Award boost for knowledge exchange

Edinburgh Research and Innovation (ERI) is to pilot a new bioscience knowledge exchange initiative after winning first prize in a new competition run by the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC).

The £50,000 award will help ERI roll out a new project to increase the commercial impact of bioscience research.

Initiative features

The new initiative will offer three elements:

• technology scouts – individuals based at research centres will be tasked with identifying commercial opportunities
• mini secondments – to support collaboration between industry and academics
• future scoping workshops –where academics can explore what problems may arise and identify potential solutions.

Initial pilot

ERI will work with the Edinburgh Infectious Diseases consortium in an initial pilot project.

The consortium is a research hub that brings together more than 700 active researchers across the spectrum of infectious disease science and clinical medicine.

The successful aspects of the pilot will then be introduced to other areas of research strength, such as industrial biotechnology and biosciences underpinning health.

Activating Impact

BBSRC’s inaugural Activating Impact contest was set up to recognise the efforts of knowledge exchange and commercialisation teams in turning BBSRC-supported bioscience into real-life applications.

With its strong record in supporting the commercialisation of bioscience research, ERI beat 41 leading UK universities to the top prize.

Winning this award against tough competition is fantastic and acknowledges the successes that ERI has achieved with BBSRC-funded research outputs at the University. We are very excited about winning this funding, which will allow us to put our ideas into practice.

Photo credit: Tim Gander