Grant winners

ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL RESEARCH COUNCIL

Research grant

• Award winner: Mark Blagrove

• Institution: Swansea University

• Value: £99,483

Dream content as a measure of memory consolidation across multiple periods of sleep

Follow on fund

• Award winner: Peter North

• Institution: University of Liverpool

• Value: £80,000

Building the low-carbon economy on Merseyside

• Award winner: Barry Goodchild

• Institution: Sheffield Hallam University

• Value: £47,880

Consumer perspectives in low- energy/low-carbon housing: a video and interactive website

Knowledge Exchange Opportunities

• Award winner: Charlie Jeffery

• Institution: University of Edinburgh

• Value: £46,338

Conversations on the political economy of constitutional change in Scotland

• Award winner: James Downe

• Institution: Cardiff University

• Value: £70,672

Accountability, efficiency, improvement and change in UK local public services: the role of benchmarking and external performance assessment

NATIONAL INSTITUTE FOR HEALTH RESEARCH

Health Technology Assessment programme

• Award winner: Nadine Foster

• Institution: Keele University

• Value: £224,950

Evaluating acupuncture and standard care for pregnant women with low back pain (EASE BACK trial): a feasibility and pilot study

Health Services and Delivery Research programme

• Award winner: Jonathan Benn

• Institution: Imperial College London

• Value: £142,859

Evaluation of a continuous monitoring and multi-level feedback initiative to improve quality of anaesthetic care and perioperative workflow efficiency

ARTS AND HUMANITIES RESEARCH COUNCIL AND NETHERLANDS ORGANISATION FOR SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH

Anglo-Dutch network initiatives in the humanities

Joint applications for up to €40,000 each have now been successfully funded for networking or exchange activities relating to two thematic areas: sustainable communities in a changing world; and cultural interactions of research

• Award winners: Owain Jones and Bettina van Hoven

Institutions: University of the West of England and the University of Groningen Between the tides? Comparative arts and humanities approaches to living with(in) intertidal landscapes in the UK and the Netherlands: learning from those who live and work with complexity, change and fragility

IN DETAIL

Efficacy and Mechanism Evaluation programme

• Award winner: Ian Muir Anderson

• Institution: University of Manchester

• Value: £1,002,385

Ketamine augmentation of electroconvulsive therapy to improve outcomes in depression

Many patients suffering from depression fail to recover with current drug and psychological treatments. ECT is effective but remains controversial. A serious concern is impairment in memory and other cognitive abilities, leading some patients to stop ECT prematurely. If these effects could be prevented, and fewer ECT treatments needed, this could change clinical practice. Ketamine is an anaesthetic drug that blocks the effects of a major brain chemical, glutamate, involved in memory and mood. Preliminary research shows ketamine protects against the adverse effects of ECT on memory and makes it work more quickly. The study will investigate the benefit of adding ketamine to the usual anaesthetic used for ECT.