The Australian Research Council (ARC) has signed a new Implementing Arrangement with the European Research Council (ERC) which is designed to provide opportunities for ARC-funded early career researchers from Australia to pursue research collaborations with European researchers supported through a relevant ERC grant. 

The Implementing arrangement will commence in late 2019.

Further information to follow on the opportunities for international research collaboration page on the ARC website.

For all ARC advice and application support at Flinders, contact arc@flinders.edu.au.

Professor Joanne Tompkins, Executive Director Humanities and Creative Arts, Australian Research Council will be hosting a 2 hour forum to meet with Humanities and Creative Arts researchers and assessors in South Australia.

The forum at the University of Adelaide on 1 March 2019 from 11 am - 1 pm, will focus on the assessment process and the current climate for competitive funding within these disciplines. Researchers from other disciplines are also invited to attend. 

Please contact your College Research Support staff staff by Friday 22 February to register and secure a place. 

The Executive Directors at the ARC play an important role in providing strategic policy and operational advice and outreach within the higher education and research sector. 

Please join us at an information session for the South Australian Science Excellence Awards.

Sarah Thomas, Senior Project Officer, Science, Industry & Entrepreneurship, Department for Industry and Skills will be visiting Flinders to give an overview of each award category and application timelines. Previous Flinders University winners will also be sharing their insights.

The information session will be held on Wednesday 13 March, 9.30-10.30am in the Council Room, Registry, Bedford Park Campus. Please enrol at ienrol-Research.

The SA Science Excellence Awards showcase the critical importance of science and research to the development of industry and our society.

The awards acknowledge the achievements of talented individuals, including recent PhD graduates and early career science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) researchers, who are making an outstanding contribution to society both nationally and internationally.

Awards are presented in five categories:

• South Australian Scientist of the year
• PhD Research Excellence Award
• STEM Professional Award
• STEM Educator of the Year (split into School Teaching and Tertiary Teaching categories)
• Excellence in Research Collaboration

The Executive of the Southern Adelaide Local Health Network (SALHN) has recently undertaken a review of the conduct of phase 1 clinical trials by SALHN.

A decision has been made that these phases of a clinical trial, (referred to as the “legacy system”), require an additional level of review.

This decision has been made in an endeavour to balance their heightened risk with the value of such trials to the network and research in general. This has now been refined further since the earlier process implemented in June 2018 following user feedback and discussions with internal stakeholders.

Effective from 12 December 2018 the decision attached (referred to as the “new pathway”) was made by the SALHN Executive. New Pathway

The major change is that the requirement for an independent toxicology report has been replaced with a referral by the Office for Research to the SALHN DTC for drug studies or the SALHN New Health Technology and Clinical Practice Innovation Committee for device studies. This pathway only applies to phase 1 clinical trials.

Any questions or concerns can be directed to the office and person below:

Dominic How

Ethics Officer, Office for Research

Southern Adelaide Local Health Network

Flinders Medical Centre, Ward 6C, Room 6A219

Tel: (08) 8204 6285

Email: Dominic.How@sa.gov.au / Health.SALHNOfficeforResearch@sa.gov.au

Website: http://www.sahealth.sa.gov.au/SALHNresearch

The ARC has released the updated Variations of ARC Agreement instructions, which are now available on the ARC website.

These instructions incorporate recent streamlining undertaken by the ARC with regards to Variations and the requirements associated with them. To assist with understanding the changes, there is also a downloadable list of the changes.

The 2018 End of Year Reports (EOYRs) are now open in RMS and are available for processing. The End of Year Financial and Progress Reporting instructions are also available on the ARC website. Please note, the instructions are updated from 2017 and include more advice and FAQs. 

The next round of Final Reports are now available in RMS (DP17, DE17, LP17, FL14, FT15, IC15, IH14, IN17, LE18 and CE14). The Final Report Instructions have also been updated to further assist in processing the reports.

2018 has been a year for Flinders to build on past success and evolve in a changing environment. Inspiring Research has reported on some landmark research and research management achievements. As the year draws to a close, in this, the last, edition we look back over the year that was.

We wish all staff a happy and safe holiday break and look forward to seeing you in 2019.

Research Management highlights at Flinders included:

• The successful implementation of the online research certification form and signing of a new research management tool for implementation in 2019, informed through consultation with our research community.
• The Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Research), Professor Robert Saint established a new Flinders Research Support program to provide ongoing support towards our ARC and NHMRC success rates.
• Formalised researcher professional development was established and embraced by Flinders’ research community. The Research Activate (June) and Flinders Focus on Research Engagement and Impact (Sept) training intensives had massive attendance.
• Flinders’ submission to the ARC’s Engagement and Impact assessment.

