Academy of Finland Newsletter, October 2009
The Academy of Finland newsletter will keep you updated on basic research funded in Finland and on other news from the Finnish world of science and research. In case you wish 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.
Features:
Academy of Finland’s research appropriations increasing slightly
Academy of Finland’s October call for funding applications opened
36 million euros from the Academy of Finland to research on culture and society
47 million euros from the Academy of Finland to research in natural sciences and engineering
Finland and Brazil to strengthen cooperation in energy research
Academy of Finland prepares a research programme on climate change
Finnish FiDiPro programme crucial in promoting internationalisation
Significant ERC research funding to Finland
Finnish scientist awarded in the United States
Scroll down for more on these stories
ACADEMY’S RESEARCH’S APPROPRIATIONS INCREASING SLIGHTLY
In the Finnish Ministry of Education budget proposal for 2010, focus areas include raising the quality of research, higher education and basic education. The Ministry’s budget proposal includes an increase of 12.9 million euros on 2009 to the Academy of Finland’s budget authority for research project funding. A further two million euros are proposed for the funding of research infrastructures. The Academy of Finland operates within the administrative sector of the Ministry of Education. In 2009, research funding from the Academy of Finland will come to some 300 million euros. Total expenditure in the administrative sector of the Ministry of Education comes to 6,186 million euros.
Finnish lottery proceeds are expected to come to 463 million euros. Annually, 26 per cent of science expenditure is funded with lottery proceeds.
The Academy of Finland will continue to work to raise the quality of research, develop research careers, strengthen the status and visibility of science, and boost strategic partnerships. The Academy is concerned to promote international cutting-edge and ethically sustainable research, the renewal of research, research aiming at new multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary research topics and approaches, the strengthening of a wide and multidisciplinary knowledge base in society and scientific breakthroughs.
ACADEMY OF FINLAND’S OCTOBER CALL FOR FUNDING APPLICATIONS OPENED
The Academy of Finland’s October 2009 call for applications has been published. The deadline for submitting applications is 30 October 2009. In this call, funding is available for the following: Academy Professorships, Academy Research Fellowships, funding for Senior Scientists, Finland Distinguished Professor Programme, doctoral studies of employed people, researcher mobility in working life, researcher training and research abroad, preparation of international joint projects, academies and science policy academies. The Academy is also inviting applications for international joint calls, specifically a joint call in education research between the Academy of Finland and the Chilean National Commission for Scientific and Technological Research (CONICYT); a joint call in the field of research of materials for photonics, optoelectronics, solar cells and batteries between the Academy of Finland, Tekes and the Japan Science and Technology Agency (JST); and international joint calls related to the Academy’s Research Programme on Photonics and Modern Imaging Techniques, including a joint project call in the field of optoelectronics between the Academy of Finland and the Brazilian National Council for Scientific and Technological Development (CNPq), and a joint call in the field of photonics between the Academy of Finland and the Russian Foundation for Basic Research (RFBR), and an ERA-NET PRIOMEDCHILD call. More information is available on the Academy’s website at www.aka.fi/eng.
36 MILLION EUROS FROM THE ACADEMY OF FINLAND TO RESEARCH ON CULTURE AND SOCIETY
The Research Council for Culture and Society of the Academy of Finland has granted 36 million euros on the basis of the January 2009 call. In the call in question, the Research Council received altogether 471 applications, 263 of which concerned general project funding. A total of 55 research projects were granted funding. The amount of funding allocated to individual projects increased slightly. Projects received funding of some 500,000 euros each on average.
Research projects are the foremost type of the funding provided by the Academy, as funding is granted to projects with topics chosen by the researchers themselves. Free project funding secures the renewal and regeneration of different disciplines and the freedom of research. The Research Council invites internationally renowned experts chiefly from outside Finland to review applications. The experts commended the high standard of applications submitted to the Research Council.
The January 2009 call also involved two specific themes, one of which was research on migration. The Research Council received 14 applications, four of which were awarded funding. The other specific theme was ethical, legal and socio-cultural perspectives on genomics. In the call, Finnish, German and Austrian research funding agencies fund joint projects. Six Finnish researchers submitted applications for this call.
A total of 188 applications were submitted for funding for Postdoctoral Researcher’s projects; 45 of these received funding.
For several years, the Research Council for Culture and Society has provided funding to support the European Social Survey (ESS). The Research Council now funded the data collecting of the fifth round. In the course of nine years, the ESS has collected data that covers society, its operation and the set of values of citizens in different countries. This data is saved in a joint database for the use of researchers. The ESS is one of the joint European research infrastructures. The aim is to promote multidisciplinary research and research collaboration. More interest has focused on Finland since Finland joined the project.
