Published on 10 January 2025
Symplectic Elements link to Researchfish available until Monday 20th January
The annual submission period for UKRI, NIHR, BHF, CRUK and other funders is 3rd February 2025 to 13th March 2025, during which time PIs need to use their Researchfish account to submit a return on their research outputs.
Prior to the submission period, please encourage PIs to enter their research outputs into Symplectic Elements and link them to their relevant funding by 20th January 2025. These links can then be included in the bulk upload from Elements to Researchfish, which will happen at the end of the month. After 20th January 2025, any additional links and the outputs themselves, will need to be inputted directly in Researchfish during the submission period.
Note that the links being uploaded from Symplectic Elements to Researchfish are from journal articles, conference proceedings, book chapters and data sets where they have a unique identifier (DOI) and have been linked to a grant in Elements which matches a University of Cambridge affiliated award in Researchfish.
ERC Proof of Concept call
The aim of the ERC Proof of Concept (PoC) grant is to facilitate exploration of the commercial and social innovation potential of ERC funded research. Only a PI of an ongoing ERC grant or one that has finished recently can apply for the PoC.
The call is currently open and there are two deadlines: 13th March & 18th September 2025. Guidance and the crib sheet are now available on the ROO website.
ERC requirements on PI time
This is a reminder that the ERC requires a minimum PI time to be spent on the grant as per the terms and conditions of your award. The time spent needs to be evidencable, even if it is not charged against the grant. The Research Office strongly recommends using timesheets for this purpose. Further guidance is available on our timesheet SharePoint site.
New Research Culture resource
A new suite of resources is being developed to help with writing high-quality research grant applications, is now available for researchers and professional services colleagues. Current topics include guidance on writing about research culture and facilitating good research practice.
This is in addition to the grant application support already provided by the Research Strategy Office which includes help with project management of bid preparation, organising internal peer review and practice interview panels. If you have any questions or would like to discuss your potential project, please contact researchstrategy@admin.cam.ac.uk.
Royal Society Medals and Awards
Nominations are now open for the Royal Society’s annual medals and awards programme, including awards for those ‘behind the scenes’ (such as technicians and research office staff). Although self-nominations are not allowed, nominations are otherwise not restricted. The awards are;
- The Royal Society Hauksbee Award is awarded for outstanding achievements in science to an individual or team whose work is mostly ‘behind the scenes’ or in support.
- The Royal Society Research Culture Award is awarded to an individual or team for outstanding and sustained work in the improvement of the research system or research culture.
- The Royal Society Environment Medal and Lecture will be awarded to an individual or team for outstanding and sustained work in environmental science.
The deadline for submission is 21st February 2025.