http://www.esrc.ac.uk/funding/funding-opportunities/cross-disciplinary-mental-health-network-plus-call/?utm_medium=email&utm_source=govdelivery

Deadline: 4pm, 22 March 2018

Duration: 48 months, to start in 2018

Amount: £1.25m @ 100%fEC, (£9-10m budget for six and ten awards that will, collectively, address the breadth of research areas). No limit of applications per RO.

The aim of the call is to encourage the creation of multi-disciplinary networks that cross the remit boundaries of the research councils. These networks will address important mental health research questions that require an innovative, cross-disciplinary approach to accelerate progress; to build cross-disciplinary research capacity in the field; and to strengthen the UK mental health research base.

The call has been informed by the research councils recently published Cross-disciplinary Mental Health Research Agenda (RCUK website) which represents their collective interest in supporting and furthering mental health research. It encourages areas where high quality cross-disciplinary research could add the most value and impact to the broader mental health research landscape through novel and transformative research.

Research areas:

• Understanding mental health and mental health problems
• Connection between physical and mental health
• Public health, prevention and wellbeing
• Living with mental health problems

Cross-cutting themes:

• Effective intervention(s)
• Technology and data
• Lifestyle and behaviour
• Inequalities
• Empowerment, ethics, confidentiality and trust

As well as helping to build cross-disciplinary capacity within the mental health research field and facilitating knowledge exchange, the successful networks will be able to fund small research projects that will answer specific research questions relevant to one or more of the research area(s) listed above.

The additional planned activities and objectives could include running workshops and other networking events, funding short discipline hops, and feeding into policy and practice.

In addition each network will set aside an appropriate amount of ‘plus’ funds that can be used for organising activities open to the whole research community throughout the period of the award.

It is expected that the application process for network plus funded activities will allow for applicants from outside of the network to participate, thereby drawing more people into the community of researchers.

Applications for network plus awards should outline appropriate plans, including timelines, governance and assessment criteria, for the distribution of ‘plus’ funding.

Please ensure to read the full call guidance documents and FAQs available through the link above.

If you are thinking of applying, please could you email Dr Gwen Averley and Darren Airey so that we are aware of potentially overlapping bids.

5 January 2018, 5pm – Mandatory attendance – Registration deadline for community meeting to be held in London on 17 January 2018

24 January 2018, 4pm (EoI) through Je-S

BBSRC Networks in Industrial Biotechnology and Bioenergy (NIBB) Phase II

http://www.bbsrc.ac.uk/funding/filter/networks-in-industrial-biotechnology-bioenergy-phase2/

up to £10m is available to fund a number of UK-wide multidisciplinary Networks, of varying scales, focusing on a broad range of fundamental and strategic challenges and questions facing the IBBE area.

Networks will operate for up to 5 years and are expected to become self-sustaining beyond this.

Applicants intending to submit an Expression of Interest must attend and present their proposed Network at the Community meeting being held in London on 17 January 2018.

Registration for the community meeting is via Key Survey here and closes 5 January 2018, 16:00. Register at the BBSRC NIBB Phase 2 Community Meeting registration page.

The networks will be interdisciplinary, working across the engineering, physical, chemical and biological sciences research communities.

The objectives of this call are:

• To support a number of Networks in industrial biotechnology and bioenergy and through them, continue to facilitate the development and growth of internationally competitive cross-disciplinary communities capable of undertaking innovative research and attracting further investment from UK and international sources.
• To provide the resources to support proof of concept funding for a range of research projects identified by the Networks, ultimately leading to more competitive, collaborative, cross-disciplinary and integrative research proposals to BBSRC and elsewhere particularly in the areas of manufacturing, bioremediation and bioenergy.
• To encourage the interaction between the academic research base and technology-deploying, associated value-chain and end-user businesses, promoting the translation of research particularly involving genomic, systems and synthetic biology.
• To enable the supported Networks to provide the leadership to develop, in collaboration with business, challenges to be addressed though national and international competitive funding mechanisms taking their research further towards commercialisation.

Note also:

• Networks will be encouraged to work across the Technology Readiness Levels (TRL) 1-4 with the aim of transitioning excellent fundamental research towards higher TRLs.
• Each Network should have members from the relevant academic and business communities covering the disciplines of biology, chemistry and engineering. Networks should comprise a diversity of expertise and experience and may include international researchers, Government Departments and other stakeholders, as appropriate. Networks should include participation at all levels including, where appropriate, postdoctoral and postgraduate researchers as well as more senior members. Applicants should also consider the wider impacts of work undertaken by the Network and include representatives from the environmental, economic and social science communities.
• Successful Networks are intended to be “open” in that participation by other interested members will be encouraged throughout the life of the Network in order to develop the community as it matures. How new members can join the Network should be described within the full proposal.

