Grant winners

VITAE

Seven projects have won funding under Vitae's Innovate scheme, which supports ventures that enhance the development of researchers. The winners were announced at the Vitae researcher development conference 2009, held this week at the University of Warwick.

Award winner: University of East Anglia

Value: £15,725

Essential business skills for the low-carbon economy: a bespoke programme for researchers

Award winner: National Union of Students

Value: £9,900

Researcher-led initiatives: generating frameworks for promoting a postgraduate-researcher stake in researcher development

Award winner: University of Leeds

Value: £9,750

Building impact into social science research

Award winner: History Research Wales

Value: £8,516

The research-impact agenda and early-career development for historians: a pilot study

Award winner: Imperial College London

Value: £7,160

Facilitating research as a creative process

Award winner: University of Sussex

Value: £4,500

Win-win: developing the transferable skills of research staff through mentoring

IN DETAIL

Award winner: The Open University

Value: £20,000

Open research: The application of e-knowledge tools in researcher careers training and development

This project seeks to explore how different technologies can best be used to enhance researchers' development by evaluating the web-based provision of researcher career-development training. It will also help to produce a series of guidance notes for the UK research community and develop a way to use online training materials alongside workshops hosted by partners.

BIOTECHNOLOGY AND BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES RESEARCH COUNCIL

Up to £1.7 million has been awarded to 16 new fellows across the biosciences. Winners will conduct research lasting between three and five years. Details of the professorial fellowship were published last week.

DIAMOND PROFESSORIAL FELLOWSHIP

Award winner: So Iwata

Institution: Imperial College London

Studying structure and mechanisms of human cell-membrane transporters

RESEARCH DEVELOPMENT FELLOWSHIPS

Award winner: Miltos Tsiantis

Institution: University of Oxford

Using computational modelling to study the genetics of leaf geometry

Award winner: Adrian Whitehouse

Institution: University of Leeds

Analysing changes within animal-cell nucleolus during a herpesvirus infection

Award winner: Carmen Molina-Paris

Institution: University of Leeds

Studying the adaptive cellular immune system using systems biology

Award winner: Gillian Stephens

Institution: University of Manchester

Exploring new methods of using different enzymes to break down waste materials for use as biofuels

Award winner: Sotaro Kita

Institution: University of Birmingham

Exploring how young children develop language skills

INDUSTRIAL IMPACT FELLOWSHIP

Award winner: Mark Ian Christie

Institution: King's College London

Working with the Centre for Integrative Biomedicine to maximise the partnership and education opportunities for in vivo science and translational medicine

DAVID PHILLIPS FELLOWSHIPS

Award winner: Christian Rutz

Institution: University of Oxford

Studying tool use, culture and cognition in New Caledonian crows

Award winner: Nicholas Roberts

Institution: University of Bristol

Studying vision in deep-sea animals

Award winner: Martin Stevens

Institution: University of Cambridge

Exploring defensive colouration and predator vision in birds

Award winner: Jeremy Murray

Institution: John Innes Centre

Learning more about the function of a gene found in legumes required for beneficial interactions with bacteria and fungi

Award winner: Gareth Lavery

Institution: University of Birmingham

Exploring the metabolic pathways that mammals use to derive energy from the glucose found in food and utilise it in muscle

Award winner: Alastair Wilson

Institution: University of Edinburgh

Studying the genetics of competition in animals and whether resource limitation constrains evolution

Award winner: Alessio Ciulli

Institution: University of Cambridge

Developing new approaches to advance understanding of protein-protein interfaces and of their modulation using small molecules

INSTITUTE CAREER PATH FELLOWSHIP

Award winner: Christopher Bass

Institution: Rothamsted Research

Exploring the molecular mechanisms underlying insecticide resistance in crop pests