Successes and 2018 research highlights included:

The award of $7.85 million to Flinders’ researchers in the November 2018 announcement of ARC grants - a total of 19 grants funded across four ARC schemes: 15 Discovery Projects (DP); 1 Discovery Early Career Researcher Award (DECRA); 2 Linkage Infrastructure, Equipment and Facilities (LIEF) grant; 1 Linkage Project (LP) grant. This builds upon Flinders earlier six LP successes in 2018.

Three Flinders University research leaders collectively received more than $1.6 million in NHMRC research grants. The Flinders’ International Centre for Point-of-Care Testing team, led by Professor Mark Shephard, is a co-chief investigator in the new five-year $2.49 million collaborative NHMRC Centre for Research Excellence (CRE) focusing on scaling up new point-of-care (POC) diagnostic technologies for infectious diseases of global importance, including HIV, hepatitis C, tuberculosis, HPV and STIs.

Professor Jamie Craig received a 2017 NHMRC Research Excellence Award for ‘Top Ranked Program Grant’ at the annual research excellence awards in Canberra.

Four Flinders researchers were appointed to the 2019 ARC College of Experts, Professor Mike Nicholls, Associate Professor Janni Petersen, Professor Colin Raston AO FAA, and Professor Sharyn Roach Anleu.

Professor Simon Brookes and Associate Professor Phil Dinning, College of Medicine and Public Health, partnership with groups from University of California Los Angeles, CALTECH, Universities of Nevada (USA) and Munich (Germany) led to a successful National Institutes of Health consortium grant.

Associate Professor Wendy Van Duivenoorde and Dr Jonathan Benjamin became co-Chairs of the UNESCO University Twinning and Networking Programme for Underwater Archaeology (UNITWIN Network) in 2015, and in 2018 they submitted an Australian Research Council (ARC) LP grant with the UNITWIN Network as a result.

Associate Professor James Ward has received a prestigious Viertel Senior Medical Fellowship, providing $1.25 million over five years to help transform the health of Aboriginal young people.

Six Flinders' Chief Investigators were granted a Translational Research Package, an Early Career Cancer Research Fellowship, a Project Grant, two travel awards and continued funding for the Beat Cancer Professorial Chair at Flinders through the 2018 round of SA Beat Cancer awards. Flinders researchers are also collaborating with other state partners on projects that were awarded in this round.

Flinders researchers continued their excellence in research communication in 2018. Dr Alice Gorman’s articles in The Conversation achieved over half a million unique reads in May 2018, after she first started publishing in 2012. Professor Corey Bradshaw published, The Effective Scientist – A Handy Guide to a Successful Academic Career in 2018. To book aims to help younger scientists, with Corey focusing in on writing, communicating and storytelling. It is illustrated by Flinders University PhD candidate René Campbell.

Inspiring Research continued to profile our Early Career Researchers (ECRs) through the ECR Spotlight series and Impact Seed Funding recipient series. The inaugural Flinders Impact Seed Funding Grants were awarded in 2018, and the initiative aims to provide an opportunity for ECRs to develop their careers and enable key research projects or promotion of research outcomes.

Ten ECRs were awarded 2018 Vice-Chancellor Awards for their contributions to research at Flinders University.

ECR Dr Ian Moffat took his Flinders research expertise to Cambridge University (UK), funded by a Commonwealth Rutherford Fellowship. He has been working at the McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research while in Cambridge.

The Timor-Leste National Human Development Report 2018, a collaboration between the Government of Timor-Leste, United Nations Development Program and Associate Professor Udoy Saikiaand team was delivered to the United Nations. This was the first time a UN Human Development Report at a national level has attempted to measure well-being, a subjective aspect of the quality-of-life, through developing a dedicated index.

The Human Equity Hub, an initiative of the Southgate Institute, was launched in 2018, aiming to bring together policy briefs and summaries of key findings from research to inform practice and policy in Australia and internationally.

In November 2017, Flinders began an exciting journey to modernise its digital research management environment, to meet research objectives outlined in Making a Difference: The 2025 Agenda.

After an intensive period of consultation with the research community, Research Development and Support (RDS) and Digital Research Services (DRS) ran an open tender for a software solution to replace the ageing ResearchMaster system; replace RePortal;and help streamline ethics approvals. Our research community told us that the solution had to be easy to use and work as a single system.

