Center for Analysis and Design of Intelligent Agents

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Research Environments: Grants & Scientific Authorship

Grants: Overview

Grants: The application process

Scientific authorship: How to give credit

Research Grant Applications: Where Do They Come From?

What Does a Grant Application Look Like?

Review Process

So I Got a Grant. What now?

So I Got a Grant. What Are My Responsibilities?

Example Grants

Where Grants Come From

There are more grants than you can imagine	However, some are not that easy to find

EU: Cordis	Focus on multi-national collaboration. Typically just under 100 pages
Iceland: RANNÍS	All sizes and shapes

What a Grant Application Looks Like

It looks a lot like a conference paper!	Except for a few obvious differences (such as a budget, length, and more) Abstract of the work to be performed Complete budget information for each of the years (usually 2-3) for which funding is sought Complete information on each individual associated with the research
Prior work section	Describes referenced previous published results of other investigators and sets the context for the contributions of the proposed work A section with information on all related work already accomplished by the person submitting the proposal
A research plan describing the order and methodology of the proposed work, with milestones and deliverables for the entire period	Must include: Predicted outcomes, pitfalls and/or possible difficulties which may be encountered, experiments/work designed to resolve these difficulties, and their predicted outcomes
Signatures of all involved
Letters approving the use of facilities etc.	These depend on the nature of the research and the requirements of the particular insitution giving out the grant

Review Process

Typically done by a committee	There should be at least one expert in the particular area of the application, plus some people familiar with the field
RANNÍS has 3 people reviewing each application	Sometimes outside Iceland
Reviewers grade the appliaction	RANNÍS: Gives each appliaciton one of three grades, Fail, Medium and High
The review is final	Reviews are returned to the applicant Duration of review process: 2-4 months

So I Got a Grant. What now?

You will sign a contract with the institution giving the grant	This may include reconfirming that your budget and plan has not changed, or submittin a (small) revision of these
Once the contract has been signed by both parties you will get the first chunk of money	Subsequent payments of grant will typically be incremental, based on acceptable progress reports and reached milestones

So I Got a Grant. What Are My Responsibilities?

Financial responsibility for the work

Ethical responsibility for the work, data collection, personnel involved, publications which may occur

Responsibility for publications which may be required

Use of any funds which may be awarded

Progress reports to the grant institution

Final report when work finishes

Example Grants

EU Cordis: Community Research & Development Information Service	Cordis PF7 home page
RANNÍS Project Grant	Example application form

Authorship

Scientific Publications: The currency of Science	The scientific paper appearing in a peer-reviewed publication is the “currency” of science.
Date of publication, reception, acceptance	In addition to having a particular date of publication, many journals publish the date a paper was first received by the editors, before the revies and revision process started.
Ethics - Misaccreditation (plagiarism)	It is unethical to repeat verbatim from another author without proper accreditation. It is unethical to accredit oneself with work done by others.
First author	This is the main author of the paper, that is, the person who: - is the driving force behind the work presented - is the author of the ideas presented in the paper - did most of the work and implementation Ideally it is also the person who wrote most of the paper.
Reality	First author is often a professor who sticks their name on every paper published by a laboratory or department or group.
Second author	This is the “second person in command” for the work presented in the paper, that is whoever.
Third, fourth, fifth, etc. author	Typically a list of people who did some of the work; sometimes these are also people who had a hand in the writing of the paper, but very often they are not (mostly for practical reasons)
Extremely long authorship lists	Becoming increasingly common in group projects
Last author	Increasingly advisors/professors are putting themselves at the end of the authors' list on papers describing the work of their students
Acknowledgment vs. author?	If a person is not the authors' list (for whatever reason) but contributed something to the work, it is customary to put in a thank-you note in the Acknowledgment section

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