Designing Effective Research Spaces Sandpit: SPIRES- Supporting People Investigating Research Environments and Spaces

The EPSRC Digital Economy theme seeks to investigate how the use of innovative ICT can transform both lives and work. Research is vital to the UK economy. The UK research councils annually invest 2.8 billion into new research across a spectrum of academic disciplines. Total research and development spending by UK businesses was 16.1 billion per annum in 2007 . Research is also a significant part of the lives of the general public, whether researching their family history or contributing observational data to the BBC programme Springwatch. Given that research is so important to society, it is reasonable to ask how we can assist researchers to become more effective.SPIRES arises from a Digital Economy sandpit held in July 2009 on Effective Research Spaces that brought together an inter-disciplinary set of researchers interested in this theme. SPIRES - Supporting People Investigating Research Environments and Spaces - is a network proposal that aims to bring together currently disparate groups interested in the design of effective research spaces and environments in order to create a new research community. Through a set of focused workshop and outreach activities it will bring together the three perspectives of physical spaces, novel technology, and social interaction to support a new synthesis of ideas and new conversations between groups currently not in contact with each other. Its objectives are: - To form and support a multi-disciplinary community of researchers with expertise in enhancing physical, technological or social aspects of research environments; - To develop a deeper understanding of the ways in which effective research can be fostered; - To document and disseminate the current state of the art in nurturing effective research spaces, both from a UK and international perspective; - To stimulate the production of new methodologies for designing and evaluating effective research spaces.

SPIRES will actively seek to expand its membership base outside of academia, using its contact with the Edinburgh BELTANE (Beacon for Public Engagement) with their close links to public organisations such as Edinburgh Museums and Botanic Gardens. Equivalent public engagement organisations elsewhere in the UK will be sought to expand the network's influence into Museums and other public spaces where research is carried out by non-academics. Nesta FutureLabs will also be approached in order to link SPIRES to state-of-the-art work in more generic learning environments and to non-university educationalists. SPIRES has been asked not to approach the British Library at the proposal stage because they are involved as evaluators, but will do so as a priority if the network is funded both because they will be designing an innovative research space of their own and because they link to many different types of researchers whose research environment requirements may be very different from those of university researchers. SPIRES will also benefit industrial research centres by making available and publicising the most current work on effective research spaces as well as the theoretical basis for making research more effective. Industrial research centres such as Microsoft Cambridge and Google will be approached at the start of the network with a view to drawing them into membership. The Salford MediaCity will also be approached through SPIRES Salford members as a domain in which technology-rich research spaces are likely to be of immediate benefit to Media and Communications professionals. SPIRES will also target specific industrial sectors such as pharmaceuticals and genetic engineering where increasing the effectiveness of research has a direct impact on UK productivity and wealth and on the health of its population.