EARC supports new app to help develop research collaborations

Developing creative, sustainable research collaborations can be difficult, particularly in a world in which the opportunities to meet in person have been limited. Early career researchers (ECRs) can find it especially hard, as they may not yet have developed a broad network of contacts, but academics at all career stages can face an uphill struggle in making links beyond their own discipline or with colleagues outside of academia.

To help to overcome this, Eastern Arc is supporting the development and roll out of a new app. This has been created by TRN – The Research Network, led by Dr Andy McElroy, who formerly headed the External Research Solutions team at Pfizer Sandwich, Dr Jennifer Hiscock, a reader in supramolecular chemistry and UKRI FLF fellow at Kent, and Dr James Bentham, a lecturer in statistics, also at Kent. Although three scientists created the app, it is suitable for people working in any discipline in which team-working is important.

The app is a platform that uses AI machine learning algorithms to support the development of research collaborations. It is very simple to use and takes less than five minutes to sign up. The more people that sign up, the more effective the algorithms will be in finding potential collaborators.

Eastern Arc offers a perfect testbed for the app. The consortium enables and facilitates colleagues in working together, and the app is an ideal way of simplifying and automating the process. As such we would encourage you to sign up and see how it can work for you.

We will be running a webinar giving an overview of the app in September. In the meantime, to download the app, click on the links to Google Play or the Apple App Store here.