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February 6th 2020

Letter from the Director

As some of you already know, the faculty has made an analysis of what is required to secure the long-term organisational and economic stability of CEC. A report by Michael Calner, as well as comments on the report by CEC, was recently discussed in the faculty leadership group (“ledningsrådet”). A short summary of that meeting is that the faculty leadership as well as the heads of other departments view CEC as an asset to the faculty’s future work with questions relating to sustainable development. The faculty also realizes the need to make sure that CEC has sufficient leadership and administrative capacity to take responsibility for both the subject environmental science and activities of network character such as university-wide interactions and dialogue with stakeholders. I am therefore confident that we are looking forward to a very positive development of CEC the coming years.

Yours,

Henrik

From the management

RQ20, the evaluation of all research at LU, continues this semester with site visits from panels of external reviewers. Most panels will visit LU on May 4 to 8, and we advise you not to book anything else in your calendar Monday 4th to Thursday 7th . The panels will get a tour of relevant facilities and meet with management and parts of the research community. The planning of these visits are ongoing, and you will be updated along the way.

There was a great interest from students and other participants in the open talk by the renowned development ecologist and former UNDP director Sakiko Fukuda-Parr, who visited Lund on February  3rd. Fukuda-Parr gave a talk about how to reach the Sustainable Development Goals and to make them more inclusive.

Martijn van Praagh will give his docent lecture in Environmental Science on The natural scientist’s dilemma: risk perception in environmental risk assessments on March 11. And in March the CEC Postdocs will have a retreat at the Hyltemossa station, focusing on research initiation and career development.

During lunch breaks and Friday fikas, the CEC lunch room is from time to time crowded. You are then welcome to use the small meeting room opposite to the lunch room, there is also an additional microwave oven. If you are in need of a temporary quiet office for a phone call or a skype meeting, feel free to use an empty office of a colleague. If you need help unlocking an office, please contact Lena Söderberg, Irene Bergstrand, Annika Malmgren Widerberg, Åsa-Katrin Erlandsson or Karin Hofvendahl.

Information about the Coronavirus outbreak: Lund University is monitoring the situation and following the information and recommendations of the Swedish Public Health Agency and Ministry of Foreign Affairs. LU has from February 1st the following positions for staff and students in order to minimize the risk of spread of infection and as a part of the University’s preventive work environment management:

  • Until further notice, the University advises all staff and students not to travel to China.
  • Staff and students who have recently visited the Hubei province are recommended to work/study from home for a two-week period after arriving back.
  • Any visits by guests from the Hubei province should be cancelled.

In cases where your work is affected by the recommendations above, or if you have questions or concerns, you should contact your line manager - Katarina Hedlund, Yann Clough, Henrik Smith or Karin Hofvendahl. Updated information about the Coronavirus outbreak can be found at the LU Staff pages.

February 17-21 there is a school holiday and some of us have a vacation, including the CEC Director Henrik Smith who will be back on February 24th. In the meantime Katarina Hedlund is the Acting Director of CEC.

But before that, on Valentine's Day we will have a Kakfest and take the afternoon "fika" to a new level, and we invite you to bring your favourite cake, cookie or pastry to share with your colleagues.

Dates

For an updated list of events see the CEC calendar (English version). Below the most relevant events during the coming two weeks.

 CECs Friday breakfast fika is served from 9:30 to 10:15 in the CEC lunch room and most Fridays a presentation starts at 10:15. Tomorrow on February 7 Johan Ekroos will tank on Student-driven literature reviews as a way to integrate teaching and research. Next Friday on February 14 Georgina Brennan will talk on Using environmental DNA (eDNA) to identify the grass pollen that gets up your nose.

At 15:00 on February 14 you are Welcome to a CEC Kakfest! On Valentine's Day we will take the afternoon "fika" to a new level, with inspiration from the Swedish tradition of "Kafferep" - a social meeting where coffee is served with seven kinds of cakes. We invite you to bring your favourite cake, cookie or pastry to share with your colleagues.

Save the date and register:
Planning is going on for the LU popular science Future Week with the theme Forces in motion to be held on 12–18 October. We want you to come up with ideas about how CEC can participate with seminars and events! Please contact Stina Johannesson or Anna Maria Erling. There is an LU start-up meeting on February 24 at 14:30-16:30 in the large conference room at the Botanical Museum. To sign up, contact louise [dot] pierce [at] kommunikation [dot] lu [dot] se (subject: ) (Louise Pierce) by 14 February.

On February 26, there is a CEC Fellows concept seminar on Resilience, with short presentations from different research fields to straighten out the concept of Resilience as a research perspective. Register before February 19.

On March 6 there is a Workshop for supervision of interdisciplinary PhD projects. Read more and register on the link.

On March 11 at 13:30 Martijn van Praagh will give his docent lecture in Environmental Science on The natural scientist’s dilemma: risk perception in environmental risk assessments in the Red Room in the Ecology building.

PhD students, postdocs and researchers are welcome to attend a Neutron Imaging doctoral school organized by LINXS during 23-26 of March. Read more and register here.

The planning of the CEC spring conference: Science says! Mobilizing the knowledge of our time: The IPCC and IPBES reports, 23-24th of April proceeds. See new updates on the conference webpage.

This year’s CEC PhD students spring meeting will take place in Lund on May 14 to 15. In a two-day event format, CEC PhD students will present their current work via oral and poster presentations. It will be an event open for anyone to attend, but registration is required. It is an excellent opportunity to get to know on-going research at CEC, and an excellent arena to get friendly feedback from other researchers and students at CEC.

Handling procedure for CEC applications to calls for infrastructure

The Faculty of Science and Lund University central calls for research infrastructure are now open, deadline: 1 April 2020. For both calls, the Director’s signature is required. Below you find the handling procedure at CEC.