The tender team selected two components that would be integrated to establish a solid foundation for the evolving Research Ecosystem at Flinders:

• Elsevier Pure for improved research management
• Infonetica ERM for more efficient ethics process management.

A project team, drawn from DRS, RDS, and the Library, will release the integrated Pure and ERM solution in four stages.

By early 2019, Stage 1 will be released. This will provide researchers with more accurate publication management, as well as enriched researcher profiles to help promote Flinders research and collaborations. Stage 1 will also include the first of the new ethics processes being co-designed by RDS, ethics committees, and stakeholders.

In subsequent releases in 2019 the remaining functionality from ResearchMaster and RePortal, and other ethics processes, will be transferred to the new solution.

To find out more, visit the DRS website and look for updates in Inspiring Research. We welcome your feedback - just email Research Management Project.

Flinders researchers have been awarded a total of $7.85 million in the latest round of ARC grants, announced late afternoon on 27 November 2018.

Flinders’ DP success rate is 29%, above the 22% national average. Congratulations to our researchers whose application success has been underpinned by strong collaborations between researchers, Colleges and professional staff, particularly members of Research Development and Support (RDS) who have provided quality research management support, including advice on funding rules, grant development and reviews, and researcher training and development programs.

Our researchers have had significant success with a total of 19 grants funded across four ARC schemes: 15 Discovery Projects (DP);  1 Discovery Early Career Researcher Award (DECRA); 2 Linkage Infrastructure, Equipment and Facilities (LIEF) grant; 1 Linkage Project (LP) grant.

Let’s build on this success – please contact RDS now to collaboratively plan and schedule support for your 2019 ARC applications.

Read more, including details of the researchers and their projects, at the Flinders News Desk.

In the 2018-19 Budget, the Federal Government announced a reform of current governance arrangements for Antarctic science funding. This is supported by two measures: $8 million per year from 1 January 2020 to 30 June 2027 for a new Special Research Initiative in Excellence in Antarctic Science, run by the Australian Research Council, and $5 million per year from 2019-20 for a new 10 year Antarctic Science Collaboration Initiative (ASCI) grants program.

The Department of Industry, Innovation and Science (DIIS) is responsible for the implementation and administration of the ASCI grant program. The process that is being conducted and where to get more information as they progress follows.

The ASCI will be a long-term, strategic investment in Antarctic science that will build on the work of the Antarctic Climate and Ecosystems Cooperative Research Centre (ACE CRC) as its funding ends on 30 June 2019. The ASCI will support ongoing Antarctic science, research and innovation, and support the operation and activities of a collaborative Australian Antarctic Program Partnership (Partnership).  

In the response to the Australian Antarctic Science Program Governance Review (Clarke Review), the Government announced that the Australian Antarctic research community would need to come together to form a collaborative Partnership to develop a proposal for the funding under the ASCI program.

DIIS has begun working with key members of the Antarctic science community – particularly those involved in the ACE CRC – to design and plan for the establishment of the ASCI, including looking at appropriate models for the Partnership. It is anticipated that the Partnership will be brought together in 2018, and will develop a proposal for funding to provide to DIIS in early 2019. The Minister for Industry, Science and Technology will be the final decision maker on the proposal for ASCI funding. The funding will be available from 1 July 2019.

The research community is responsible for bringing together the collaborative Partnership, and determining the priorities for Antarctic science and research investment over the next decade. The University of Tasmania is supporting the establishment of the Partnership. If you would like more information about the formation of the Partnership or the development of the proposal, please contact Tim Moltmann at tim.moltmann@utas.edu.au.

If you would like any further information about the implementation of the ASCI, please contact ASCITaskforce@industry.gov.au or Sally Railton on 02 6102 9166 or Sally.Railton@industry.gov.au.

Inspiring Research, our Flinders internal research communique, will be re-launched in 2019 and we are investigating what information is most important to the Flinders research community through a short survey.

Staff are asked to provide their feedback to help us deliver focused content and communications – with those who participate in the survey able to go into the draw to win a $50 Myer voucher.

The survey is now open for completion at this link.

Perspectives are welcome from regular readers as well as staff who have not read the publication. Please share the survey link with colleagues.

Congratulations to current mentee, Dr Tully Barnett, on the award of her ARC DECRA, which will commence in 2019. The Flinders University Researcher Mentoring Scheme is about to enter its 8^th year, and this is one of the many successes that our ECRs have achieved from being in this program.

