Global Partnering Award UK Ageing Networks: South Asia - SAAgeNet

The UK Ageing Network is made up of 11 ageing research networks that bring together researchers and stakeholders from different disciplines to better understand the mechanisms of ageing and their impact on human health. This proposed work brings together 4 of these networks focussing on cognitive and physical decline with age and the involvement of nutrition in these declines and aims to integrate the network research interests with those of research institutes in India and Malaysia. The proposed network activities' ultimate aim is to produce research proposals that are multidisciplinary and multicentre. Person to person networking activities will enable networks and global partners to identify research synergies for future research projects. The networking activities aim to maintain and strengthen existing links between the UK ageing networks with institutes in India and Malaysia. Networks and international partners will share data and identify research synergies relevant to each network's individual research themes. This work will enable the development of frameworks for collaborative/global human data collection and analysis plus a common research language across different geographical locations and cultures.

The networking activities aim to maintain and strengthen existing links between the CFIN and Food4Years networks with New Delhi International Institute of Health Management Research, Madras Diabetes Research Foundation, and Avinashilingam Institute for Home Science and Higher Education for Women in India, and Sunway University in Malaysia. Networking activities will also integrate other networks (BLAST and MyAGE) with these institutes. Networks and partners will share data and identify research synergies relevant to each network's individual research themes. We will also develop new links with additional institutes in these regions. A new collaboration with University of Dehli, India is currently in development. Networking events will also enable the development of frameworks for collaborative/global human data collection and analysis, and an understanding of and expertise in the use of animal models for hypothesis testing. An important opportunity of this funding is to ensure future capacity in global ageing research. One-month visits by ECR network members to our global partners and by ECRs and/or technicians from our global partners to network member labs will be held to enable ECRs and technicians to gain research skills relevant to each network's theme and a global perspective on ageing research. This award will allow four of the BBSRC-MRC-funded networks to integrate research themes in the South Asia region. The proposed events in this application will not only allow networks to identify areas of research collaboration between each individual network and the partnering institutes, but they will also facilitate the integration of knowledge and understanding of ageing mechanisms across the networks' themes.