  • Contact per [dot] persson [at] biol [dot] lu [dot] se (Per Persson) if you would like to discuss ideas or have questions regarding the calls.
  • Send the full cost application (fullkostnadskalkyl) to CEC economist eva [dot] stengard [at] cec [dot] lu [dot] se (Eva Stengard) before 26 March. State clearly whether the application refers to the call from LU central or the Faculty of Science. 
  • Send the full application to per [dot] persson [at] biol [dot] lu [dot] se (Per Persson) before 30 March at 10.00 am. State clearly whether the application refers to the call from LU central or the Faculty of Science.
  • Per Persson is rapporteur for the Director (Henrik Smith). Given that the Director approves the application, he will sign the full cost application, which should be attached the application.
  • The applicant submit the application before 1 April.

More information can be found here (Swedish only):

Courses

On March 12 from 9 to 12 there is a course in how to do a risk-assessment in KLARA given by Helene Bracht Jørgensen at the Biology Department. KLARA is our chemical database and even a place where you should do risk-assessments as soon as you handle any kind of chemicals – also kits used in DNA analysis. So in this course I’ll show how it works and what you have to do. The course is primarily for student supervisors and phd students working in labs. Please sign up by contacting Helene.

Written English for Scholarly Publication. This workshop course is aimed at doctoral students and researchers who need to write and publish in English, and who wish to strengthen their grammatical expertise to do so well. The courses are taught by experienced lecturers from the English Unit at LU and given twice during the spring term of 2020: WESP 1: 26 Feb, 11 Mar, 25 Mar, 1 Apr, 22 Apr, 6 May, 20 May, and 3 Jun between 14.00 and 16.00. WESP 2: 3 Mar, 17 Mar, 31 Mar, 14 Apr, 28 Apr, 12 May, 26 May, and 9 Jun between 9.00 and 11.00. Fee 5000 SEK. You register by submitting a registration form, signed by you and your head of department. For questions and registration form contact claes [dot] lindskog [at] englund [dot] lu [dot] se (Claes Lindskog). Deadline for registration is 14 Feb for WESP 1 and 19 Feb for WESP 2.

The application for ClimBEco’s tenth program is now open

ClimBEco stands for Climate, Biodiversity and Ecosystem services in a changing world and is a two-year graduate research school programme promoting interdisciplinary research through networking and learning across different fields of study. The program is open to currently enrolled PhD students who fulfil the eligibility criteria. Deadline for applying is 5th of March. Please apply by using the following link.

PhD student info

Now you can find information regarding your employment as a PhD student in Environmental Science at the CEC Staff pages, for example how to proceed to reach the next salary level of your studies or to prolong your studies due to parental leave or teaching.

New offices

To give room to new persons, some colleagues has changed office. Melanie Karlsson will share office with Maria Balsi Romero and Theresia Widhalm on floor 3. Georg Andersson will share office with Helena Hanson and Carlos Martinez Avila on floor 2.

We’re hiring, please spread the word

5 postdoc positions financed by BECC, deadline Feb 16

Communicator with focus on web, deadline February 9 

LU news

Phishing attacks, Warning! Last week several fraud attempts using phishing emails has been targeting LU. Please be aware of emails with requests for payments in general, and immediate payments in particular, from what appears to be your manager. Phishing is also one way is to trick you into revealing the password to your university account. Read more here.

Preliminary results from Tellus. The Tellus project is a three-year, research-based project that aims to strengthen preventive work against sexual harassment at Lund University. Professor Anette Agardh, the Tellus project leader, will present the preliminary results from interviews, group discussions and the questionnaire, on 12 February at 11:00–11:30 in the auditorium of the Genetics Building. All employees are welcome to attend and ask questions. Vice-Chancellor Torbjörn von Schantz, University Director Susanne Kristensson and HR Director Ann Silbersky Isaksson will provide information on the time plan for continued preventive work as well as answer questions. No pre-registration is required. Read more at the LU Staff Pages

Improve your research presentation and participate in this year’s Researchers’ Grand Prix. Do you want to be better at summing up what is important about your research and receive help and support to present your results? If so, perhaps you would like to take part in this year’s Researchers’ Grand Prix. It is a competition in which you are to present your research in a way that is as easily accessible and engaging as possible – in only four minutes. This year’s competition will be held in Helsingborg on 24 September. Individual coaching will be given in August and September, with a possible start-up meeting in June. The researcher who wins the University’s competition will progress to the national final in Stockholm in late November. Your presentation can be in English or Swedish, depending on which language you feel most comfortable with. Read More at the LU Staff Pages.

New law on deviations from good research practice. The new Act on Responsibility for Good Research Practice and the Examination of Research Misconduct entered into force on 1 January 2020. The law means that suspicions of deviation from good research practice concerning fabrication, falsification or plagiarism (FFP), which the law defines as serious deviation from good research practice, are to be dealt with by a national board. Suspicions of other deviations from good research practice are handled, as previously, by Lund University. Read more about guidelines for deviation from good research practice on the LU Staff Pages

Pictures and videos during your time at CEC – GDPR

During your time at CEC there will be pictures taken and videos shot at staff meetings etc. If you do not wish to appear in photos, videos etc. please notify anna_maria [dot] erling [at] cec [dot] lu [dot] se (anna_maria[dot]erling[at]cec[dot]lu[dot]se) or stina [dot] johannesson [at] cec [dot] lu [dot] se (stina[dot]johannesson[at]cec[dot]lu[dot]se). See more information about data protection at Lund University.

About this newsletter

The CEC newsletter is sent to employees and those that are associated with CEC. The newsletter is sent out on Thursdays every second week. If you have anything you would like to add to the newsletter, please send your information to Karin Hofvendahl, no later than Tuesday the same week.