Research Development and Support is welcoming expressions of interest (EOI) from potential mentees and mentors for the 2019 Scheme up until Thursday 6 December 2018.

Please contact Dr Marina Delpin, Program Manager: Researcher Professional Development, directly for the eligibility criteria and application documents to participate as a mentee or mentor.

This whole of University initiative is a strategy to support our early-career researchers (ECRs), defined as one to eight years post-PhD conferral. It provides training and support to ECRs (mentees) to develop and maintain an effective, outcomes focused one-on-one mentoring partnership with a senior Flinders academic (mentor) underpinned with ECR-focussed researcher development opportunities.

The annual Scheme has positively impacted on ECRs’ well-being and research profile, including grant income, publications and engagement. Mentees have reported that the scheme has enhanced their ability to plan their research career, set goals, lead, manage and collaborate within and across their discipline.

Please contact Marina to discuss any questions that you may have about the mentoring scheme, on 8201 3873 or marina.delpin@flinders.edu.au. Further information about this scheme is available on the Flinders Researcher Mentoring Scheme webpage.

Updates and details relating to the new NHMRC Investigator Grants Scheme were presented at an information session held on 14 November 2018.

Gareth Rees, Senior Research Grants Officer (NHMRC and Health) presented on the basics of the program highlighting recent changes, the eligibility criteria and the particulars of application process. Rebecca Cook, Senior Research Support Officer, CMPH, focused on aspects of addressing the ‘impact’ component of the application with guest speaker Bill Condie, from STEM Matters, also sharing his insights.

The session can now be viewed and slides accessed on our Past Training and Development page.

If you have any queries regarding NHMRC grants please contact Research Grants and Support at research.grants@flinders.edu.au.

Service One, an online service request management tool accessible through Okta, provides a range of Research, Education and General service requests for staff.

Two new service requests have recently been added namely, "I need help with an ethics query" and "I need help with biological import, export and transport approvals".

Flinders staff who wish to undertake research involving human subjects or animals, must obtain approval from the relevant committee before commencing the study. If you are a member of staff, you can now use Service One to seek assistance with a new ethics application (human and animal) or enquire about modifying an existing project. Please view the service request called "I need help with an ethics query" which can be found in the category "Research Services".

Biosecurity is the management of biological substances to reduce the risks of pests and diseases that threaten the Australian economy and environment. You can now use Service One to seek assistance with importing, exporting or packaging biological goods. Please view the service request called "I need help with importing, exporting or transporting biological goods" which can also be found in the category "Research Services".

We encourage you to use Service One to seek assistance with these activities from two dedicated teams of Service Specialists located in Research, Development and Support. In each case there is also a general query option so you can fulfil your request in one place, within one minute, and complete one streamlined request for each service.

If there is a research service that you would like to see available on Service One please compete the "new idea" or "feedback" form on the Service One Homepage - serviceone.flinders.edu.au.

The new MRFF Priorities, covering the period from 2018 to 2020, have been released and are now available on the Medical Research Future Fund website.

In accordance with the Medical Research Future Fund Act 2015 (the Act), the independent Australian Medical Research Advisory Board (AMRAB) must develop a five-year Australian Medical Research and Innovation Strategy and a set of related Australian Medical Research and Innovation Priorities (Priorities) to be in force for two years.

The inaugural Medical Research Future Fund (MRFF) Strategy 2016-2021 and Priorities 2016-2018 were delivered to Government in early November 2016. This new release comprises the second set of MRFF Priorities spanning the period 2018-2020.

The Act requires AMRAB to take into account the following when determining the Priorities:

• the burden of disease on the Australian community;
• how to deliver practical benefits from medical research and medical innovation to as many Australians as possible;
• how to ensure that financial assistance provided under the MRFF complements and enhances other financial assistance provided for medical research and innovation; and
• any other relevant matters.

These Priorities build on (where appropriate) and replace the first set of Priorities 2016-2018. They remain consistent with the vision, aim, objectives and six strategic platforms identified in the MRFF Strategy 2016-2021.

The Priorities are:

Strategic and International Horizons

One Health – Antimicrobial Resistance
There are no borders between human and animal health when it comes to antimicrobial resistance (AMR). Research into stewardship practices, diagnostic tools and new antimicrobials and vaccines that spans this divide is critical.

Global Health and Health Security
Global health challenges including health emergencies and pandemic preparedness, and the development and implementation of low technology preventative, diagnostic and treatment solutions are best addressed through international research collaboration.

