News from Science Board July 2009

STFC’s Science Board held its most recent business meeting on 15th – 16th July 2009 at Polaris House in Swindon.

Professor Matt Griffin is stepping down from Science Board and this meeting was his last. Science Board thanked Professor Griffin for his valuable contribution to Science Board over the last two years and wished him continuing success in his role as Principle Investigator (PI) of the SPIRE instrument on the Herschel telescope.

The meeting was also Professor Walter Gear’s final Science Board meeting as he steps down as Chair of Particle Physics, Astronomy and Nuclear Physics (PPAN) at the end of July 2009. Science Board thanked Professor Gear for his valuable service to PPAN.

STFC Council has recently appointed two new members to the Science Board:

• Professor Guenther Rosner – University of Glasgow
• Professor Mike Bode – Liverpool John Moores University

At the July Meeting, Science Board discussed its ongoing work in prioritising future science and technology opportunities and the consultation process that has been put in place to prioritise STFC’s programme for 2010/11 and beyond. It reviewed the current balance of STFC’s programme and the short and medium term budget situation, and discussed the future vision of STFC with the Chief Executive.

Over the past several meetings, Science Board has received a series of presentations on a number of big challenges: environment; energy; healthcare and ageing; and security. Science Board discussed the presentations and considered the implications for STFC’s strategy and how STFC could contribute in these areas. Science Board then received a presentation on STFC’s Futures Programme which is focussed on exploiting STFC’s technological and knowledge capabilities to address the UK’s societal and economic priorities.

Science Board received updates on the New Light Source project, the development of the Research Councils UK (RCUK) Large Facilities Roadmap, and the decision timelines for the European Extremely Large Telescope and the Square Kilometre Array.

Science Board also received reports from the chair of PPAN and chair of Physical and Life Sciences (PALS).

PPAN met on 30th June – 1st July 2009. PPAN considered two statements of interest: a proposal to position the UK for involvement in a high-energy electron-positron collider; and a proposal to participate in the development of a neutrino experiment at JPARC. PPAN received one report from Projects Peer Review Panel (PPRP) regarding the Super Neutrino Ettore Majorana Observatory (SuperNEMO) project; a next generation neutrinoless double beta decay experiment. PPAN also received an interim report from the Particle Physics Grants Panel.

PALS met on 1st – 2nd July 2009 at the Institut Laue-Langevin (ILL) in Grenoble, France. The Committee toured ILL and the European Synchrotron Radiation Facility (ESRF) on the first day of the meeting. Their business included a discussion on facilities priorities and on developing a strategy for the provision of high performance computing infrastructure for research.

At their meetings both PPAN and PALS further refined a decision making framework that will facilitate consistent decision making across the STFC. Both committees also considered future priorities for the RCUK Large Facilities Roadmap.

The next meeting of Science Board will be in October 2009.