HEA shortlists 10 research programmes for £65m funding

The Higher Education Authority has shortlisted 10 third-level research programmes in its next funding round, which will be worth £65 million.

The 10 were selected from an initial group of 21 proposals after assessment by an international panel of experts. The HEA's final selection is expected to be announced by the Minister for Education, and the Minister of State for Science, Technology and Commerce in July.

The funding comes under the Programme for Research in Third-Level Institutions, which requires that the applicant takes a strategic view and promotes only projects which will enhance existing research strengths. It has £500 million available to it from the National Development Plan over the next seven years.

The HEA and the international panel of experts which helps it judge the merits of the projects, look for research proposals that have a high degree of linkage between Ireland's third-level institutions. All of the shortlisted proposals have this linkage which brings together the Irish universities, most of the Institutes of Technology, the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland, Teagasc, the Shannon Aquatic Toxicology Laboratory and Mary Immaculate College, Limerick.

A substantial project to create the Dublin Molecular Medicine Centre has been promoted in a joint effort by Trinity College Dublin and University College Dublin. The centre would join the activities of UCD's Conway Institute of Biomolecular and Biomedical Research and TCD's Institute of Molecular Medicine.

Another shortlisted joint initiative involves the Dublin Institute for Technology and TCD in a research programme into health informatics and the use of computers to support the delivery of healthcare. While, Cork Institute of Technology has been shortlisted as lead institution for research into environmental pollution and ecotoxicology.

A total of 19 institutions were involved in the shortlisted projects.