Department of CS newsletter

I strongly encourage you all to sign up for the wordsmithing session that Gavin is running on June 19th. How we perform in REF has both direct and indirect consequences for our department - so please make a special effort to come along to this session and learn about how we can maximise how our outputs are scored in the upcoming REF. Register via the following link: https://www.ticketsource.co.uk/university-of-manchester-department-of-computer-science/t-rpdvojd

Wellbeing survey

Please take a moment to fill out the Staff Wellbeing Survey. It will help our institution better understand current levels of wellbeing and the workplace factors that can impact on our wellbeing, as well as build our wellbeing approach and offer.

This is the link to the survey https://register.pxhub.io/weluom

Inaugural Professorial Lecture from Prof. Alex Cresswell

I hope to see many of you at Alex Cresswell’s inaugural professorial lecture on May 22nd. Alex has had a very interesting career including serving as Foreign and Commonwealth Office Mission Lead for Cyber and Technology, and working with the National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) to provide an important element of the UK’s operational defence against cyber threats. Alex will be presenting on “The reality versus the theory – how AI will impact cyber security in the next 12 months”.

PGR Awards

Kaled Alshmrany has been awarded the prestigious “Steve Furber Medal” for Outstanding Doctoral Thesis in Computer Science for his PhD "Efficient Hybrid Fuzzing for Detecting Vulnerabilities and Achieving High Coverage in Software." Ismail Al Salti has been recognized with the esteemed “Carole Goble Medal” for Outstanding Doctoral Paper in Computer Science for "LINK-GUARD: An Effective and Scalable Security Framework for Link Discovery in SDN Networks," along with his work on "An Effective, Efficient, and Scalable Link Discovery (EESLD) Framework for Hybrid Multi-Controller SDN Networks."

Kaled and Ismail are both members of the S3 Research Group - many congratulations to both of you!

Chester Zoo Trip Reminder

If you’d like to come along on our departmental trip (partners and children welcome) to Chester Zoo on Sunday June 30th please do remember to sign up here: https://forms.office.com/e/audV3TL0bU

Andrew

Patient-oriented language processing workshop co-organised by National Library of Medicine and the National Centre for Text Mining (S. Ananiadou, Paul Thompson). At LREC-Coling conference 20th May 2024

Program https://lnkd.in/dsdEtJFp

Event: 16-May-24, 9:00 to 11:00 UK time

[from Liz Fay]

The European Commission will hold a new webinar on lump sum funding for Horizon Europe projects on 16 May.

The webinar will focus on how lump sum funding works and how to write a proposal for a call that uses the lump sum funding model. The agenda will also include a discussion panel with guests presenting their practical experience with lump sum grants. The attendees will be able to post questions via Slido.

No registration is required, joining instructions are available on the event website.

The Funding and Tender Opportunities Portal has a dedicated “Lump sum funding in Horizon Europe” section that brings together all the information on lump sum funding in the programme, FAQs, and events.

The department has successfully navigated this scheme already, so we do have experience in this area.

Reminder: FSE Research Services Sharepoint Site – access information and resources to navigate research application and award processes. You can find contact details for the RS team and lots of other useful information.

[from Liz Fay]

From May 2024 the UKRI guarantee team will administer all future guarantee calls for ERC and MSCA (previously administered via Je-S) through the new UKRI Funding Service.

The first two guarantee funding opportunities to launch solely on the Funding Service will be:

• ERC Advanced Grants 2023
• MSCA Doctoral Networks 2023

Both of these will be launched on 13 May 2024.

Further guidance on how to apply using the new Funding Service will be provided in early May.

Guarantee ERC and MSCA calls which are currently open in Je-S and will be open for submissions beyond May 2024 will transition over to the UKRI Funding Service for new applications from 17 May.  A full list can be found here. If you plan on applying to either of these schemes then please contact your Research Support direct contact.

UKRI are in the process of transitioning all Je-S awards onto the UKRI Funding Service during 2024, with further guidance being released by UKRI in due course.  To keep up to date with these developments please subscribe to the Simpler and Better Funding newsletter.

All non-ERC and non-MSCA grant types currently hosted on the Innovation Funding Service (IFS) will continue to be hosted on IFS.

Internal deadline: noon 24-May-2024*
Blavatnik deadline: 29-May-2024

*the FSE internal sift information now in place on our Sharepoint (see 'Internal triage' information) https://livemanchesterac.sharepoint.com/:u:/r/sites/UOM-FSE-RS/SitePages/Blavatnik-Awards-for-Young-Scientists.aspx?csf=1&web=1&e=foUK2H

This award is for early career academics (academics born in or after 1983; holding a doctorate degree).

Nominations are allowed in one of three categories (Life Sciences; Chemistry; Physical Sciences and Engineering). One award in each category will be made for £100,000, and two for £30,000. Please also refer to the Blavatnik website for details of eligibility.

If you are considering applying, then please email sarah.chatwin@manchester.ac.uk AND klaudia.januszewska@manchester.ac.uk asap. 

The university is only able to put forward a single candidate for each category so an internal review will be required.