's going on at a University level, but maybe more importantly - what's in the pipeline. This is my first report of eight (one a quarter for two years) and are the things that I thought were interesting. This is my egocentric view and is a short summary of 4 hours of meetings, 180 pages of agenda documents and four slide presentations. The Senate discusses academic matters and not ones related to HR, Pensions and the like. There is a Faculty Pre-Meeting, Senate Briefing Session and then the Senate Meeting proper.

    • Staff Survey - Things across the University ranked as low satisfaction: Feeling valued; P&DR-occurrence; Felt discriminated; and, Positive changes.
    • Staff Survey - Things across the University ranked as high satisfaction: Good place to work; PaDR clear objectives; and Can decide my work.
    • Staff Survey - Problems with FSE - items ranked low (very low IMO): Senior Leadership Team listening/ responding to the views of staff; and, communicating well and keep staff informed on important issues.
    • Change - Beth Dodd head of the new 'Transformation Management Team'. Lots of buzz words and a seeming predisposition to reports, milestones, quality surveys and the like. Doesn't seem very agile, and came with a get-out clause (we can't do it alone). Comments around ' Culture eats Strategy for breakfast' - noted that culture needs changing for changes to strategy.
    • T&L - Next years student applications across the University - UG Home + EU stable, International up 29% and  PGT Home + EU stable, International up 28%.
    • T&L - NSS - Low scores across Law, ChemEng, and Medicine - teams will be created to address these low marks. We will all need to form a Student Experience Action Plan to address our failings.
    • Research - UKRI Delivery Plan Announced - More Doctoral training focus with possibly a doubling of students.
    • Research - REF preparation on Target.
    • Research - 'Code of Practice for Investigating Concerns about the Conduct of Research' - unclear around some aspects of meaning, aural reporting, and the introduction of new evidence. Not approved for ratification - discussions ongoing.
    • Research - 'Code of Good Research Conduct' - heavily modified and not approved for ratification - discussions ongoing.
    • Union 'UCU Report' clarification around Student Suicides - 5 UG / 1 PGT last year.
    • KT - Changes to 'IP Policy' sent for ratification to the Board of Governors (BoG) - commended on clarity and fairness to academics.
    • University - 'Strategic Plan' sent for ratification to the BoG - commended on zero emissions target.
    • University - 'Rules for forming Faculty Boards' approved - I raised the point that elections seem fair, but in some cases, smaller Departments could end up with no representation. Said they would monitor this but it hasn't been a problem in FBMH. FSE see this may be a problem and so will try to mitigate it.
    • University - 'Semester Dates Approval'  - Discussion as to whether semesters will continue - may move to terms or periods in the future.

    Contact Me:
    If you'd like to know more you can email me at simon.harper@manchester.ac.uk - if you'd like a longer chat or dig into the issues further then book a meeting.

    Discover More:
    https://www.manchester.ac.uk/discover/governance/structure/senate/
    https://www.staffnet.manchester.ac.uk/senate/meetings/

    gravatar Simon Harper

    Nominations now open for new School Boards

    The Faculty of Science and Engineering School Boards are open for nominations

    The new School Boards are currently in the process of being established and in accordance with the University’s Statutes, there is a requirement for these bodies to be constituted.  In line with standard process in these matters a window of two weeks will be provided for nominations for the position of School Board Chair to come forward. Should an election be required, all eligible academic staff will be entitled to vote over the following 2 weeks.  

    Should you wish to apply for position of chair, nominations should be sent to Rachel Brealey via Ruth Rawling before noon on Monday, 4 November using this nomination form. Should an election be required to appoint the new School Board Chair, this will be held over the following two weeks after the closure of nominations.  Please note that nominations and voting rights are only conferred to academic and research staff with a minimum of one years’ service – PS staff are unable to participate in this process. 

