ACTION MEDICAL RESEARCH
Award winner: L. Islam
Institution: Institute of Child Health, University College London
Value: £138,300
Blindness in children
Award winner: S. Khanjani
Institution: Imperial College London
Value: £86,694
Pre-term labour - investigating protein interactions that could control labour
Award winner: D. Eleftheriou
Institution: Institute of Child Health, University College London
Value: £191,375
Stroke in children
ARTS AND HUMANITIES RESEARCH COUNCIL
Award winner: Hannah Greig
Institution: University of York
Value: £12,236
The Yorkshire Coiners: narrating history through image, text, object and memory
Award winner: Eva Frojmovic
Institution: University of Leeds
Value: £42,012
Postcolonising the medieval image
Award winner: Siobhan Lambert-Hurley
Institution: Loughborough University
Value: £50,197
Women's autobiography in Islamic societies: the ultimate unveiling?
Award winner: Jean Allain
Institution: Queen's University Belfast
Value: £50,568
Slavery as the powers attaching to the right of ownership
Award winner: Thomas Schramme
Institution: University of Wales, Swansea
Value: £42,220
The role of moral theory in healthcare ethics
Award winner: Scott Thurston
Institution: University of Salford
Value: £16,240
Talking poetics: dialogues in innovative poetry
Award winner: Peter Bisschop
Institution: University of Edinburgh
Value: £77,352
Early Saiva mythology
Award winner: Matthew Ratcliffe
Institution: University of Durham
Value: £245,224
Emotional experience in depression: a philosophical study
Award winner: Stefan Vogenauer
Institution: University of Oxford
Value: £300,875
The common frame of reference on European contract law in the context of English and German law
Award winner: Astrid Ensslin
Institution: Bangor University
Value: £147,211
What's hard in German
ENGINEERING AND PHYSICAL SCIENCES RESEARCH COUNCIL
The EPSRC has awarded £16.5 million under the cross-council programme Nanoscience through Engineering to Application. Funds will be shared among ten UK-based projects developing new techniques to screen and treat major public health problems such as cancer, Aids and influenza.
Award winner: R. Bayford
Institution: Middlesex University
Value: £796,480
Developing new imaging methods for the detection of cancer biomarkers
Award winner: P.R. Williams
Institution: Swansea University
Value: £923,647
Developing a detector for early blood clot detection and characterisation in disease screening, theranostic and self-monitoring applications
Award winner: Q.A. Pankhurst
Institution: University College London
Value: £1,648,342
Heating cancer cells to improve drug treatments
Award winner: C.J. McNeil
Institution: Newcastle University
Value: £1,918,431
Developing a micro sensor system that could detect MRSA and other infectious diseases
Award winner: R.A. McKendry
Institution: University College London
Value: £1,636,554
Hand-held home tester for HIV patients to monitor immunity levels
Award winner: G. Battaglia
Institution: University of Sheffield
Value: £2,173,198
Improving the delivery of neurological drugs to the brain
Award winner: S.L. Hart
Institution: University College London
Value: £1,391,287
Targeted delivery of therapeutic agents to the brain for the treatment of dementias
Award winner: J. Moger
Institution: University of Exeter
Value: £216,213
Technologies for the treatment of brain diseases
Award winner: S. Rannard
Institution: University of Liverpool
Value: £1,422,399
Delivering HIV/Aids drugs to areas that are very difficult for conventional drugs to reach
ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL RESEARCH COUNCIL/ARTS AND HUMANITIES RESEARCH COUNCIL/BRITISH ACADEMY
South Asia fellowships worth a total of £80,718 have been awarded. The winners spend up to six months undertaking a research project in the UK with their UK host academics.
Award winner: J. Abraham
Institution: Jawaharlal Nehru University, India
Partner: C.J. Fuller, London School of Economics
Value: £5,956
Houses and kin-groups: Transformations in matriliny in north Kerala
Award winner: F.Z. Arockiavictorial John
Institution: Population Council, India
Partner: S. Padmadas, University of Southampton
Value: £7,473
Poverty, family size and modern contraceptive choices in India
Award winner: S. Aziz
Institution: Lahore University of Management Sciences, Pakistan
Partner: H. Iqtidar, University of Cambridge
Value: £5,300
Legal activism: the politics of the lawyers' movement in Pakistan
Award winner: A. Balachandran
Institution: Centre for the Study of Culture and Society, India
Partner: R. Ahuja, Soas
Value: £5,148
Christ and the Pariah: Colonialism, religion and outcaste labour in South India, 1780-1830
Award winner: B. Bhukya
Institution: Osmania University, India
Partner: S. Tejani, Soas
Value: £4,739
Subordination of the sovereigns: colonialism and its Gond Rajas in Central India, 1853-1948
Award winner: N. Deb
Institution: Jadavpur University, India
Partner: J. McDonagh, King's College London
Value: £7,445
Under Eastern eyes: cultural and commercial traffic between the Port of Calcutta and the Australia-Pacific region, 1847-1947
Award winner: B. Kar
Institution: Centre for Studies in Social Sciences, Calcutta
Partner: W. Ernst, Oxford Brookes University
Value: £7,142
The cultural and political economics of opium in British Assam, c 1800-1942
Award winner: M.N. Khan
Institution: University of Peshawar, Pakistan
Partner: C.A. Petrie, University of Cambridge
Value: £6,770
The sacred and secular in ancient Gandhara: investigating the unique stupa and settlement site of Aziz Dheri, Peshawar Valley, NWFP, Pakistan
IN DETAIL
Award winner: Peter Ashburn
Institution: University of Southampton
Value: £1,134,189
Silicon nanowire arrays for viral infection markers
This project aims to develop low-cost blood-testing kits that can be used in GPs' surgeries for immediate analysis.
Professor Ashburn, head of the Nano Research Group at Southampton's School of Electronics and Computer Science, will work with colleagues in the School of Medicine and Chemistry to find a new way to fabricate nanowires - a technology used in computer and TV displays - that allows mass production. The technology will analyse protein biomarkers electronically rather than optically to give much faster results.
"Standard clinical laboratory tests have limitations outside the laboratory," Professor Ashburn said. "This can reduce the impact of new protein biomarkers for diagnosing complex conditions such as cancer. However, one-dimensional nanostructures such as nanowires are ideal for the purposes of diagnosis because they can be integrated into microfluidic chips that provide a complete sensor system."
Because of its potential impact on the healthcare system, the team will work with colleagues from the School of Social Sciences, who will assess the social aspects involved in the take-up of the testing kit.