As well as a variety of internal meetings, I attended a couple of receptions, the first of which was at BIS – largely for industrialists and partner organisations. This was very useful, and I met a number of folk who would not normally see themselves as close to our interests. The second was an annual event (though a first for me) where ‘scientists meet the media’ at the Royal Society. Again I made a number of potentially important contacts that will help get the BBSRC message out.

The main visit of the week was to Harper Adams University College. Harper Adams is a major provider of agricultural education, training and knowledge transfer, as well as (largely applied) research. This was thus an exceptionally interesting visit. Without seeking to pick out specific areas, I note that Harper Adams runs the only UK degree courses in Agricultural Engineering, and I saw some very interesting work at the interface of engineering and agriculture, especially in the areas of using modern technology to plant, sense, weed, and harvest agricultural crops. The whole area of ‘precision agriculture’ is going to provide an important contribution to increasing the productivity of food and non-food crops, and we can expect it to expand significantly.
Continue reading: Genomics data, the media and Harper Adams

Last week saw another (and the final) ‘double-header’ of Institute Assessment Panels, the first being that of the Babraham Institute and the second of The Genome Analysis Centre (TGAC). Both panels were as usual redolent with real experts, with whom it was also a pleasure to enjoy informal discussions. This coming week completes the Institute Assessment Panels with one visiting the Institute for Animal Health. As with all the others, funding decisions will not be taken until Council meets next March, and this blog does not really comment on such visits. However, I was interested to have my first sight at TGAC of one of the new ‘PacBio’ single-molecule genome sequencing machines.
Continue reading: Babraham, TGAC, Schrödinger and economic growth

Among last week’s meetings was one to discuss how we might best take forward our implementation of the Athena Swan arrangements, and in particular the development of requirements for our fundees to have done so (by applying for and achieving the necessary charter awards), probably in the manner set down by the NIHR for bids to become Biomedical Research Centres.

I managed to attend the dinner discussion of the first meeting of our new Exploiting New Ways of Working Panel, and also had a first meeting since his appointment with Tim Benton, the new Global Food Security Champion.
Continue reading: Athena Swan, Exploiting New Ways of Working, East Malling, and The Two Cultures

Last week began with a meeting of the Heads of Research Council of the G8 nations, the G8HORCs of the title. This is an annual meeting that moves between member nations, and this time was held in the UK at and near the University of Warwick. This was a very useful opportunity to hear, in a closed setting that allowed a degree of frankness, the thoughts of equivalent leaders of research funding agencies around the world. Many of the issues are common to us all, of course (the increasing costs of doing science, open access, data floods, upskilling our communities, etc.), but the opportunity to share solutions that work was both welcome and taken. Subra Suresh, the relatively new Head of the US National Science Foundation, stayed on for further meetings with the RCUK Chief Executives both as a group and individually, and this allowed a longer and deeper discussion.
Continue reading: G8HORCs, process technology and synthetic biology

Last week a number of us spent the better part of three days visiting (and meeting members of) the many Institutions on the Norwich Research Park (NRP). There is a welcoming and increasing synergy of activities and coincidence of purpose, helpfully catalysed by the recent Budget announcement of the provision of a £26M investment for NRP campus developments. I also had the opportunity to see the new Training Suite, at the John Innes Centre named in honour of Chris Lamb, and the massive TGAC Data Centre which presently holds the world record as the largest computer (in terms of RAM) running Red Hat Linux, that was opened the following day. Such a machine gives us a world lead in terms of assembling short-read sequences for very large genomes such as that of wheat.
Continue reading: Norwich Research Park, genomics data and carbon sequestration