Professor John Hearn concludes his work as WUN’s Executive Director on 31 July 2018

Did you know that teabags are made of plastic? Do you know where that plastic ends up? With WUN funding, a team of researchers led by Professor Bruce Sutherland (University of Alberta) are learning how to predict the movements of microplastics after their entry into water systems. Click through to read more about their recent workshop and their goal to help policy-makers take action.

WUN recently held the first set networking workshops as part of its special program for early career researcher (ECR) entitled “Developing the next generation of research leaders for sustainable development.” The first two, of which there will be 17 in total, focused on SDG 13: Climate Action, and SDG 4: Quality Education, respectively. Click through for a summary and videos of the keynote talks.

The inVIVO Planetary Health network, which has its origins in a 2012 WUN Research Development Fund grant, pursues positive change that reflect the link between people and place. In a November 2020 publication in The Lancet, researchers from inVIVO appealed for health professionals to pledge their dedication ‘to the service of humanity, and to the protection of natural systems on which human health depends.’ We asked experts around the Worldwide Universities Network for their perspectives on the pledge and its effort to expand the interpretation of ‘first do no harm’ to reflect human connections to the planet. Click through for more.

Researchers and policy experts from across the globe are collaborating to monitor and analyse the role of evidence in policy-making during the COVID-19 pandemic. Their data cover more than 100 countries, publicly accessible in the INGSA COVID-19 Evidence-to-Policy Tracker. Click through to read more about this WUN-supported initiative.

In Ghana, the term “dumsor” (literally meaning “off-on”) is a term that was born to describe the periods of electricity blackouts in 2015 when the country experienced persistent and intermittent power outages. Though access to electricity is widespread, communities in different regions confront challenges of reliability, cost, and safety.

Click through to read about how the WUN-funded research group SEN-Africa is working on new models that incorporate the range of stakeholder priorities.  

The International Symposium on Digital Health is an annual event that connects international experts and professionals from the healthcare and engineering sectors in the promotion of interdisciplinary research in digital health. Click through to learn more about this upcoming free virtual symposium.

Why do we have the Sustainable Development Goals and why are university collaborations essential in making progress on them? Hear from Peter Lennie, WUN Executive Director, and special guest Jeffrey Sachs, President of the United Nations Sustainable Development Solutions Network, as they launch a new WUN networking initiative for early-career researchers working on the world’s biggest challenges.  

A WUN Interdisciplinary Research Group is hosting an international symposium that reflects on the challenges and opportunities in thinking about what counts as public space during a global pandemic. WUN Executive Director Peter Lennie and Chair of Global Higher Education and Research Global Challenge Chair Jose Escamilla, join PI Hendrik Tieben to discuss ‘Campus as Public Space in the Age of Pandemics’.  Click through for the program and registration information.

We are delighted to invite you to the virtual launch of the Worldwide Universities Network Global Africa Group book, Africa and the Sustainable Development Goals. Attendees are invited to meet the editors of Africa and the Sustainable Development Goals and participate in a live Q&A session with its contributors.  Click through for full details and to register for the event.

This is one of the first academic publications to comprehensively and critically engage with the intersection of the Sustainable Development Goals and African development agendas. It presents multidisciplinary research that captures the necessary complexity and breadth of the theory and practice of sustainable development on the continent. 

Click through for full details and to register for the event.

The ways of thinking and knowing developed in Indigenous cultures have long been marginalised within the academy and in public life, including in approaches to the environment, migration, and justice. Dr June Bam–Hutchison (University of Cape Town) is leading a collaborative network that aims to restore understandings of Indigenous concepts, enrich existing scholarship, and help to develop new approaches to today’s global challenges.

With a potentially large proportion of COVID-19 cases showing no symptoms but still infectious, sensitive and accurate methods of testing for the virus are essential to reduce the dangers of transmission within communities. A newly established WUN research group is helping to refine testing methods of testing for SARS-Cov-2.

Click through for the full story.

Some of the most striking spaces of the twentieth century were conceived with the modernist ambition to make urban living healthier. In the twenty-first century, the COVID-19 crisis and the changing use of public space is encouraging a return to such thinking. These debates have crystallised discussions of how to make public spaces work best for local communities—questions that the WUN group on sustainable, healthy cities has been exploring in their research and practice for several years.  Click through to discover more.

We are delighted to announce that Makerere University has joined the Worldwide Universities Network.  WUN warmly welcomes Vice Chancellor Barnabas Nwangwe and colleagues as partners.  Click through to learn more.

The third instalment of WUN’s webinar series sharing experiences during the COVID-19 pandemic focused on research: how universities are managing priorities during campus closures and conditions on returning to work. Click through for a summary and recording of the event. 

An international consortium of WUN member universities along with WUN+ partners is examining the experiences of staff members and students at universities around the world, seeking to reveal the impacts of the coronavirus pandemic on their mental health and wellbeing. Click through to learn about the project and to access their global survey for academic staff members.