    These arrangements are part of wider governance and engagement changes which are being put in place following the implementation of new Faculty structure - including the creation of a new Faculty Committee, as well as the formal establishment of the new School Boards and Departmental Fora. 

    gravatar Ruth Maddocks

    [ top ]Events

    Men's Health Month

    Men's Health Month landing page with all events and resources (This content has also been shared on Yammer).

    https://www.staffnet.manchester.ac.uk/wellbeing/mens-health-month/

    These include:

    Grow a Mo for Movember (thanks to Wellbeing Champion Michelle Kipling in AMBS)

    Men’s Health Checks (bookable) thanks to Wellbeing Champions Gail Heathcote-Milner and Andy Ellison

    Love your Balls - Testicular cancer talk with charity Baggy Trousers UK (bookable)

    Prostate Cancer UK - Drop-in for advice

    On campus sport facilities

    Be Active health and wellbeing programme

    Lunchtime Wholeness Programme at St Peter’s

    Run commute and free breakfast

    Sign up for the Big White Wall

    gravatar Karon Mee

    Robotics and AI Innovation Community Meeting

    Event: 30-Oct-19 11:30-14:30 (3.44A, Simon Building)

    The Research Lifecycle Programme would like to invite current users and interested researchers to a lunch meeting to discuss the use of Robotics and Artificial Intelligence (AI) in research across the University.
    The idea of the Innovation Communities is to share experiences and common interests and discuss ways in which we can work better together to use available resources and generate an inclusive community that can collaborate internally and apply for research funding collectively. 
    The event will include short research presentations, a networking lunch and group discussion on how to better foster collaboration and how to generate a thriving community.
    The following presentations are planned for the meeting, but please get in touch if you'd like to present:
    • Agile Robots Inspired by Animals, Ben Parslew, MACE
    • Predicting the Human in HRI and Other Things, Guido Herrmann, EEE
    • Small Molecule Robots, David Leigh, Chemistry
    • Deep Learning and Machine Vision, Hujun Yin, EEE, FSE

    Get involved in the conversation by visiting www.slido.com and type in #ROBAI in the event code to join the discussion. 
    Register to attend.

    gravatar Sarah Chatwin

    Atlas Talk: The Cache-Aware Roofline Model and Application Characterization

    Atlas Talk on Wednesday 6th November 2019 at 14:00 in Kilburn L.T 1.5

    Title: The Cache-Aware Roofline Model and Application Characterization

    Speaker: Professor Leonel Souza

    Host: Rizos Sakellariou

    Abstract: Simple models and analysis methods, such as Cache-Aware Roofline Model, were proposed in order to provide first-order insights regarding application execution, allowing software

    developers and hardware engineers to derive the most suitable optimization techniques to extract the maximum potential of multi-core architectures. In this talk, a set of Cache-Aware Roofline

    Models are presented, aiming at providing a more accurate characterization of real-world applications in computer systems. To show the potential of the proposed models, a set of applications from

    Exascale Computing Project Benchmark Suite are characterized with the proposed models and its insights are validated against current state-of-the-art solutions.

     

    Bio: Leonel Sousa has been with Instituto Superior Tecnico (IST), Universidade de Lisboa(UL), Lisbon, Portugal, since 1996,where he is currently full professor and chair of the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering. In 2016, he was a visiting professor with Tsukuba University, Tsukuba, Japan, with a JSPS Invitation Fellowship for Research in Japan, and at Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA. He is currently an associate editor of the IEEE Transactions on Computers and a distinguished scientist of the ACM.

     

    gravatar Karon Mee

    Horror Movie Halloween

    As you may know Thursday next week is 31st October so for anyone who enjoys a fright we will be showing a horror movie in George Begg C1 from 12:30 onwards to mark Halloween.

    There will be a few options to choose from (listed below) with a quick vote at 12:30.