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health
Indigenous leadership and Indigenous-led priority setting to drive health-related research to improve the health of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australians and to close the gap on health mortality and morbidity.

Ageing and Aged Care
Research into the diseases of ageing and the means to prolong quality of life, including tackling cognitive decline and dementia, and compressing the period of intense morbidity in later years through biomedical discovery and health service innovation.

Data and Infrastructure

Digital Health Intelligence
The digitalisation of healthcare will disrupt and transform clinical practice. Data science, informatics, advanced clinical decision making tools, wearables and artificial intelligence research are the key to realising the benefits of healthcare digitalisation.

Health Services and Systems

Comparative Effectiveness Research
Support systematic evaluation and demonstration of the comparative value of health interventions to better inform the decisions clinicians and consumers make in healthcare.

Primary Care Research
Address the capacity and production gap in primary care research with an emphasis on multidisciplinary, adaptive research methodologies and clinician capability support.

Capacity and Collaboration

Clinical Researcher Capacity
Continue to enhance Australian clinical researcher capacity with a focus on next generation fellowships that target multidisciplinary engagement, fields of emerging scientific effort that has healthcare application potential and primary care.

Consumer-Driven Research
Conduct research that is driven by crowdsourcing consumer priorities and purposefully connecting researchers to consumers with the intent of enhancing evidence translation into every day clinical practice.

Trials and Translation

Drug Repurposing
Partner with industry to foster an enduring partnership to systematically identify drugs with repurposed therapeutic potential for investigative research.

Public Health Interventions
Targeted research to test innovative public health approaches to addressing modifiable risk factors that are at the heart of the rise of chronic and complex disease prevalence and persistence in Australia.

Commercialisation

Translational Research Infrastructure
Address gaps in early biomedical and medical technology product development by supporting access to expertise and infrastructure in partnership with industry that seeks to accelerate rapid pre-clinical work and evaluation.

Congratulations to the four Flinders researchers who were announced as new appointments to the 2019 ARC College of Experts, Professor Mike Nicholls (CEPSW), Associate Professor Janni Petersen (CMPH), Professor Colin Raston AO FAA (CSE), and Professor Sharyn Roach Anleu (CHASS).

They join current Flinders College of Experts members, Professor Michael Brunger (CSE), and Professor Sarah Wendt (CEPSW).

To support the advancement of knowledge and contribute to national innovation, the ARC engages an ARC College of Experts to play a key role in identifying research excellence, moderating external assessments and recommending fundable proposals. It also assists the ARC in recruiting and assigning assessors and in implementing peer review reforms in established and emerging disciplines as well as interdisciplinary areas.

The ARC has provided an update on the Industrial Transformation Training Centres (IC19), Discovery Projects for funding commencing in 2020 (DP20), and Discovery Indigenous for funding commencing in 2020 (IN20).

The CEO of the ARC, Professor Sue Thomas, will be visiting Flinders on 29 November 2018 as part of ARC Week at Flinders.

The week will kick off on the 21 November 2018 with a workshop on Preparing an Application: Discovery Projects, presented by Maya Roberts and Professor Jim Mitchell. Dr Graham Steed from GR Steed and Associates will be presenting two workshops at Flinders on 22 and 23 November 2018. The first will be an interactive workshop will focus on the Key Selection Criteria and proposal sections for ARC Linkage grants. The second will focus on the "Dos and Don'ts" of writing your ROPE sections in an interactive workshop.

The updated Instructions to Applicants for IC19 are now available on the GrantConnect website.

Additional information has been included in (Part E) Project Costs (pages 27–32) on how to add ARC funded Training Centre Higher Degree by Research candidates (ICHDRs) and Training Centre Postdoctoral fellows (ICPDs ) into the budget table.

All documentation for this scheme is available on the GrantConnect website. Please note, while the grant guidelines are available to view, you will need to register with GrantConnect to access all documentation. If you have any issues in access GrantConnect, please contact Research Development and Support (RDS) via arc@flinders.edu.au.

The ARC is anticipating a delay to the opening dates for the following grant opportunities:

• Discovery Projects for funding commencing in 2020
• Discovery Indigenous for funding commencing in 2020

When the new opening dates for these schemes are known, the ARC website and GrantConnect will be updated and the ARC will advise via a Network Message. RDS will update our website information, including the ARC grant calendar with Research Development and Support internal deadlines as soon as this new information is made available.

The Flinders University Social and Behavioural Research Ethics Committee (SBREC) has released a revised Human Ethics (non-clinical) Application Form.

