News | Page 5 | Scottish Universities Physics Alliance

International Year of Light Scotland Closing Event

IllumiNations, the closing event for the International Year of Light in Scotland too place on the 3rd December at Heriot-Watt University. School children and adult visitors attended a range of science exhibits, a lecture by BBC science communicator Professor Jim Al-¬Khalili and a spectacular science-based light show. SUPA shared a stand with the Institute of Physics and displayed information about IYL activities that had taken place in Scotland during year, and information on Scottish physics more widely.

Back in 2014, recognising the importance of the Year of Light to Scottish physics, and the many links to Scotland, SUPA, together sought to establish a distinct Scottish contribution to the Year’s activities, as well as playing a role in the UK and global programmes. SUPA, together with IOP Scotland and the Royal Society of Edinburgh, made a case to SFC to support a core programme of IYL2015 events in Scotland. SFC’s funding of £50k was more than matched by the SUPA universities, alongside contributions from RSE, M Squared Lasers, the Knowledge Transfer Network, Gas Sensing Solutions and others.

Funding available to support Horizon 2020 proposals

SUPA has recently received a further tranche of funding from the Scottish Funding Council to compete for, and participate in, European funding. The purpose of the funding, known as PEER, is to enable SUPA:

to submit applications for European funding under Horizon 2020 and as part of that process
to engage and build partnerships with industry, particularly (but not exclusively) Scottish SMEs
to establish network connections, showcase skills and capabilities and participate in specific networking activities

SUPA PEER funding is available to support applications to current and future EU funding calls. This might include funding specialist consultants, finding company partners to join consortia, funding academic travel for consortium or networking meetings, or other relevant activity.

PEER funding has been successfully used to support pre-proposal consortium meetings across Europe and to attend networking events and call development events such as Photonics 21 meetings. We have also used PEER funding to help pay for consultant support. To date, 50% of proposals using PEER funded consultant support have been successful (versus 14% overall and 20% in the ICT theme).