Academy of Finland Newsletter, April 2011
The Academy of Finland newsletter keeps you updated on leading-edge scientific research funded in Finland and on other news from the Finnish world of science and research. If you want us to send this to someone else in your organisation or if you do not want to receive these newsletters in the future, please let us know at viestinta@aka.fi.
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Academy funding continued to increase
In 2010, the total value of Academy of Finland funding decisions came to EUR 324 million, up a strong 7 per cent from 2009, when the disposable funding stood at EUR 304.2 million. The value of all applications received by the Academy in 2010 was EUR 1.4 billion, compared to EUR 1.6 billion in 2009. Funding could only be granted to applications that received the highest ratings in peer reviews.
According to the Academy’s Annual Report for 2010, researchers based at universities received 84 per cent of all Academy funding. Funding awarded to Academy Projects accounted for 38 per cent of the total amount of funding, altogether for EUR 124 million. The Finnish Centre of Excellence programmes accounted for 9 per cent, research programmes for 4 per cent, and research posts as Academy Professor and Academy Research Fellow for 9 per cent of the total amount of funding. In turn, contributions to international organisations and cooperation agreements accounted for 7 per cent, or EUR 21 million.
The Academy invited applications for research programmes and announced the second stage of the Centres of Excellence 2012–2017 call, which involves 32 shortlisted applicants. The Academy Board will make the decisions on the teams to be selected to the CoE programme in June 2011.
The Academy awarded EUR 28 million in support for research infrastructures. Funding was made available in three infrastructure calls to nationally significant research infrastructure projects prioritised by universities. Seventeen of the projects are listed on the roadmap for national-level infrastructures and 15 have connections with the European roadmap of the European Strategy Forum on Research Infrastructures (ESFRI, 2006 and 2008).
The Academy of Finland Annual Report is available online at www.aka.fi/publications.
Finnish BBMRI National Hub launches
BBMRI.fi, the Finnish National Hub of the European Biobanking and Biomolecular Resources Research Infrastructure (BBMRI), was officially launched on 11 March 2011. The new national network for biobanking is a component in the joint European research infrastructure development project ESFRI (European Strategy Forum for Research Infrastructures). Together with other infrastructures in the field of life sciences, BBMRI is expected to reinforce European competitiveness in both natural sciences and medicine.
Finland has had a key role in the start-up of the BBMRI network. Academician of Science, Professor Leena Peltonen-Palotie, who passed away last year, was chair of the Governance Council for the network’s preparatory phase and Professor Eero Vuorio, Director of Biocenter Finland and former Chancellor of the University of Turku, is the Executive Manager of the network.
The Finnish Ministry of Education, Science and Culture is committed to supporting the development research infrastructures, for example, through long-term funding to Biomedinfra, a consortium of three Finnish organisations included in the ESFRI project and listed in the national roadmap for research infrastructures. The BBMRI.fi network will operate as part of Biomedinfra. According to Finnish biobanking organisations, biobanking research and the transformation of its results into applications for the benefit of healthcare are best promoted through networking and cooperation. Last year, a number of Finnish biobanking bodies from hospital districts, the National Institute for Welfare and Health (THL), universities and other research institutes therefore joined forces to set up the BBMRI.fi network as a national effort for efficient and automated collection of biological material and as a National Hub of BBMRI.
The objective set for BBMRI.fi is to introduce common and compatible practices in Finnish biobanking by utilising available resources as far as possible and investments made over the last few decades. One of the goals is to produce new knowledge on how genes, the environment and lifestyles affect health and health risks. Besides biological samples, biobanks store data on population health, lifestyles and eating habits. These data help in better exploring health risk factors and in acquiring additional information on the development, prevention and treatment of diseases. Biobanking samples are treated anonymously without any information that can identify donors, and researchers with access to this anonymised data are not able to link their results to any one donor.
Employment rate exceptionally high among those with tertiary degrees
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In 2008, a total of 85 per cent of those with tertiary-level degrees in Finland were employed, which is 14 percentage points higher than the employment rate of the total population. According to Statistics Finland, the situation was best for those with doctorate-level degrees, whose employment rate was over 90 per cent. The difference between the employment rate of men and women was small, just over one percentage point, while in the total population it was three percentage points.
