Department of CS newsletter

The Engineering the Future conference will be hosted by the School of Engineering and the Department of Materials on 28 and 29 March 2023. The conference will give our UoM staff, visitors and our postgraduate researchers an opportunity to learn more about our recent and future research and our educational activities that are delivering the next generation of engineers. There will be the chance to meet with colleagues from our Research Institutes, Business Engagement & Innovation Teams. The event will be held in the brand-new home of Engineering and Materials at The University of Manchester. It is a place like no other and one of the largest higher education construction projects completed in the UK – as part of the event we will be offering tours of the research and teaching facilities that exist within the building.

In addition to a number of interesting research-focused sessions, there will also be a session on the second day discussing the use of tools such as ChatGPT in student assessments.

The conference itself will be a great opportunity to meet with other colleagues across the School of Engineering. The sessions on AI in Engineering, and on Robotics and AI (led by Angelo and featuring Bruno Adorno, Louise Dennis, Wei Pan, Simon Watson) are likely to be of particular interest. Please also encourage your PGRs to register as it will be good opportunity for them to learn about a range of research activities across our School.

To see more details of the sessions that will be running at the event and how to register, please visit Engineering the Future Conference 2023 - The University of Manchester.

Thanks

Andrew

These are the new arrangements for contacting the Head of Department Office and communication channels for the new Departments of Engineering for Sustainability, Solids and Structures, Fluids and Environment, and Engineering Management. Please disseminate this information to your teams as appropriate.

Head of Department Office

For matters which require the attention of the Head of Department Office, please send emails to the appropriate Operations Executive Assistant (OEA) inbox address below:

HODPA.MACE Inbox will no longer be monitored following this communication.

Departmental Listservs

For operational communication dissemination, the following Moderated Listservs have been created for academic and research associates.

Please note MACE-ACAD, MACE-PDRA, MACE-DEPARTMENT will no longer be used.

Operational Support

For the time being, please continue to use maceops@manchester.ac.uk email address to request support of the main operational areas:

-          Finance, including procurement, fees and expenses claims, one-off payment requests and credit card bookings

-          Support for recruitment, including processing of timesheets, casual appointments, honorary staff, visitors and teaching assistants

-          Travel support

-          Event management

-          Advice and guidance on compliance, including export controls, data protection, ATAS, overseas workers and visa

Sue Davies

Deputy School Operations Manager Department of Engineering for Sustainability Tel: +44 (0) 161 529 3900

Gwilym Jones

Deputy School Operations Manager Department of Solids and Structures (SaS)

Martin Greenhalgh

Deputy School Operations Manager Department of Fluids and Environment Department of Engineering Management Tel: 0161 529 4162

Come and meet members of the TLSE team who are aligned to support CompSci – a great chance to get to know the new team!

Event 1: Discovery and Design, 01-Mar-23
Event 2: Analysis and Outputs, 08-Mar-23

Greater Manchester has received funding from NHS England to develop a Secure Data Environment (SDE) for Research and Development. SDEs are data storage and access platforms, which uphold the highest standards of privacy and security of NHS health and social care data when used for research and analysis. They allow approved users to access and analyse data without the data leaving the environment.
 
The GM SDE will be hosted by the GM Integrated Care Board (GM ICB), and is being developed by the GM ICB in partnership with Health Innovation Manchester and the University of Manchester. It will become the primary route for accessing electronic health records for research in Greater Manchester (replacing, for instance, the existing access to the Greater Manchester Care Record via Graphnet Carecentric).
 
The SDE is currently in its design phase, and we are keen to understand the needs and requirements from academic researchers. The Christabel Pankhurst Institute and Health Innovation Manchester are therefore organising two workshops to inform GM academic researchers about the current plans, and to involve them into the design of processes and technology solutions.
 
The first workshop (1st March) will focus on the phases of data discovery (i.e. understanding which data are available) and study design/planning while the second workshop (8th March) will focus on the phases of data analysis and extracting outputs from the SDE.

