CyberHER: Bridging the gender gap in cybersecurity

by Daryl Ilbury

The CyberHER: Bridging the Gender Gap in Cybersecurity project addresses the global gender gap in cybersecurity. By promoting cybersecurity awareness for women, international collaboration, and inclusive education, the project empowers women in Pakistan and the UK. By tackling barriers in STEM and championing diversity, CyberHER is sparking systemic change and redefining the role of women in technology.

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Finding more inclusive entrepreneurism for what is a white space

by Daryl Ilbury

While overt displays of racism are shocking, their visibility makes them easier to challenge and isolate; it is the disguised, even unintended, racism that is more pervasive and, because it is unquestioned, is enduring and, arguably, more injurious. There’s an argument that such racism would not find fertile ground within business academia – especially within institutions or programmes encouraging entrepreneurship and diversity in business. Such assumptions are naïve.

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The Archaeologists Guide to Good Practice Handbook: A blueprint for a successful dig

by Daryl Ilbury

When major excavation work started on the UK’s HS2 high-speed rail project, hopes were high it would transform public transport between London and the North. While the project is no longer completing all of its infrastructure targets, its construction crews are creating a wave of archaeological discoveries that have captured the public’s imagination and uncovered hidden layers of Britain’s past.

Historic England, the UK government’s statutory adviser on the historic environment and helping people understand, value, and care for historic places, is looking to maximise the benefits of all the archaeology that has been discovered. With that in mind, it is supporting Research and Development work on the Archaeologists Guide to Good Practice (AG2GP) Handbook – an essential directory to ensure that post-excavation work on the results of any archaeological dig is methodical, precise, and consistently adheres to the highest standards of practice.

Self-Care 2030: Towards a seismic shift in perceiving and practising mental healthcare

by Daryl Ilbury

In today’s fast-paced world, where digital connectivity blurs the lines between work and home, the pressures of social media to conform are unrelenting, and socio-political divisions are ripping communities apart, mental health challenges are escalating with unprecedented force. We are navigating a period of intense social, technological, and environmental change. Each of these dimensions introduces complex challenges that can strain mental health and the systems in place to provide the necessary care and support. Systems designed to promote mental wellbeing must deal with limited resources, inadequate training of health professionals in mental healthcare, stigma associated with mental disorders, and an underestimation of the economic impact that mental health issues pose.

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YIP–Your Ideas to Practice: Shaping the next generation of humanitarian engineers

by Daryl Ilbury

While technologies have evolved throughout human history and arguably helped propel us forward, one constant has held us back: our compulsion to compete for resources instead of cooperating in their sustainable management. There are very few resources as necessary as water; it’s no coincidence that we look for signs of water first when searching for extraterrestrial life.

Here on Earth, technological advances have ironically helped fuel a climate crisis that risks escalating inter- and intra-state water conflicts. Such conflicts have historically impacted the socioeconomic development of societies and nations. Beyond cross-state wars over water sources, disputes over water resources can arise within a society, such as between industries and agriculture, urban and rural populations, or different ethnic groups.

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Respecting unity and diversity: Towards effective multidisciplinary research

by Daryl Ilbury

To those in the corporate sector, academia may not seem a particularly competitive environment. The truth is that in academia, highly prized resources such as funding are coveted, and hierarchies exist, determined mainly by academic output with the eye on cementing scholarly authority and academia’s version of job security: tenure.

However, at the same time, academia’s strength lies in collaboration. This is especially true when we look to academics for guidance in addressing the world’s most complex societal, environmental, and public health challenges, such as poverty, climate change, and obesity. Such insight is impossible without multidisciplinary collaboration that requires significant knowledge sharing by researchers. Collaborations can last years, demanding significant time and input.

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The remarkable legacy of the International Space Weather Initiative

by Daryl Ilbury

From a celestial perspective, Earth’s position is anything but serene. It is like an exposed rock on a storm-lashed coastline, constantly battered by the elements, primarily, ironically, by what is essential for life on our planet: the Sun. Just as it is the primary driver of Earth’s weather, the Sun immediately powers the weather in the space around it. The term ‘space weather’ refers to the phenomena triggered by solar activity, such as solar wind – the stream of charged particles emitted by the Sun – and its effects in our thermosphere, magnetosphere, and ionosphere – a series of regions within our atmosphere hosting a relatively large number of electrically charged atoms and molecules.

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Unlocking opportunity: The importance of student–faculty interactions in promoting Black students’ academic identity

by Daryl Ilbury

On 29th June this year, the United States Supreme Court sent a shockwave through higher education when it outlawed race-conscious admissions. The practice, which gained momentum after the civil rights era of the 1960s and 1970s, encouraged greater diversity at historically and/or predominantly White institutions (H/ PWIs). As a result of the judgement, historically Black colleges and universities (HBCUs) are expecting an influx of new applicants. HBCUs punch above their weight in terms of the output of Black graduates and offer a more inclusive environment. So, could the Supreme Court judgement trigger a significant shift in Black student enrolment, and what can H/PWIs do to attract more Black students?

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Human Systems Integration, it’s time to take centre stage

by Daryl Ilbury

There is an old engineering design joke, probably more a wry observation, that the most dangerous component to a motor vehicle is the nut holding the steering wheel. On its own, a motor vehicle is an inert, albeit highly complex, technological system. It takes people, also a highly complex sociotechnical system, to activate and apply its purpose. However, that purpose does not necessarily need to be part of its original design – a car can transport its occupants safely, efficiently, and comfortably, but it can also kill. As humans and technology converge, making sense of the resulting combined complexity is the focus of an interdisciplinary field called human systems integration, or HSI.

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The perpetual motion of digital scholarly preservation

by Daryl Ilbury

It’s fair to say most researchers don’t do what they do for the money. Instead, what drives them is their passion for contributing to the scholarly record. This ‘record’ is not a simple sequential chronicle of academic information. Instead, it is an ever-expanding, highly interconnected network of all human knowledge racing outwards in myriad directions. Scholars build upon the work of those who published before so that those who follow them may do the same. Those tasked with curating such knowledge can never rest because the responsibility of preserving scholarly knowledge is immense, and since becoming progressively digital, it has become increasingly mercurial, and the demands on their skills more intense.

You can read the rest of this article, complete with additional feature content, on the Research Features website here. (Opens in a new tab)

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