    Hide and Seek

    Prom Night

    When a Stranger Calls

    Stephen Kings Carrie (Original)

    Stephen Kings Children of the Corn (Original)

    Get away from your desk and get the adrenaline going (if you’re brave enough). There will be some ghostly treats available!

    gravatar Karon Mee

    Cyber Security Work Experience Opportunities

    Cyber Security Work Experience Opportunities

    The Cyber Resilience Centre for Greater Manchester is a new, not-for-profit joint venture between Greater Manchester Police (GMP) and Manchester Digital, which aims to provide a targeted programme of work to increase the take-up of effective cybersecurity measures to safeguard Greater Manchester’s business community.

    The Centre has an influential network of experienced partners at senior level across many sectors, including Law Enforcement and Intelligence Agencies, Banks, Financial and Professional Services and Cyber Security Providers.

    We are working closely with local Universities to help upskill and increase employability into this growing sector and have opportunities for students to gain paid, real world and relevant work experience through employment as Junior Cyber Security Consultants as part of our Ethical Hacking Service.

    If you would like to learn more, please join us at our student open evening on Wednesday 30th October from 5.30-7.30pm at the Tech Incubator, Manchester Technology Centre, Oxford Road, Manchester M1 7ED where food and drink will be provided. (And don't forget to tell your students!)

    At the event you will hear from students from Abertay University who are already delivering this service in Scotland so you can hear first-hand how it all works.

    gravatar Karon Mee

    [ top ]Research Funding Opportunities

    UKRI Centre - Trustworthy Autonomous Systems Hub - Outline Call

    Outline deadline: 12-Dec-2019

    https://epsrc.ukri.org/funding/calls/trustworthy-autonomous-systems-hub-outline-call/

    The UKRI are looking for outline proposals for an Autonomous systems coordination hub (£11.7 million at 80% fEC). The purpose of the call is to ensure that autonomous systems can be trusted and adopted by society. Therefore, both technical and social/humanities research is required (the partnership between Humanities and FSE would be necessary for a successful application). The engagement of multiple disciplines alongside key regulators and the public are also important factors for a successful bid.

    Contact sarah.chatwin@manchester.ac.uk if you are interested in this bid. Contacts from humanities will be explored.

    There’s already academics in the Dept of Environment, Education and Development) with a background in the societal and urban impacts of autonomous vehicles with an interest in this call, who may be able to collaborate.

    gravatar Sarah Chatwin

    DSTL Development of Good Practice for the Assurance of Autonomous Component Integration: Invitation

    Register interest before 13-Nov-2019

    Deadline: 13-Dec-2019

    If this sounds interesting to you then please contact sarah.chatwin@manchester.ac.uk for full information

    gravatar Sarah Chatwin

    Reminder: EPSRC ISCF Digital Security by Design Research Projects

    Deadline: 07 Jan 2020
    https://epsrc.ukri.org/funding/calls/iscf-digital-security-by-design-research-projects/
    The Industrial Strategy Challenge Fund (ISCF) Digital Security by Design challenge is executing a mission to increase the protection of software in the light of increased cyber-attack against various class of software vulnerabilities, through additional hardware protection capabilities architected around the containment of pointers, and the privilege by which regions of fine grain data can be accessed.
    Leveraging the Capability Hardware concepts and approaches investigated by the CHERI program (led by the University of Cambridge), a consortium led by Arm is investigating a prototype silicon-based solution based on Arm AArch64 architecture. This prototype solution will be made openly available to academics and businesses across the UK, so as to provide early access, evaluation, and the opportunity to feed back on the proposed major change to the instruction set architecture of a processor, while investigating the broader impact to various aspects of computer science and ICT in general.
    The aim is to support innovative research projects that will help to move the technology beyond the state of the art, moving Capability Hardware concepts and use forward, without duplicating or conflicting with the existing CHERI research.
     

    gravatar Sarah Chatwin

    BBSRC Partnering Awards

    Deadline: 14-Nov-2019
    https://bbsrc.ukri.org/funding/filter/#November2019

    BBSRC have funds for partnering schemes with the following:

    • China
    • Brazil
    • European
    • Australia
    • India
    • Taiwan
    • Japan
    • Canada
    • US
    • New Zealand
    • ‘Global’

    Funds are available to set up partnership links between UK and European/ overseas laboratories; promote the exchange of scientists, particularly early career scientists; promote access to facilities.

