Beneficiaries

Manchester Metropolitan University

MMU is the largest campus-based undergraduate university in the UK with a total student population of more than 37,000. Although it was awarded university status in 1992, its roots in higher education go back over 150 years. It has a number of research centres and groups that have worldwide excellence, one of which is the Centre for Policy Modelling (CPM).

CPM is a dedicated research centre that researches all aspects of social simulation, including: methodology, validation techniques, software tools, and applications – http://cfpm.org. It has been particularly active in simulations with ecological aspects as well as socio-economic ones, going back to the “Freshwater Integrated Resource Management with Agents” (FIRMA), 2000-2003 where it lead the modelling workpackage. Other EU framework projects includes: “Complexity, Agents, Volatility, Evidence and Scale” (CAVES), a ‘NEST’ project as coordinator; “New Approaches to Adaptive Water Management under Uncertainty” (NeWater), 2005-2008; “Emergence in the Loop – the two way dynamics of norm formation” (EMIL) an FET project, 2006-2009; and ‘Ocopomo’ a project under ICT for Governance and Policy Modelling 2009 – 2012.

Currently it leads the 5-year, £3M UK project “Social Complexity of Immigration and Diversity” along with the University of Manchester, which is funded as part of the EPSRC’s “Complexity in the Real World” initiative. This project brings together social scientists, agent-based modellers and complexity physicists to tackle issues associated with immigration and diversity in the UK, including trust. It has launched an initiative to better use qualitative evidence for informing simulations.

University of Tromsø – The Arctic University of Norway

The Faculty of Biosciences, Fisheries and Economics (BFE) consists of Department of Arctic and Marine Biology, Norwegian College of Fishery Science (NFH) and School of Business and Economics. The main task of BFE is to conduct teaching and research dissemination at a high national and international level within all relevant fields.

Prioritised research areas are aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems, climate, life in the arctic, marine bioprospecting, fish health, seafood products, business and macroeconomics, resources and environment, markets and management of marine resources. The interdisciplinary profile of the faculty provides good opportunity to develop research projects involving several research groups at the faculty according to its strategy.

The University of Utrecht

Founded in 1636, Utrecht University has evolved into a modern and leading education and research institution with a high international reputation. The Shanghai Ranking ranks the university in first place in the Netherlands, in 13th place in Europe and in 52nd place worldwide. The university offers its almost 30.000 students 45 undergraduate programmes and 153 graduate programmes. Utrecht University’s annual turnover is 761 million EUR, including 224 million EUR external project funding from a multitude of international and national sources.

The department of Information and Computing Sciences (ICS) of Utrecht University offers Bachelor and Master programs in Computer Science (including Game-technology), Information Science, and Artificial Intelligence, and performs research in Computer Science and Information Science. The research of ICS is organised in four divisions: Artificial Intelligence, Virtual Worlds, Interaction Technology, and Software Systems. ICS is a leading centre of academic research into serious games and virtual worlds in Europe. It coordinates the university focus area Game Research and the centre for Game Research and Technology (U-GATE, www.u-gate.nl). The groups in the department study all aspects of games: from graphics, simulations and artificial intelligence, to the development of software technology for developing games.

The division of Artificial Intelligence is world famous for its work in agents and agent-based simulations, which are applied in many fields ranging from serious games for disaster management and virtual patients to smart energy grids, logistics and traffic management.

University of Iceland

The University of Iceland was founded in 1911. The country’s oldest and largest university, it has about 700 academic staff and over 13,000 undergraduate and graduate students. Five Schools provide the basic organisational structure for teaching and research. The Faculty of Life and Environmental Sciences is located within the School of Engineering and Natural Sciences. Its constituent departments are the Department of Biology and the Department of Geography and Tourism. Within the latter department, considerable research has been undertaken by human geographers on regional and local development in Iceland. Staff have participated actively in multinational research, including EU-funded projects. Good facilities exist for GIS-based work.

CETMAR

The Centro Tecnológico del Mar-Fundación CETMAR is a non-profit Public Foundation promoted by the Galician Regional Government and the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation in 2001. CETMAR aims for sustainable and competitive maritime and fishing sectors, using interagency coordination and interdisciplinary integration of marine research and technology resources at regional, national, European and international levels.

CETMAR facilitates the participation of companies in innovation activities, strengthen links between institutions involved in R&D and is a consulting firm for policy makers and the marine and maritime industry in the fields of marine environment, fisheries socioeconomics, marine and seafood technologies, technology promotion and transfer, training and international cooperation.

Currently CETMAR employs 54 professionals with an extensive experience in project management and coordination of R&D&I and international cooperation in more than 35 countries.

Matís ltd.

Matís is a government owned, independent research company, founded in 2007 following the merger of three former public research institutes. We pursue research and development aligned to the food and biotechnology industries as well as providing Iceland’s leading analytical testing service for public and private authorities. Matís’ vision is to increase the value of food processing and food production, through research, development, dissemination of knowledge and consultancy, as well as to ensure the safety and quality of food and feed products.

Matís employs around 100 staff in offices, laboratories or Food Innovation Centres located in eight cities or towns around Iceland. Our turnover in 2014 was around $USD 11.5 million, of which 33% comes from international cooperation.

Employees at Matís include many of Iceland‘s most competent scientists in the fields of food technology, food research and testing, and biotechnology; food scientists, chemists, biologists, engineers and fisheries scientists. Several employees also hold associate positions Iceland’s universities, while approximately 15 Ph.D. students and many M.Sc. students conduct their research at Matís in collaboration with industry in Iceland and abroad.

Matís’ specialised fields include biotechnology, enzyme isolation, processing technology, traceability, genetic analysis, chemical and microbiological testing, physical and chemical properties of food, quality and safety of aquatic and marine catches, feed technology for aquaculture and environmental research.

Syntesa

Syntesa (Faroe Islands) is an innovation consultancy founded in 2004 with partners and associates in Scandinavia, the United Kingdom, Spain, Germany, Belgium, South Africa and India. Syntesa provides advisory services on innovation, conducts socio-economic impact analysis and assists with market development. The company is heavily involved in commercial and research projects related to fishery and aquaculture activities.