Early and Mid-Career Researcher Sandpit Event

The Future Human leadership team facilitated a second sandpit event on May 4th & 5th targeted at  early and mid-career academic colleagues.  14 academics attended from across range of Schools– Sports and Exercise Science, Physics, Film & Media, History, Education, SSPSSR, Anthropology, Politics, Engineering and Music. Over the two days four projects emerged from discussions and were developed in to outline proposals to pitch for the small grant funding from the Future Human SRT. 

Yes again our colleagues rose to the challenge of developing innovative and multidisciplinary projects. The leadership team decided to offer funding to all four projects as all were of an excellent standard and posed interesting research questions and ideas. The projects are summarised below. 

Quantum Supremacy: Will investigate what ‘quantum supremacy’ means, and what it might achieve in the future; utopia, apocalypse or something less dramatic? Academics involved:

Dr Dieter Declercq https://www.kent.ac.uk/arts/people/2335/declercq-dieter

Dr Mark Hill https://www.kent.ac.uk/social-policy-sociology-social-research/people/3842/hill-mark-j

Dr Ben Turner https://www.kent.ac.uk/politics-international-relations/people/2599/turner-ben

Dr Bruno Tomasello https://www.kent.ac.uk/physics-astronomy/people/3803/tomasello-bruno

In Tune: Will explore the potential of a novel form of visual biofeedback, together with a set of psychological strategies, to enhance embodied awareness, reduce chronic pain and promote feeling ‘in tune’ for elite sports professionals and specialist musicians. Academics involved:

Dr Ruth Herbert https://www.kent.ac.uk/arts/people/24/herbert-ruth

Dr Kyra De Coninck https://www.kent.ac.uk/sport-sciences/people/332/de-coninck-kyra

Dr Chris Fullerton https://www.kent.ac.uk/sport-sciences/people/335/fullerton-chris

Human movement: Past, Present and Future: This project will take a unique and reflexive look at human movement, by exploring how far our movements are affected by our visual perceptions of them; “Do we move differently when we look at the movement?”. Academics involved:

Dr Kyra De Coninck https://www.kent.ac.uk/sport-sciences/people/332/de-coninck-kyra

Dr Chris Dunmore https://www.kent.ac.uk/anthropology-conservation/people/2776/dunmore-christopher-james

Controlling the Reproductive Body in the Past, Present and Future: Will aim to recover the voices, stories, histories, and physiologies of a diversity of individuals who have been controlled or have the potential to be controlled through their reproductive bodies. Academics involved:

Dr Jennifer Leigh https://www.kent.ac.uk/study-of-higher-education/people/3739/leigh-jennifer

Dr Claire Jones https://www.kent.ac.uk/history/people/401/jones-claire

Dr Aparajita Mukhopadhyay https://www.kent.ac.uk/history/people/1856/mukhopadhyay-aparajita

Dr Lucy Hale https://www.kent.ac.uk/sport-sciences/people/338/hale-lucy

Well done to all our successful awardees! We will update on progress and outputs in blog post later this year.

We hope to hold more sandpit events during the Autumn so look for announcements on our blog and emails from Divisions.