These revisions have been made to the application form to ensure that SBREC can meet annual reporting requirements of Governance, Legal and Risk at Flinders University and to improve the useability of the form for applicants.

Remember to download the ethics application form from the Guidelines, Forms and Templates SBREC web page every time a new application is to be submitted to ensure that the correct form is used.

If you are currently submitting an application on the previous version of the Application Form, additional information will be requested before it is submitted to the Committee for consideration.

The 2019 SBREC meeting dates have now been released on the Applying for Human Ethics Approval webpage.

In support of the research objectives in The 2025 Agenda: Making a Difference, and to provide an improved experience for researchers and research support staff, Flinders is investing in new digital technologies that support the research community.

The investment will lead to replacement of our ageing ResearchMaster and associated RePortal environments with a new state of the art research management system and introduction of a streamlined Ethics approval process supported by a new digital solution.

As such, Flinders has recently signed two major contracts with leading research management technology providers:

• Elsevier for their Pure product for research management
• Infonetica for their ERM product for ethics process management

The signing of these contracts represents the start of an exciting journey for Flinders to modernise and streamline our research management technologies and processes.

An extensive consultation process, including product demonstrations, was undertaken with the research community to reach this point. Professor Robert Saint, Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Research), would like to thank members of our research community, Digital Research Services (DRS) and Research Development and Support (RDS) staff and others who have contributed to date.

Implementation of Pure and ERM will be managed by the Research Management Project team, comprising representatives from DRS, RDS and the Library. The project will be governed by a Project Steering Committee and a Project Governance Committee, both of which include researcher representatives from each College and wider representation from the Flinders research support functions.

The next stages of the project are as follows:

• Replacement of the current Publications functionality in ResearchMaster with that provided by the Pure application
• The launch of Flinders Researcher Profiles through the Pure Portal which will provide an enhanced Researcher Profile, building on information already presented on our Staff Profile pages
• Implementation of the Infonetica ERM application for ethics application management, informed by an RDS-led review of the University's Ethics processes.

Replacement of the remaining functionality provided by ResearchMaster and RePortal will commence early 2019.

More information will be shared after detailed project planning has been completed, and further engagement across our community will commence shortly. You can keep up to date with high level progress on these initiatives by visiting the DRS website here, or by contacting any member of the project team via the Research Management Project mailbox.

Flinders University defines a Mid Career Researcher (MCR) as 9 – 15 years post PhD conferral.

Are you an MCR?

If so, please forward this email with your PhD conferral date to researcherpd.rds@flinders.edu.au.

In 2019 Flinders will be running an increased number of programs and initiatives to foster, support and develop our MCR community.

Contacting us will ensure that we can get communications to you regarding upcoming opportunities in relation to your development, prizes, awards and funding.

Flinders University has purchased the Idea Puzzle® software for all staff and students to use when designing and planning their research.

The Idea Puzzle® software is a visual decision-making tool for integrative research design based on Philosophy of Science (Morais & Brailsford, 2018). In particular, it integrates the theory, method, data, rhetoric, and authorship of a research project to focus an academic text such as a research proposal, a thesis, or a journal article. The Idea Puzzle® software asks 21 questions, helps answer them, and allows the self-evaluation of each answer. The sequence of 21 questions follows a funnel logic to help focusing the research design.

The output of the Idea Puzzle® software is a research design with around 2000 words, an overall score and a coloured jigsaw puzzle, based on the 21 answers and the respective self-evaluation (examples: Design; Engineering; Management; Medicine; Psychology). The estimated time to complete a research design is of one working day, ideally six months after enrolling in a PhD.

For further information and instructions, please watch the video below.

The main benefits of the Idea Puzzle® software are the coherent design and defence of a research project from the point of view of Philosophy of Science (Morais, 2010). In 2016, the Academy of Management Learning & Education (4.235 5-Year Impact Factor) considered the Idea Puzzle® software "a very useful tool for research across a multitude of disciplines, not only for PhD students as they learn about all of the elements of research project design, but also for reviewers and research project teams" (Parente & Ferro, 2016, p. 645). To date, the Idea Puzzle® software has helped design more than 4,000 research projects worldwide.

You can access the Idea Puzzle® software exclusively online, without installation on the computer upon registration with your Flinders email address. All Flinders students and staff members have access to the software.

Please contact Dr Dani Milos, HDR Education Coordinator, Office of Graduate Research, if you have any queries about Idea Puzzle.