47 MILLION EUROS FROM THE ACADEMY OF FINLAND TO RESEARCH IN NATURAL SCIENCES AND ENGINEERING
The Research Council for Natural Sciences and Engineering of the Academy of Finland has allocated 47 million euros to research on the basis of the January 2009 call. A total of 35 million euros was granted to fund research projects. In addition, the Research Council supported researchers in gaining of competence with 12 million euros by funding 47 three-year Postdoctoral Researcher’s positions.
Some 25 million euros were allocated for the promotion of basic research in engineering. In the January 2009 call, special focus was placed on research in mechanical engineering and water engineering as an incentive to researchers in those fields. By investing in basic research in mechanical engineering, the Research Council also wished to support the Strategic Centre for Science, Technology and Innovation in the field of metal products and mechanical engineering through new knowledge and expertise to be generated in the projects. Funding allocated to projects that are linked water engineering came to 1.8 million euros.
A link with major international projects in science forms a theme in the Council’s funding decisions; funding allocated to research related to such projects came to some 4.6 million euros. The Research Council funded projects involving research with organisations such as the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN), European Space Agency (ESA), the International Continental Scientific Drilling Program (ICDP) and the European Incoherent Scatter Scientific Association (EISCAT).
About half of the 35 million euros granted to research projects went to projects whose principal investigator is under 45 years old. The percentage of young researchers among grant recipients has been increasing in recent years, and their success in scientific reviews is a promising sign of a new generation of researchers emerging.
In 2008, the Academy of Finland carried out an international evaluation of mechanical engineering research in Finland in 2000–2007. According to the evaluation, the scientific standard of research in mechanical engineering needs improvement and the general appreciation of researcher training and the prestige of the doctoral degrees also need to be improved. In the January 2009 call, the Research Council for Natural Sciences and Engineering decided to allocate a total of 2.5 million euros specifically to machine design, manufacturing engineering and engineering mechanics. Applicants were also encouraged to establish project collaboration with researchers in the fields of basic natural sciences, computer science, electronics and energy research.
More applications were submitted to the targeted call in research on mechanical engineering than the Research Council had received from that field in total during the two previous years. An international expert panel found the applications to be of such a high standard that the projects were funded with a total of 3.1 million euros. The projects that receive funding represent fields such as shipbuilding, moving machines, robotics, micromanufacturing and friction research.
FINLAND AND BRAZIL TO STRENGTHEN COOPERATION IN ENERGY RESEARCH
Finland and Brazil will strengthen their cooperation in energy research. The Academy of Finland provides funding worth more than two million euros to Finnish partners in five joint research projects. The Brazilian funding agency will fund Brazilian researchers in the projects.
Finland is highly interested in bilateral research collaboration with Brazil. So far, Brazil has had bilateral agreements on research collaboration with Argentina and France. The Academy of Finland and the National Council for Scientific and Technological Development (CNPq) of the Federative Republic of Brazil opened a joint call for Finnish-Brazilian research projects in the energy field in November 2008. The themes of the joint call were sustainable terrestrial biomass systems for energy, energy efficiency in pulp and paper production, and biomass-based production in biorefineries. The joint projects will be incorporated as part of the Academy of Finland Sustainable Energy Research Programme.
The parties agreed on the themes for research collaboration in Finnish-Brazilian workshops held in July 2009. The workshops were attended by Finnish and Brazilian top researchers in the fields of energy research, forest research, plant breeding and photonics. Bioenergy in particular proved to be of great interest to both parties in the joint call in energy research. Brazil is one of the leading countries in the world in bioenergy research. Both Finland and Brazil also considered it important to investigate the use of bioenergy in the forest industry.
In the future, the Academy of Finland will seek to launch Finnish-Brazilian joint calls in fields where the Academy has an ongoing research programme. This autumn, the joint call of both parties is in the field of optoelectronics research.
ACADEMY OF FINLAND PREPARES A RESEARCH PROGRAMME ON CLIMATE CHANGE
The Academy of Finland is preparing a research programme on climate change in which the focus areas of research are the impacts and mitigation of climate change. The research programme will be implemented in cooperation with Tekes, the Finnish Funding Agency for Technology and Innovation, Finnish ministries and other national and international research funding organisations.
The research programme on climate change contributes to supporting the top-level research initiative “Climate, Energy and the Environment” launched on a proposal by the Nordic Council of Ministers. The Academy of Finland participates in European climate change research networking through the CIRCLE ERA-NET network, in which a Nordic pilot call has already been implemented.
