News for All Faculty and Research Staff           Oct. 2, 2014

Kick-off Meeting #2 for the Research Administrators Information Network

The Research Administrators Information Network (RAIN) will meet Oct. 6 on Busch Campus in the CoRE Building Auditorium from 9:30 to 11:30 a.m. Sponsored by the Division of Grants and Contracts Administration and the Office of Research and Sponsored Programs, RAIN was dormant during the integration. The guest speaker will be Terri Goss Kinzy, associate vice president for research administration, who will discuss Reflections a Year Post-Integration and Into the Looking Glass Moving Forward. This meeting's agenda repeats that of a well-attended meeting Sept. 29 in Newark. Additional RAIN meetings will be held during the academic year to keep administrators abreast of the new regulations and policy changes that impact research.

The new Rutgers Center for Sensory Sciences and Innovation invites Rutgers researchers to submit a short research proposal for a Nov. 6 NSF Planning Workshop. It will provide an open forum for discussing interdisciplinary research in sensory sciences and collaboration with industry. Your participation will be an opportunity to position yourself for funding, present your research ideas, obtain feedback from industry and NSF, and help shape research and industry-university collaboration in this field. For more information, and a proposal submission form, please contact Dave Sadowski at 848-445-3344 or [email protected]. The deadline for proposals is Oct. 31.

If you're interested in partnering with industry on funded collaborative research in any aspect of data science, the NSF-sponsored Center for Dynamic Data Analytics (CDDA) at Rutgers wants to help. By providing a framework of academic and industrial researchers, and assistance with corporate outreach, the CDDA is a great alternative to traditional sponsored-research agreements. If you have a project proposal that requires corporate sponsorship through a combination of funding and data sets, please contact James Mielke to learn how the CDDA can help. Also, a few seats remain open at CDDA's Spring Workshop and IAB Meeting May 7-8. Read more here. 

New Ideas on Strategic Alliances to be Explored at Innovations in Dermatological Sciences Conference Oct. 8

With cuts in federal research funding, how do we find other funding sources and do more with less? One answer is collaboration. Thought leaders from academia, industry and government will gather to share their experiences with successfully partnering to translate cutting-edge research into use, including successes, best practices and lessons learned at the Oct. 8 conference, "Innovations in Dermatological Sciences." The focus is collaborating to advance product innovation and translate basic dermatological discoveries to successful products that will improve patient's lives. This conference will also provide an opportunity for researchers from universities, industry and government to exhibit their works-in-progress, obtain feedback from their peers in an informal setting, and give attendees a forum where they can interactively learn about cutting-edge research projects. It is sponsored by Rutgers' Center for Dermal Research. For the agenda and online registration, click here.

All Rutgers faculty, staff and students are invited to participate in the Nicholson Foundation & Rutgers Healthcare Delivery Innovation Idea-thon, a competition to improve health outcomes of vulnerable populations and reduce health care costs. In phase one, set for Oct. 13 and 27, three teams will win a total of $15,000 in prizes and some perks. In phase two, a challenge, the winning team receives $50,000 to participate in the final phase, a pilot test in a clinical or community setting. Read more here.

Awards and Honors for Staff in the Office of Research Regulatory Affairs

Paula Bistak, chief of the Human Subject Protection Program, has been selected as the recipient for the Society of Research Administrators International 2014 Excellence Award, Advanced Level. It recognizes Bistak's knowledge and performance of research administration, and her dedication to the continuous study and development of the field. Donna Hoagland, Health/Sciences IRB director for New Brunswick-Piscataway was recently elected president of the Delaware Valley chapter of the Society of Research Administrators.  The chapter's area covers a 60-mile radius around Philadelphia.  Nava Bastola, IRB program assistant, New Brunswick-Piscataway Health Science IRB, won the Emerson Award Inaugural Essay Competition. Her essay, The Climate Change Challenge: Engaging the Environmental Health Practitioner, was honored at the 13th International Federation of Environmental Health World Congress this summer.

Whether you're a senior faculty member, a recent Ph.D., a grad student or a research staffer, the search for sponsor information is the first step toward external funding success. All Rutgers faculty, staff and students have free subscriptions to COS-PIVOT, a powerful search engine for finding funding opportunities and scholar profiles from within all of Rutgers and outside of the university. Also, be sure to join our public SAKAI site, Funding Sources - ORED Resources, for links to open searches for most federal funding agencies.

Key Contacts for Research Support

A list of key contacts has been posted here, including staff with ORED and elsewhere at Rutgers. Send suggestions to [email protected].

You Can Contribute Content and Email Addresses

We invite you to submit news or events that are related to research for this newsletter, which goes to all Rutgers faculty and our list of more than 530 research staff. We continue to expand that list, so please send email addresses of any Rutgers staff members who should get our newsletter to [email protected].