    Funds can only be used for travel, subsistence and other activities, such as workshops or exchanges from Apr-2020. They are not to fund salary costs, consumables, items of equipment or other research costs, nor to link ongoing single collaborative projects. Funding is for over a 4 year period and the amount depends on the partnering country.
    Research groups should try and access other sources of funding in addition to the Partnering Award.

    gravatar Sarah Chatwin

    EPSRC IAA 7th Call for Proposals

    EPSRC IAA 7th Call for Proposals - Submission Deadline – 12 noon, 18th December 2019

    *Please note that projects awarded under the Call 7 deadline have an earliest start date of 1st April 2020* 

    The Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) has awarded The University of Manchester an additional £0.8M to deliver an Impact Acceleration Account (IAA) between April 2020 and March 2021 that aims to increase and accelerate the impact of EPSRC research outputs from the university through a range of knowledge exchange activities. Running for 12 months, the IAA will aim to ensure that the university fulfils its strategic knowledge exchange objectives in the domains covered by EPSRC research. 

    The Knowledge Exchange Team is pleased to announce the 7th Call for Proposals under the following mechanisms: 

    Fostering new relationships between industry and academic researchers, creating opportunities for collaboration and exchange of knowledge and skills 

    Support for the very early stage of transforming research outputs into commercial opportunities 

    Flexible support for secondments between The University of Manchester and businesses and other organisations 

    Eligibility 

    Applications are only permitted for projects focused on the exploitation / application of knowledge or technology generated through EPSRC-funded research at The University of Manchester. 

    Eligible collaborators are UK-based businesses (including UK sites of international businesses), UK charities, and UK public sector organisations such as the NHS. Non-UK based businesses may be eligible where there is demonstrable evidence of the intention for inward investment during or beyond the lifetime of the project (e.g. establishing a UK site, job creation). If you have any queries regarding user organisation eligibility, please contact the Knowledge Exchange Team. 

    Do you have a potential project? 

    The Knowledge Exchange Team provide active support for the development of EPSRC IAA submissions. Prior to applying, academics are strongly advised to contact a member of the KE Team for support, and ideally at least 1 month before the call closing date of 18th December 2019. Initial contact should be made via ke@manchester.ac.uk

    Application forms and guidance notes are available via: https://www.staffnet.manchester.ac.uk/rbe/beke/knowledge-exchange/iaa/ 

    Best wishes,

    Knowledge Exchange Team

    The University of Manchester Office: +44 (0)161 306 6814 
    Knowledge Exchange Team B16 Sackville Street Building Sackville Street Manchester M13 9PL
    http://man.ac.uk/kj84I0

    gravatar Ruth Maddocks

    [ top ]Research News

    Reminder

    Research Support Officers Natalia Stefanovic and Laura Nolan have now moved to the Schuster Building. We will continue to support CS academics with their research applications through the normal researchsupportcsm@manchester.ac.uk email address and we will all be available to meet.

    Research Finance are contactable via the usual email address of CompSciresearchfinance@manchester.ac.uk .
     

    gravatar Sarah Chatwin

    [ top ]Wellbeing

    Women’s Health Month: the menopause

    Last week the Wellbeing Team hosted a talk by Henpicked on menopause in the workplace. Two sessions took place, tailored towards how all colleagues – and managers specifically – can help and support fellow staff experiencing the different stages of menopause. Information on treatments available - including HRT - the right to choose as an individual, and media myth-busters was provided and discussed.
    For more information on receiving help with the menopause and its symptoms, or to help a colleague, follow the links below:

    gravatar Ruth Maddocks

    gravatar Ruth Maddocks
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Last change: Tuesday, 29 October 2019 11:49:28