In this case study we talk to Emily Allman, MEng Chemical Engineering undergraduate student, who looked into the efficiency of Resonant Acoustic Mixers (RAM) using BlueBEAR, for her final-year research project. Emily presented her paper at the recent BEAR PGR Conference 2025. I am a final-year MEng Chemical Engineering student at the University of Birmingham. For … Continue reading “Shaking up mixing: optimising mixing using BlueBEAR”
Extracting tender information with BlueBEAR: tackling complex documents with NLP and image processing
In this case study we talk to Asim Abbas, PhD Researcher in Artificial Intelligence (School of Computer Science), who is using BlueBEAR to extract structured information from unstructured and ambiguous tender documents. My research focuses on extracting structured information from unstructured and ambiguous tender documents, whereas these documents present distinctive processing challenges due to their … Continue reading “Extracting tender information with BlueBEAR: tackling complex documents with NLP and image processing”
May 2025 BEAR Newsletter
Birmingham Environment for Academic Research (BEAR) Newsletter As we head into summer, we have a busy events season starting this week with the HPC-SIG in Cambridge, the Thesis Submission event for PGRs, and the BEAR Conference. Hopefully you will have seen that our summer programme of BEAR training workshops (being held online) has now been released, and you can … Continue reading “May 2025 BEAR Newsletter”
RSE Midlands 2025
Senior Research Software Engineers James Tyrrell and Gavin Yearwood led the organisation of RSE Midlands 2025, and below James gives a summary of this successful event. The Advanced Research Computing team hosted the Research Software Engineering (RSE) Midlands 2025 Annual Conference at The Exchange on Monday 7 April, 2025. Sponsored and supported by our partners … Continue reading “RSE Midlands 2025”
RNA sequencing analysis made easy with BEAR
In this case study we talk to Jonny Lewis (researcher in Inflammation and Ageing) about how BEAR helps in understanding changes in the cells lining blood vessels when blood flow is not linear and smooth – altering what they release and communicate with. The sound of a computer, working at its limit, the fan desperately … Continue reading “RNA sequencing analysis made easy with BEAR”
Extraction and Analysis of Hydrological Spatial Data
In this case study, we hear from Chenlu Yang, a PhD student in the School of Geography, who has been leveraging BEAR (Birmingham Environment for Academic Research) to study flood behavior and hydrological extremes My research focuses on analyzing trends in flood behavior and hydrological extremes across the UK using high-resolution gridded datasets and long-term … Continue reading “Extraction and Analysis of Hydrological Spatial Data”
Utilising BEAR workshops for Multimodal Analysis in Cognitive Translation Research
In this case study, we hear from Mingjie Zhang, a postgraduate researcher in the Department of Languages, Cultures, Art History and Music (LCAHM), who has been leveraging BEAR workshops to apply digital humanities methods in her project “Translating between Minds: Cognitive Insights of the Dao De Jing.” By integrating tools such as R, Python, Matlab, and GitHub—learned … Continue reading “Utilising BEAR workshops for Multimodal Analysis in Cognitive Translation Research”
April 2025 BEAR Newsletter
Birmingham Environment for Academic Research (BEAR) Newsletter Earlier this month, members of the Research Software Group led the RSE Midlands 2025 meeting at The Exchange featuring a wide range of talks showcasing research software, from Research Software Engineers (RSEs) through to researchers – we will provide a summary of the event in a future newsletter. Yesterday was … Continue reading “April 2025 BEAR Newsletter”
SSI Research Software Maintenance Fund
The Software Sustainability Institute recently announced that they’ll be running the first Research Software Maintenance Fund. The scheme will offer up to £500k for two years or up to £150k for one year “to support and maintain existing research software or sustain a team responsible for multiple software tools”. The closing date for Expressions Of … Continue reading “SSI Research Software Maintenance Fund”
Planned work to improve resilience of the Research Data Store
Users of the Research Data Store (RDS) may have noticed intermittent performance issues affecting storage recently, which has been causing some disruption to users. This work is a necessary precursor to a major program of work in which we will replace, expand and enhance, the RDS service. Phase 1 Between now and summer 2025 we … Continue reading “Planned work to improve resilience of the Research Data Store”