supa – the evolving vision april 2012

Scottish Universities Physics Alliance

SUPA – the Evolving Vision

April 2012

Prof Jim HoughChief Executive


• SUPA l will • pool and enhance Scotland's strongest physics

research to develop international leadership• provide a magnet for researchers and sponsors

worldwide

Scottish Universities Physics Alliance:A Partnership for Excellence

SUPA I(Scottish Universities Physics Alliance)

A Partnership for Excellence

In the beginning


SUPA I

SUPA l – funded for a start in 2005 £14.1M (58% from Scottish Higher Education Funding Council) ending 2010 then extended to 2011

SUPA l – 6 Universities: Edinbugh, Glasgow, Heriot-Watt, St Andrews, Strathclyde, University of West of Scotland

5 funded themes + Graduate School• Astronomy and Space• Condensed Matter and Materials Physics• Nuclear and Plasma Physics• Particle Physics• Photonics

• Plus subtheme of PP and Astro – TEOPS (Technology for Experimental and Observational Physics in Scotland) which involved the Astronomy Technology Centre in Edinburgh.


Vision of SUPA

Aim:SUPA 1 will place Scotland at the forefront of research in physics in the UK

2008 UK Research Assessment Exercise

• Three departments in Scotland were ranked 7th equal or better (out of 42), led by St Andrews standing at equal 2nd with Cambridge and Nottingham,

• Edinburgh 6th and Glasgow equal 7th. • Heriot-Watt Physics improved significantly, rising to equal

15th place, on a par with Oxford and Southampton.

• Collectively, SUPA has more high quality activity than Cambridge.

SUPA


SUPA II

SUPA ll – funded to start winter 2009 £48M (33% from Scottish Funding Council), for 7 years, so overlap with SUPA l

SUPA lI – Two More Universities: Aberdeen and Dundee

• extra themes• Physics and Life Sciences (PaLS)• Energy

• Plus extension of TEOPS subtheme, renamed SPARK (Scottish Physics and Astronomy for Research and Knowledge exchange)

More investment in people overall but particularly in • PaLS and • Nuclear (SCAPA: The Scottish Centre for the Application of

Plasma-based Accelerators)


Current SUPA network


Now SUPA 11 - VISION

• Strong International Profile • Recognised Research Excellence As

determined by – REF performance– grant income– international collaborations

• Long term sustainability


Progress to date 1

• Currently we have – > £150 M research grant portfolio– approx. 60 prestigious appointments/fellowships

including• 8 Leadership professorial appointments made

across the themes and schools (4 in PaLS, 2 in condensed matter and 2 in Photonics)

• 2 leadership professorial positions in Nuclear/Plasma Physics theme offered

• 7 holders of ERC awards, • 14 RS/RAE Fellowships etc

– 5 new Wolfson Merit Awards– 8 new electees to the RSE– 1 Royal Society Professor


Publications in SUPA II to date

Astro CMMP En’rgy N/PP PaLS Phot. P’rticle

697 447 81 268 232 383 374


Progress to date 2

• Prizes include– 2011 Charles H Townes award holder (Sibbett)– 2011 Royal Medal of the RSE (Smith)– 2011 Occhialini Medal holder (Oppo, Strathclyde), – 2011 IoP Particle Physics Group Prize (Davies,

Glasgow), – 2012 Edinburgh Award (Higgs)– 2012 RAS Gold Medal (Brown)

• JUNO Champion Status for Glasgow.


Themes

• All 7 themes (Astro, CMMP, Energy, Nuclear/Plasma, Particle, PaLS and Photonics) are progressing well with clearly laid out strategies for their future development– Strategies will be discussed later by the theme

leaders or representative• Graduate School has ever increasing number

of applications for prize studentships• SUPA 11 has a Director of Knowledge Transfer

and he will report on the growing activities in this area.


REF – see papers attached

• 3 Meetings of REF Champs since May– Looking at impact statements – Will cross read selection of papers– Will collaborate on wording on overall applications

• Currently– Edinburgh/St. A. intending to submit jointly with

high ‘entry’ threshold. Will exclude significant number of staff.

– Other Schools/departments undecided as yet• Serious discussions will commence in early

summer


International Agenda

• Invitation to talk at ‘Regional Cooperation in Higher Education’ in Essen, October 2011

• Developing MoU with CNISM (Italian National Inter-university Consortium for the Physical Sciences of Matter)

• Involvement in Scottish Fraunhofer Centre.

• Potential Max Planck Centre in Scotland– (SUPA/MPG)


Max Planck Centres

The Max Planck Society is one of the world’s most successful research organizations. Since its establishment

in 1948, the Society has produced 17 Nobel Laureates, putting it on a par with the most prestigious research

institutions worldwide. (10th in the world and 3rd in Europe according to

http://research.webometrics.info/top4000_r&d.asp)


Max Planck Centre Measurement and Observation at the Quantum Limit

• Propose Max Planck Centre on Measurement and Observation at the Quantum Limit

• Joint venture between SUPA (Glasgow, Strathclyde and St Andrews in the first instance until set up) with AEI Hannover and Golm, MPL Erlangen, MPQ Garching, MP for Chemical Physics Dresden, and MP for Solid State Physics Stuttgart

• promote international collaboration with the Max Planck Society and beyond

• success will be measured in terms of jointly authored papers and grants

• international recruitment programme• visitors exchange programme• international workshops/sandpits• pump-priming of projects

Strategy, Aspiration and Progress


Max Planck Centre Measurement and Observation at the Quantum Limit

• Five Year life in first instance• Being led by Danzmann (AEI) and Hough

(initially)• Strong support from the Universities with

interest from STFC, EPSRC and SFC.• Negotiations are ongoing.

• Fully consistent with the original SUPA Vision

The Max Planck Society delivers science at the highest of international standards, making the Centre a magnet for the

world’s leading researchers, students, fellows and full professors


Challenges to be met

• Keeping researchers motivated towards collaboration and the work required, when they have received their share of funding– Prize Studentship contest helps but future carrots are needed

– hence internationalisation and other activities.• Matching collaborative priorities to competitive

individual institutional priorities when bidding for funds– requires care– the pool has to be able to add value to each institutional bid– Would be helped if collaborative proposals specifically invited

• Long Term Sustainability


Opportunities

• SFC imposed a funding cut of 16.4 % for 2011/12 but ongoing funding has been restored

• Amount cut will also be restored provided it is used to place early career researchers in industry or an entrepreneurial environment.– Real opportunity here to get young researchers out to Silicon

Valley for a period using our SU2P connections• Extra funding has also been provided for helping with

EC grant applications involving SMEs, and for early career exchanges to improve internationalisation.

• Funding of a number of Innovation Centres recently announced

• Last two points will be discussed under KT and Graduate School.

supa – the evolving vision april 2012

Documents

observational physics

heriotwatt physics

materials physics nuclear

renamed spark scottish

supa li

scottish centre

scottish funding council

forefront of research