The Academy is also preparing a research programme on the future of living that will focus various trends related to living as well as its social, technological and environmental issues. Programme themes include urbanisation, construction, land use, changes in living, and exercise and the living environment.
The Future of Living Research Programme will involve a joint call to be launched together with Japan.
The Academy Board will decide on the launch and funding of the new programmes in autumn 2009. The research programme proposals are included in the Academy of Finland’s action and financial plan, approved by the Board on 22 September 2009.
If the Academy Board decides to launch the research programmes, calls will open in January 2010 and projects will be funded mainly in 2011–2014.
The Academy has 12 ongoing research programmes. The Academy is taking part in the pan-European Baltic Sea research programme in 2010–2016 and is prepared to provide funding to a pilot project on health challenges of an ageing population. The pilot project is carried out within the European Union’s Joint Programming.
FINNISH FiDiPro PROGRAMME CRUCIAL IN PROMOTING INTERNATIONALISATION
The Finland Distinguished Professor (FiDiPro) programme is crucial in promoting the international engagement of Finnish research organisations. FiDiPro professorships have clearly strengthened the competence areas defined by universities. These are among the findings of a survey conducted by the Academy of Finland.
The survey was made with a view to finding out the significance of FiDiPro funding for the Finnish research organisations. The aim was to assess what added value FiDiPro funding had generated for the internationalisation of the Finnish research system and how it had promoted the profiling of universities in their strategic competence areas.
More than 80 per cent of respondents said that many of the measures their institutions had taken to increase internationalisation would not have been made if it had not been for FiDiPro professorships. Nearly 90 per cent of respondents said that international visits to their departments had increased after the launch of the FiDiPro programme. The presence of foreign researchers clearly exercised a positive impact on the teaching and tutoring at institutions. The majority of FiDiPro professors supervise writers of doctoral theses and a few also provide tutoring to post docs. In addition, the professors also contribute to other teaching at the departments where they work.
The survey conducted by the Academy of Finland shows that FiDiPro professorships have attracted additional funding to most of the organisations involved. From the perspective of internationalisation, funding received from international funding bodies and funding received for international activity is of particular importance. Additional funding has been received from sources such as the EU Seventh Framework Programme, the European Research Council (ERC), NordForsk and the Nordic Council of Ministers.
The FiDiPro programme is a joint funding programme of the Academy of Finland and Tekes, the Finnish Funding Agency for Technology and Innovation, that provides Finnish universities and research institutes with an opportunity to employ foreign top researchers or expatriate Finnish top researchers who have long worked abroad to carry out research in Finland for a fixed period of time.
SIGNIFICANT ERC RESEARCH FUNDING TO FINLAND
Finnish researchers have been successful in the European Research Council’s (ERC) latest call for research funding. In the ERC call for Starting Independent Researcher Grants, now implemented for the second time, Finnish researchers received six major research grants. The highest amount of a single research grant comes to 1.5 million euros.
The ERC received a total of 2,503 applications for funding to young researchers; 48 of these came from Finland. Funding was awarded to some 240 projects, i.e., about 10 per cent of applicants. Finland was successful in the call in a Nordic comparison: out of the Nordic countries, Finland came second after Denmark.
Researchers who received ERC funding have also been successful in competitions for national research funding. The Finnish recipients of ERC funding have close links with the Academy of Finland which has supported their research through Academy funding instruments such as Academy Research Fellowships, Postdoctoral Researcher’s projects and general research grants.
FINNISH SCIENTIST AWARDED IN THE UNITED STATES
Dr Iiris Hovatta, Academy Research Fellow and Adjunct Professor, has been awarded a young investigator’s award in the United States. The Rosalind Franklin Young Investigator’s Award is granted by the Peter and Patricia Gruber Foundation, and in addition to Dr Hovatta, this year’s award was also given to a US researcher. The award sum is 75,000 US dollars (about 53,000 euros). Dr Hovatta is researching the genetic background of psychiatric diseases and mental disorders. She was given the award in recognition of her studies and the new approaches she applies.
The Peter and Patricia Gruber Foundation is a private US foundation. The Foundation honours and encourages educational excellence, social justice and scientific achievements that better the human condition.
Academy of Finland in brief: 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. The Academy makes decisions on research funding worth about 300 million euros annually. Each year some 5,000 people benefit from Academy research funding. For more information, go to www.aka.fi or send a message to maj-lis.tanner@aka.fi.