Previous Networks are listed here:
http://www.bbsrc.ac.uk/research/programmes-networks/research-networks/nibb/

http://www.neurodegenerationresearch.eu/2017/11/2018-joint-transnational-call-for-research-proposals-pre-announcement/

The EU Joint Programme – Neurodegenerative Disease Research (JPND) will shortly launch a call for:

Multinational research projects on Health and Social Care for Neurodegenerative Diseases

There are an estimated 47 million people suffering from Alzheimer’s disease and related disorders worldwide. This figure is expected to double every 20 years as the population ages.  As of today, neurodegenerative diseases are debilitating and still largely untreatable conditions.

Providing appropriate health and social care represents an increasingly significant responsibility for people who live with such diseases as well as their relatives and carers. Novel health and social care concepts focus on what people still can contribute in the context of the disease and how their environment may influence this process. Nevertheless, the availability and quality of health and social care services vary considerably across Europe and beyond.

Therefore, JPND will launch a call for multidisciplinary proposals that focus on one or several of the following research areas:

• Care pathways and programmes using the potential of patient involvement
• Factors influencing progression and prognosis of disease
• Outcome measures for patients and their informal carers
• Palliative care of patients
• Cost-effectiveness and affordability of interventions including ethical concerns

The following neurodegenerative diseases are included in the call:

• Alzheimer’s disease and other dementias
• Parkinson’s disease and PD‐related disorders
• Prion diseases
• Motor neuron diseases
• Huntington’s disease
• Spinocerebellar ataxia (SCA)
• Spinal muscular atrophy (SMA)

This will be a two-step call, expected to be launched in early January 2018, with a likely pre-proposal submission deadline in March 2018.

Further details will be provided with the official launch of the call.

Bloodwise – Call for Applications

Bloodwise is the UK’s specialist blood cancer research charity dedicated to improving the lives of people living with and beyond blood cancer. The charity’s research is targeted at understanding more about blood cancer, finding causes, improving diagnosis and treatments, and running ground-breaking clinical trials for patients.

We are pleased to announce that our project grants scheme is open. Projects are for up to £250,000 and up to three years for clearly defined research projects addressing key questions in the field of blood cancer. The remit of the project grant scheme also includes research projects that maximise the value and outcome of a clinical trial.

The deadline for project grant applications is 4:00pm on Thursday 15 February 2018.

More information and details on how to apply are available on our website.

Please pass on this announcement to relevant people.

Bloodwise Research

research@bloodwise.org.uk

11 January 2018, 4pm

12 July 2018, 4pm

MRC Public Health Intervention Development (PHIND) Scheme

https://www.mrc.ac.uk/funding/browse/public-health-intervention-development-scheme/public-health-intervention-development-scheme-phind-jan-2018/

This scheme runs twice a year and is for up to £150K for up to 18 months.

The MRC Public Health Intervention Development scheme (PHIND) supports projects that will develop innovative new interventions that address an important UK or global public health issue, and seeks to encourage a novel, high risk approach to intervention development. Complex, population level interventions, with a focus on non-health care settings (such as: transport, education, employment, leisure and the built environment), are considered particularly suitable. Health care settings are not excluded, but projects should demonstrate potential for improved health of general, high risk or vulnerable populations.  In addition, proposals that align with the NIHR Public Health Research Programme or for MRC Global Health schemes are particularly welcomed.

Proposals should address the early stage of development of new interventions including qualitative and quantitative primary research, developing theory and designing the intervention.

Examples of the types of research within scope are:

• defining the intervention
• specifying content
• developing theory
• modelling process and outcomes such as developing logic models
• identifying components and their inter-relationships
• developing procedures and protocols
• creation of new interventions where active components of existing interventions are recombined to create a new intervention

Where appropriate, investigators are strongly encouraged to include user participation in their developmental study, as absence of user engagement at an early stage can reduce the success of the intervention.

We are pleased to announce that the Medical Research Council has launched a further call to support ‘rising star’ African Research Leaders. This is a prestigious award, jointly funded by the MRC and the Department for International Development (DFID). The aim of the scheme is to strengthen research leadership across sub-Saharan Africa by attracting and retaining exceptionally talented individuals who will lead high quality programmes of research on key global health issues pertinent to the region and beyond.

Please see the link below for further information on the scheme and guidance on how to apply:

https://www.mrc.ac.uk/funding/browse/arl-2018/mrc-dfid-african-research-leader-scheme-2018/

Please could I ask you to pass this email on to anyone who you think might be interested in this scheme. Many thanks.

Please direct any queries to ARLadmin@headoffice.mrc.ac.uk