Doctoral Training Partnerships: a range of postgraduate training is funded by the Research Councils. For information on current funding routes, see the common terminology at https://www.ukri.org/apply-for-funding/how-we-fund-studentships/. Training grants may be to one organisation or to a consortia of research organisations. This portal will show the lead organisation only.

Doctoral Training Partnerships: a range of postgraduate training is funded by the Research Councils. For information on current funding routes, see the common terminology at https://www.ukri.org/apply-for-funding/how-we-fund-studentships/. Training grants may be to one organisation or to a consortia of research organisations. This portal will show the lead organisation only.

The initial research questions are: - What are some of the ways in which literary artists can develop work in active engagement and partnership with communities around issues of representation, identity, voice and representation? - What are some of the challenges for literary artists/ poets/ performers in this context? - What are the current practices, challenges and obstacles for UK literary festivals in addressing issues of representation and diversity? - What recommendations for future strategy and policy best practice can be made to effectively address issues of inclusivity and diversity in literary festival programming? Aspects of race, class, and disability will be explored through the work of The Stuart Hall Foundation and the Centre on the Dynamics of Ethnicity and The Ledbury Emerging Poetry Critics Scheme, the work of Kit de Waal and New Writing North on the Common People Project. The PhD will be undertaken in partnership with Sabotage Reviews, which runs the Saboteur Festival. This will support the development of an understanding of the current practice of literature festivals, the pressures of organising a festival, and links to the research questions above including in terms of promoting inclusivity. The student will be encouraged to bring her own interests to shape the project, based on the student's expertise in writing and wellbeing and the potential of contributing an exciting and original perspective to issues of diversity and inclusion in literary festivals.

Renewable energy has recently received considerable media and public attention because of perceived benefits to the environment, including climate change, the potential to replace imported sources of energy, the possible impact on food production, and aesthetic issues related to the location of wind turbines. Potential sources of land-based renewable energy include bioenergy from forests, arable crops, energy crops and waste, solar heating and electricity, hydroelectricity, ground-source heat, and wind-energy. The spatial organisation of such energy sources, together with energy demand, energy infrastructure and other energy-sources within a particular landscape can be termed the 'EnergyScape'. 'Ecosystem Services' is a collective term to describe the various services we obtain from land and its associated ecosystems. They include the provision of food, fibre and fuel, the regulation of nutrients, water supply and water quality, the creation of opportunities for recreation and education, the maintenance of biodiversity, and the space to build and maintain our supporting infrastructure. The development and use of land-based renewable energy resources will have both negative and positive impacts on these services. Positive aspects may include increased biodiversity from biomass crops; negative aspects may include reduced river flows and increased road transport of biomass. This one-year research project aims to determine, through a pilot study, how a systematic understanding of the 'EnergyScape' and 'Ecosystem Services' could help guide the deployment of land-based renewables. For the pilot study we have selected Marston Vale in Bedfordshire which is a sub-catchment of the Great Ouse river, and contains a mix of agricultural, forestry and urban land. It is the site of a community forest and there is local interest in renewable energy. Working with national and local stakeholder groups, the project will identify the key sources of renewable energy within the study area and the key ecosystem services likely to be affected by the development of land-based renewables. Using spatial data, geographical information systems and existing models, the project will then develop a spatial description of the EnergyScape and the key ecosystem services for the study area. Because some models are weaker than others, we will use a 'Plug and Play' framework, as used in computing, so that new and improved models can be introduced as they become available. Similarly, the approach will allow new data sources to be included as they become available. Starting from the base-line description, we will then investigate the benefits and losses associated with the deployment of different combinations of land based renewables. Because renewable energy sources have different spatial and temporal characteristics relative to the demand for energy, the outputs will not be simply additive. Similarly, there will be complex interactions between energy generation and different ecosystem services, and amongst the ecosystem services. Some interactions will be antagonistic (e.g. solar power v demand for heating; food v biofuel) whereas others may be complementary (e.g. sharing of facilities; biofuel v biodiversity). By using appropriate visualisation tools, we hope that the key interactions can be explained to stakeholder groups, who can then use the information to inform future decisions. We intend that the approach developed in this research, which will be limited to the renewables and ecosystems of a specific area, can be applied to other regions and at a national spatial scale in future research projects. To validate the academic efficacy of our approach, we will submit papers for peer review, seeking to get them published in high-impact scientific journals.

Recent Nobel Prize-winning discoveries on the circadian clock (CC) have laid the foundation for ground-breaking approaches to treating many diseases, including Alzheimer's disease (AD). AD is a current public health priority. Amplifying the demographic burden of the rising numbers of patients is the low success rate of AD therapies. Given that CC genes regulating memory, sleep, and neurodegeneration has altered expression profiles in AD, CC has recently emerged as a viable therapeutic target for new effective drugs. However, how to develop them remains a fundamental challenge. The "Targeting Circadian Clock Dysfunction in Alzheimer's Disease" Doctoral Network (TClock4AD) is proposed to create a new generation of researchers able to face such challenges by harnessing neurobiology, medicinal chemistry, pharmaceutical nanotechnology, neuroimmunology, big data, bioinformatics, and entrepreneurship. TClock4AD will exploit unique expertise and advanced technologies at 10 leading universities, 3 research centres, a hospital, 10 non-academic institutions including SMEs, a large pharma company, a Health industry association, and a patient organization across the EU, UK, Israel, USA and China. TClock4AD will deliver double degrees to 15 doctoral candidates, with triple-i knowledge/skills, broad vision and a business-oriented mindset. Their research activities will be structured around 5 scientific themes to (1) develop novel artificial intelligence-, proteolysis targeting chimeras- and multitarget-based strategies for new CC drug candidates; (2) develop novel drug delivery nanotechnologies, which take into consideration CC; (3) investigate innovative in vitro (stem-cells, 3D cultures) & in vivo (Drosophila), as well as organ-on-chip techniques, for preclinical validation of CC drugs; (4) get insight into the molecular mechanisms underlying CC in AD and associated drug response in mice and C. Elegans models; (5) develop innovative biotech business model and exploitation strategies.