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Internationalisation Programme
Last 11 May 2015 the CIBER Platform for Support for Internationalisation was set up. The Platform for Support for Internationalisation (PAI) emerged as a joint initiative of the areas of Bioengineering, Biomaterials and Nanomedicine (CIBER-BBN), Rare Diseases (CIBERER) and Respiratory Diseases (CIBERES), of the Centro
de Investigación Biomédica en Red (CIBER), with the aim of reinforcing and coordinating the efforts made
to promote its researchers’ participation in European Programmes and of creating a common structure for promoting internationalisation and leadership of research and innovation in these three thematic areas.
In 2016 the platform concentrated its efforts on two main areas: encouraging participation of all the CIBER groups in international projects and improving the visibility of the CIBER on an international scale.
As regards promoting the participation of CIBER groups in international projects and improving the
quality of the proposals presented, the PAI held 4 specific sessions for dissemination of the advantages of internationalisation and gave 3 specific courses on drafting and managing European Projects intended for researchers and managers in the CIBER environment: “Relevant aspects in presenting and justifying European proposals in the CIBER environment” (April 2016, with 70 persons attending) and “Drafting successful collaborative proposals in the H2020 setting” (Madrid edition, June 2016, with 40 attending and Barcelona Edition, September 2016, with 44 attending) which were a great success with the participants.
In order to raise the quality of the proposals and improve returns the PAI got under way a Service for editing proposals which carried out the following activities: 1) Solving doubts and positioning proposals (contrasting the scientific idea with that of the call and issuing a grounded report with recommendations on how to adapt the idea, need for strategic partners, etc...) in which the PAI has received over 27 consultations in this respect; 2) Editing proposals (PAI has edited over 20 proposals); 3) Evaluation of results (in previous proposals or those not sent through the PAI), giving a grounded criticism of the result and proposing where there is room for improvement (12 requests in the period); 3) Seeking strategic partners (6 requests in this period, plus 6 external partners who got in touch with CIBER to propose joint cooperation).
Thanks to this work, CIBER put forward 36 new proposals in 2016, 4 new projects being granted. Interest was expressed in the presentation of 10 new proposals. In this field it should be stressed that CIBER has received
5 new contacts from research groups or companies in order to establish agreements for joint presentation of proposals in the H2020 environment, and 2 of these contacts have now materialised in the real presentation of two H2020 proposals.
In the field of the CIBER’S international visibility, the CIBER has done some intensive work by attending
over 18 events (including informative sessions, infodays and events for seeking partners). The platform also placed special emphasis on establishing a smooth relationship with different national representatives and national points of contact, by means of specific meetings, acting as a liaison on the institutional level. In order to improve international presence, specific meetings were held with NCPs and with the head of the H2020 programme for the purpose of establishing easier relations. Thanks to this improvement in communication the CIBER was invited to the Forum for strategic definition of the Wp2018-2020 and took an active part in defining the 2017 work programmes and IMI calls as scientific experts. It was also decided to include postulating CIBER for participation in joint actions JA-01, 02, 03, 04, 05-2016 in which the possibility of taking part in measures as associated centres was put forward. We should point out that the campaign for recruiting experts promoted by the PAI has led to the CIBER including over 15 new profiles in the Cordis database and it has also promoted updating the existing ones. As a result of this work CIBERER researcher Carmen Ayuso was selected to form part of the group of experts in Ethics and Scientific Integrity, in the framework of the Science with and for Society of the 2020 Horizon (SwafS-ethics) programme, while researchers Mercedes Serrano and Isabel Varela, recently created profiles, were contacted to take part as assessors.
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