City Research Competition 2008

Tuesday 15 January 2008

Oliver Thompson Lecture Theatre, Tait Building, from 2.00 pm

The University’s first Research Competition provided an opportunity for staff from each School to present proposals for new research or for taking existing research in a new direction, with an award of £60,000 for the presentation judged to be the best on the day. The award was won by Professor John Barbur from Optometry for his presentation on "Extension of normal vision in patients with high risk of macular degeneration". A copy of the slides used in his presentation can be seen on the Applied Vision Research Centre web pages.

All staff were invited to submit proposals, with each of the University’s seven Schools making their own final selection. The event was held in the Oliver Thompson Lecture Theatre at the University’s Northampton Square site, commencing at 2.00 pm and finishing at approximately 7.00 pm with a buffet supper for all attendees. The event was a great success with about 90 members of staff and students attending, and will be repeated again next year. The 2007 staff research prizes were also awarded by the Vice-Chancellor at the end of the event.

The detailed programme can be seen below.

A panel of distinguished external judges determined the winning presentation:

Professor Salvator Roberto Amendolia, Scientific Attaché, Embassy of Italy in the UK

Susan Anderson, Director of HR Policy, CBI, and Council member of ACAS

Professor Gordon Edge, CBE, Founder of PA Technology and of The Generics Group

Professor Adrian Seville, former Academic Registrar of City University

The panel was chaired by Professor Dinos Arcoumanis as Pro-Vice-Chancellor for Research and Internationalisation.

The criteria applied by the judges (set out below) took account of the fact that the research proposals presented spanned a wide range of topics and that the judges themselves would not all be research experts:

i) The topic would make a valuable contribution to society (this will include the arts as well as other disciplines).

ii) The ideas are forward-looking.

iii) The money will be well spent.

iv) The presentation was well directed for a non-specialist audience.

PROGRAMME

Each presentation was no more than ten minutes, with five minutes for questions.

2.00 pm Welcome: Professor Dinos Arcoumanis, Pro-Vice-Chancellor (Research and International)

2.15 pm Extension of normal vision in patients with high risk of macular degeneration:

Professor John Barbur, Applied Vision Research Centre, with Professor Peter Coffey, Institute of Ophthalmology, Dr Lyndon da Cruz, Moorfields Eye Hospital Trust and Dr Janet Wolf, Applied Vision Research Centre (proposal)

2.30 pm “Broadcast Yourself”: Investigating Success Factors of User-Generated Videos and Motivations to Watch Them: Dr Caroline Wiertz, Cass Business School, and Professor Thorsten Henning-Thurau, Cass Business School & Bauhaus University of Weimar (proposal)

2.45 pm Risk factors and court decisions based on expert witness evidence: What factors make it more likely that expert witness evidence will be found to be unreliable? Penny Cooper, The City Law School (proposal)

3.00 pm ULT-R (ultra): An ultrasound investigation of the articulation of /r/ in standard British English: Dr Rachael-Anne Knight, Department of Language and Communication Science, with Jennifer Edie and Gill Harrison, Department of Radiography (proposal)

3.15 pm 3D Reconstruction of X-ray angiograms in early detection of atherosclerosis: Dr Panos Liatsis and Dr Manolis Gavaises, School of Engineering and Mathematical Sciences (proposal)

3.30 pm Dyslexia and Information Retrieval: Dr Andrew Macfarlane, Centre for Interactive Systems Research, Department of Information Science, with Professor Stephen Robertson and Asaad Albrair, Centre for Interactive Systems Research (proposal)

3.45 pm Tea break, OTLT Foyer

4.15 pm Conceptions of Excellence: a comparative analysis of journalism awards and prizes: Professor Howard Tumber and Professor Adrian Monck, Department of Journalism and Publishing (proposal)

4.30 pm Sexual offending against children: Pathways to offending and their relationship with early maladaptive schemas and sexual coping: Dr Jacqui Farrants and Dr Susana Corral, Department of Psychology (proposal)

4.45 pm Building up research activities in the emerging Terahertz Technology: Professor Aziz Rahman, School of Engineering and Mathematical Sciences (proposal)

5.00 pm Call centre workforce management system: Professor Celia Glass, Cass Business School (proposal)

5.15 pm Different histories: identifying the health and social needs of lesbian, gay and bisexual people in later life: Dr Anthony Pryce, Department of Applied Psychosocial Sciences, Dr Nick Drey, Department of Midwifery and Dr Eamonn McKeown, Department of Public Health, Primary Care and Food Policy (proposal)

5.30 pm An Intelligent Telemedicine System for Improved Treatment of Burns Patients: A study in fluid resuscitation: Dr Peter Weller and Professor Abdul Roudsari, Centre for Health Informatics (proposal)

5.45 pm Is micro-credit an effective tool for fighting poverty? Dr Gabriel Montes-Rojas, Department of Economics, with Dr Jose Olmo and Dr Saqib Jafarey, Department of Economics (proposal)

6.00 pm Break for drinks while the judges determine the winner, OTLT Foyer

6.30 pm Award of the 2008 Research Competition Prize and of the 2007 staff research prizes by the Vice-Chancellor

7.00 pm Buffet supper in the Oliver Thompson Lecture Theatre Foyer/Courtyard Café