Environment submissions database

COVID-19 impacts have been wide-ranging. Our strategy has been to mitigate disruption, but to remain responsive to opportunities, both to support national priorities and to enable individuals to move forward with their research as far as possible through successive national restrictions. Facilities: Our research facilities closed in line with government guidance from March until early July 2020, except those required for COVID-related research. Many clinical academics were called into the NHS full-time to provide additional support. We found opportunities to exploit our research facilities and use our expertise to support the national COVID response: lending qPCR machines into the lighthouse laboratories; donating PPE to our local NHS Trust; converting our AMRC Cymru site and providing 13,000 machines as part of the ‘Ventilator challenge’; and providing input to COVID-modelling exercises. On re-opening laboratories as COVID-secure environments, staff and PGRs had equal opportunities to re-start their research, with the order determined according to strategic priorities set by the Vice-Presidents for Research and Innovation, applied by units to their programmes of work. EDI issues were considered to enable researchers with caring and other responsibilities to access facilities flexibly. Staff: Our policies and support for well-being have been grounded in flexibility and collaboration. Recognising that disruption to research has impacted staff groups in different ways at different times, we deployed our UKRI COVID-19 (CoA) grant to prioritise extending fixed-term contracts. This enabled delivery of grant outcomes, but also provided postdoctoral researchers with reassurance and security, recognising their heightened sense of precarity. PGRs: We have committed c.£2m to match UKRI stipend extension schemes for students we fund and have provided tuition-fee free extensions to sponsored and self-funded students. In addition, a £3m COVID-support fund is available to PGRs without other sources of financial support. All professional development training available to PGRs moved to remote delivery with attendance significantly increased. We have developed tailored guidance to encourage adjustment to research programmes and a COVID-19 Impact Form to enable PGRs to describe the adjustments for their examiners. Grant income: Researchers have remained productive; institutional grant applications and awards have increased slightly. We secured 69 research grants from rapid-response COVID schemes and are a member of national programmes such as the COVID-19 Genomics Consortium (COG-UK), sequencing the COVID genome, and the NIHR-funded Coronavirus Immunology Consortium. We have sought to facilitate research during the pandemic wherever possible, through policies for fieldwork, qualitative research and international travel, on the basis of detailed risk assessments, adhering to national and international guidelines at all times. Future impact: We anticipate continued impact on PGR submission rates within the normal expected period, which we will endeavour to mitigate with ongoing support for adjustment to projects. Whilst rates of grant application remain similar to pre-COVID, we anticipate delays to research due to lack of access to facilities and constraints due to health and caring impacts will adversely impact research output in the coming period. We will monitor this carefully and identify tailored support to mitigate this for staff groups who may be disproportionately affected.