British Heart Foundation Centre of Research Excellence – Retreat, September 2008

The town of Woodstock in Oxfordshire was the location of the first retreat for the Directors and Theme Leaders of the British Heart Foundation (BHF) Centre of Research Excellence.

The future success of the Centre is dependent on cross-faculty collaboration, and this retreat was the perfect opportunity for individuals from across the Faculties of Medicine, Engineering and Natural Sciences to meet and share ideas. The day began with a brief introduction from Professor Schneider, followed by a presentation from him outlining the research Theme that he leads, Stem Cell and Developmental Biology. All of the twenty Themes were represented at the retreat, with a ten minute presentation on each, followed by the opportunity to ask questions.

Attendees were also given the opportunity to learn more about the four pump-priming pilot projects, which had been funded by the Centre earlier in 2008. The objective of this pilot project mechanism is to promote the investigators’ capabilities and competitiveness for external peer-reviewed funding by facilitating exploratory research, hypothesis-generating studies, proof-of-concept demonstrations and the establishment of novel tools or methods. A maximum of £40,000 funding was available for these pilot projects, and the successful studies run for between 10 and 24 months. The Centre of Research Excellence will be putting the next call for pilot project applications out in 2010.

The day ended with Dr Nigel Brand detailing the education and training aspects of the Centre, emphasising that a key aim of the Centre is to train the next generation of leaders at the interface between Clinical, Biomedical and Physical and Computational Sciences. The training opportunities offered by the Centre include MRes/PhD Studentships (for which the first tranche of students start in October 2008), Post-doctoral Fellowships and Clinical Training Fellowships.

The Retreat proved to be a huge success, providing a venue for members of the Centre from across the College to come together to share research ideas and bolster collaborations. This cross-collaboration will continue to grow, assisted by fortnightly seminars beginning in November 2008 and larger symposia events, the first of which will be held in June 2009.

If you are an independent investigator and are interested in becoming a member of the BHF Centre of Research Excellence, please contact the Centre Manger Dr Katie Payne (k.payne@imperial.ac.uk) who will be able to put you in contact with the relevant Theme leader.