Last week I had a variety of meetings, some as part of a regular series such as those with Bob Watson, Chief Scientific Advisor at Defra, and with the BioIndustry Association (here focussing largely on Industrial Biotechnology). However, a variety of other meetings focussed on the opportunities for scientists and funders offered by digital (or e-) infrastructure.

One internal meeting involved discussions of how we as funders will be able better to automate the capturing of outputs (such as papers) and linking them over time to the grants that funded them. Another showed me where we are with an internal tool that will help us capture outcomes and impacts.
Continue reading: Capturing and using digital information

Last week saw the splendid and welcome announcement in the Budget (pdf) of a new investment of £100M in science capital infrastructure for growth, with £70M of that earmarked for the Norwich Research Park (£26M) and the Babraham Research Campus (£44M). This is a magnificent recognition of the importance of BBSRC science to our potential economic prosperity as part of the Knowledge-Based BioEconomy. We shall now be working hard to develop the details of these investments so that the benefits may be realised as quickly as possible.

Another celebratory occasion was the culmination at the Bioscience for Growth networking event of our Innovator of the Year and Excellence with Impact competitions. I had no direct involvement in these, so I was as eager as the competitors to know the results. As ever, we had a huge array of exciting scientific and other activities on display (focussing for each entry on an ‘iconic’ object), and we were delighted that Minister for Science and Universities David Willetts was able both to present the prizes and to spend a considerable amount of his time conversing with the exhibitors. 
Continue reading: Celebrating the breadth of biology and its impacts

Last week’s activities included a two-day meeting of our Strategy Advisory Board, where (unsurprisingly) we concentrated on our upcoming Strategic Plan, as well as looking inter alia at the results of our survey of high-performance computing needs, and at an externally commissioned analysis of the Knowledge and Technology Transfer activities of our Institutes. Our dinner speaker was Nick Dusic, Director of the estimable Campaign for Science and Engineering organisation. I also attended another couple of meetings around Food Security, where we continue to develop our strategy. One aspect, on which we have not so much concentrated, is the issue of waste in the food chain, and I have just started to read an important book on the subject: Waste – uncovering the global food scandal, by Tristram Stuart.
Continue reading: Combined food and energy

In December I was delighted to participate, with MRC Chief Executive Sir Leszek Borysiewicz and Science Minister Lord Drayson, at the event celebrating the publication of the UK’s largest survey of public attitudes to stem cell science. The occasion was important in several ways. First, the findings showed public support for basic science and its translation into treatments for serious conditions (and there is an interesting discussion to be had on how people perceive the relative seriousness of different conditions). Secondly, the meeting took place shortly after the high-profile demonstration of research feeding into treatments – the use of stem cells in a trachea transplant - for which part of the process derived from BBSRC-funded research by Anthony Hollander at the University of Bristol. Thirdly, the study illustrated that public dialogue is becoming embedded in UK research culture – BBSRC’s Bioscience for Society Panel will be advising us on our response to the findings and recommendations. 
Continue reading: 2008 – year of the stem cell? And a lot else.