Registration required

• University of Liverpool - 13-Apr-2023, 10:30-16:00
• University of Leeds - 25-Apr-2023, 10:30-16:00
• virtual event - 07-Jun-2023

Wellcome’s Discovery Research team are holding events across the UK between March and May, to find out how their work can support you and your ideas.

The in-person events are open to researchers based in the UK and Republic of Ireland at all career stages as well as research support staff. Join them to discover the breadth of disciplines that they fund (from Biomedical Science to Population & Public Health, Medical Humanities, Social sciences, Physical sciences, Engineering, Data sciences, Clinical research and more) and hear about their commitment to unlocking your research potential through deep dives into their:

• vision and priorities
• funding schemes
• targeted funding
• approach to supporting a positive research environment

This is an opportunity to hear from and speak to Wellcome staff, committee members and other researchers at plenary sessions, a networking lunch, a panel Q&A and breakout sessions.

Registration required.

Open until: 4pm 16 March 2023

Researchfish is an online system used by several major UK research funders to gather information on the outputs, outcomes and impacts of research that they have funded. The information collected in Researchfish is used to report to, and engage with, both the government, the academic community and the wider public. Any Principal Investigator (PI) who holds a grant from a funder that uses Researchfish must report research outcomes annually through Researchfish. This submission period applies to the following funders:

• UKRI (AHRC, BBSRC, ESRC, EPSRC, MRC, NERC, STFC)
• NC3Rs
• National Institute for Health Research (NIHR)
• Cancer Research UK
• British Heart Foundation
• Wellcome Trust
   

PIs must report on awards for five years after the award has ended.

PGR Students will also be asked to submit their outcomes on the above dates. The PGR student return is coordinated through the Research Degrees and Research Development Team in the Directorate or Research and Business and Engagement.

Non-compliance

All non-compliant PIs will lose eligibility to be either a PI or Co-I on further awards from any UKRI Council and any live UKRI Council awards they hold will have their payments withheld until such time as the PI makes a valid Researchfish submission.

This sanctions policy does not apply to students.

UKRI have outlined a planned increase in the indexation rate on awards. The indexation rate is being increased from 0.81% to 2.48% for new grants offered from 1st April 2023. Any offer letters received before 1st April will remain at the 0.81 rate.

Deadline: 26-Apr-2023

The Impact Acceleration Account (IAA) is a combination of grants awarded to the University of Manchester by research councils. IAA funding supports the research and innovation ecosystem to develop wider impacts from research through fast and flexible funding for early-stage knowledge exchange activities.

IAA grants are available to The University of Manchester academics from AHRC, BBSRC, EPSRC, MRC and STFC. In addition, ESRC have recently made a new IAA allocation to the university. This has been aligned with the UKRI IAA and incorporated within this call, with a single point of application across the participating research councils.

The UoM Knowledge Exchange Partnerships Team is pleased to announce the third Call for Proposals under the following mechanisms:

• Relationship Development Scheme (up to £10k, open call); fostering new relationships between external partners and academic researchers, creating opportunities for collaboration and exchange of knowledge and skills
• Proof of Concept Scheme (up to £30k); support for the very early stage of transforming research outputs into commercial and translational opportunities.
• Secondment Scheme (up to £60k); flexible support for secondments between the UoM and businesses and other organisations.

Do you have a potential project? The Knowledge Exchange Partnerships Team provide active support for the development of IAA submissions. You are strongly advised to contact us via kepartnerships@manchester.ac.uk at least 1 month before the call closing date on the 26th April.

Deadline: 23-Mar-23

Apply for funding to establish a £3M multidisciplinary research community in digital twinning (over 5 years), complementing the existing industry-led multisector digital twins community.

https://www.ukri.org/opportunity/develop-a-uk-digital-twinning-research-community-with-a-networkplus/

The next DSE Awareness session will take place on Wednesday the 15^th of March at 10:00am, link below.

Click here to join the meeting