The employment rate of those with higher-level tertiary degrees or doctoral degrees varied somewhat by field of science. The employment rate was best in the fields of medical and health sciences (93%) and engineering and technology (90%). The employment rates of those with degrees from the humanities (83%), natural sciences (85%) and agricultural sciences (86%) were slightly weaker. The differences in employment between men and women were mostly minor, but in the fields of natural sciences and engineering and technology, women’s employment was around four percentage points lower than the corresponding figure for men.
The unemployment rate of those with tertiary degrees was 4.4 per cent in 2008. This means that the fall in unemployment that had continued throughout the 2000s stalled. At the same time, the unemployment rate of the total population was 6.4 per cent. There were also differences between highly educated groups. The unemployment rate of those with doctorate-level degrees was lowest, i.e. 2.4 per cent, and the unemployment rate of those with the lowest tertiary education was 5.0 per cent.
Sixty-two per cent of the personnel in the field of science and technology worked in specialist tasks and 19 per cent in management. There were great differences between men and women’s employment. Nearly one-third of men worked in management tasks, while only about one-tenth of women. Of men, 54 per cent were employed in specialist tasks and of women 69 per cent. Women’s employment in management and specialist tasks has not changed much over the 2000s. Men have slightly increased their share in management tasks. More information is available in “Human resources of science and technology 2009”, a statistical release by Statistics Finland (2011).
Academy actively engaged in Joint Programming
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The Academy of Finland is actively participating in Joint Programming (JPs). A JP is a structured strategic process of the European Research Area (ERA) whereby Member States agree common visions and strategic research agendas to address major societal challenges, and where participation of Member States is based on voluntary commitments leading to partnerships composed of variable groups of countries. The pilot JP, where Finland has much to offer, concerns neurodegenerative diseases, including Alzheimer's disease. In 2010, there were three launches of JP initiatives, and the Academy participates in two: Agriculture, Food Security and Climate Change, and A Healthy Diet for a Healthy Life.
Under preparations are six JPs: Connecting Climate Knowledge for Europe; More Years, Better Lives; Water Challenges; Healthy and Productive Seas and Oceans; Urban Europe; and Microbial Challenge – an Emerging Threat to Human Health.
The Academy values the general target of the JPs, which aim at better coordination of national research efforts in order to develop critical mass to address major European or global societal challenges.
Symposium honouring Academician of Science Leena Peltonen-Palotie
In honour of Academician of Science, Professor Leena Peltonen-Palotie, the Institute for Molecular Medicine Finland FIMM, the University of Helsinki and the National Institute for Health and Welfare (THL), in cooperation with other science and research organisations such as the Academy of Finland, will organise a symposium in Helsinki on 18‒19 May 2011. The symposium honours the career and scientific achievements of Academician Leena Peltonen-Palotie. This two-day meeting will feature presentations from global leaders in human genomics research, many of whom were her close colleagues at the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute in the UK and the Broad Institute in Boston in the US as well as in several organisations in Helsinki and elsewhere. Academician Peltonen-Palotie passed away last year.
The symposium, “A Global View of Disease Genomics”, will be a tribute to Peltonen-Palotie’s commitment to human genetic research. The event will feature many prominent speakers, who are all looking forward to address the past, present and future of human genetics. Science is, truly, the best way to celebrate Academician Leena Peltonen-Palotie’s career and the remarkable advances that have taken place over the past decades in her field. For more information and registration, see http://leenasymposium.fimm.fi.
Academy of Finland at a glance
The Academy’s objective is to promote scientific research of a high standard through long-term quality-based research funding, research and science policy expertise, and efforts to strengthen the position of science and scientific research. In 2011, the Academy makes decisions on research funding worth EUR 340 million. Each year some 5,000 people benefit from Academy research funding. For more information, go to www.aka.fi/eng or send a message to maj-lis.tanner@aka.fi.