A study done by the Institute of Future Cities at CUHK reveals that hot nights pose greater threat to public health than hot days and better urban planning and building design are needed to mitigate the impact.

Peter Lennie discusses the importance of collaborative networks at the Sustainable Development Solutions Network ‘University Sector Support to UN Secretary-General’s Call for a Decade of Action on the SDGs: A Meeting of Presidents of Universities’. to an audience of university and United Nations leaders.

In the second of the WUN webinars on challenges universities are facing during the COVID-19 pandemic, teaching and learning experts shared their experiences and techniques for helping students stay engaged with their courses during online delivery.  Every university in the Network has been disrupted by the COVID-19 pandemic and has had to adapt at pace. However, these common challenges have taken diverse forms and prompted distinctive solutions, with each university responding to a specific and locally grounded set of dynamics.  

Click through for a summary of the discussion and to watch a video of the webinar in its entirety.

WUN is pleased to announce the results of its 2020 special initiative to address research needs triggered by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Eight awards were made to support time-sensitive research projects whose value depends on being able to collect or analyse data obtained during the pandemic, and on which the collaboration of WUN partners confers real advantage. Awarded project teams are comprised of researchers from across 19 WUN member universities.  

Peter Lennie, Executive Director of WUN, said “We had an overwhelming response to this special call, and received many strong and exciting proposals. The eight successful projects take special advantage of member universities’ cultural and geographical diversity in tackling urgent and important problems that have arisen from the pandemic.”

Click through to learn more about the awarded projects.

WUN is hosting a series of webinars to help member universities benefit from each other’s experience in addressing some of the unprecedented pandemic-related challenges facing them.  The next in our series, to be held on Thursday 23 July will discuss the challenge of maintaining student engagement and attention during remote course delivery.

Universities around the network have deployed various approaches, reflecting the different geographical and cultural contexts in which they work, to help keep students engaged as classes have shifted from the classroom to computer screen.  In this webinar we will explore what successful strategies have emerged, what we’ve learned from failures, and how the diversity of experiences from around the network can help inform each of us as we continue to teach remotely.

Click through to learn more and register for the webinar.

We are delighted to announce that the University of Lausanne (UNIL) has become the newest member of WUN.

Rector Nouria Hernandez noted that “UNIL is very excited to join WUN and to contribute to its development. We are particularly enthusiastic about the focus of the network on research activities and collaboration, and above all the fact that it addresses major contemporary challenges. These issues are also high on UNIL’s agenda.”

WUN Executive Director Peter Lennie added, “The distinctive strength of the network lies in its capacity to bring together major research universities from different parts of the world to collaborate on solving global challenges—particularly those related to sustainable development. In joining WUN, the University of Lausanne adds significantly to our strengths, and to our effectiveness in addressing research challenges.”     Click through to read the full story.

(22 June series update)

Following World Oceans Day, WUN is pleased to share a presentation of a series of articles in which United Nations Academic Impact (UNAI) presents ocean science from WUN member the University of Bergen, UNAI’s Hub institution for SDG 14: Life below water in the Sustainable Ocean Series. 

We will be sharing four features from this project, a new article to be published each Monday, and also highlight what WUN research teams are doing to address the future of our oceans.  Click through for more.

Before COVID-19 there were transnational trends in student mental health as well as local particularities, as students face adjustment challenges, the demands of a competitive environment and external pressures like finances and employability.

As the pandemic and related containment measures take hold, click through to learn about how WUN universities are supporting students’ mental health.

Through transdisciplinary research the WUN Interdisciplinary Research Group on Climate Resilient African Landscapes is building insights into how different stakeholders use and shape the places they share. The group has established practitioner partnerships and is capitalising on regional and global academic networks.

Click to read more about the approach they are taking as their work continues.

In this story, we hear how two WUN member researchers benefited from new connections made through the Research Mobility Program: Colin Chu, who worked with engineers at the University of Rochester, and Victoria Rivera Ugarte, who collaborated with social scientists at the Chinese University of Hong Kong.

Click through to learn more about their discoveries and plans.

As the coronavirus pandemic spreads, interruptions to public services and the imposition of social distancing have had major impacts on global agriculture and food supply. Professor Mark Eisler of the WUN supported Global Farm Platform discusses likely impacts of the crisis and the potential for rebuilding systems in more environmentally and economically sustainable way. 

Click through to read more.

Stressors and traumas such as violence and abuse, the effects of poverty, and the experience of emergencies or disasters have a major impact on the health of pregnant women and their children.

As the impact of climate change multiplies the threats, understanding why and how we can make effective and early interventions is paramount.

Click through to read the full story.

WUN is hosting a series of webinars to help member universities benefit from each other’s experience in addressing some of the unprecedented pandemic-related challenges now facing them.  Each webinar will last an hour, and will be organised around the sharing of insights about a specific challenge, followed by a broad Q&A.

The focus of our first webinar, to be held on Tuesday 5 May (click through for local times) will be student mental health.  The webinar will begin with the sharing of both research and practice insights and experiences from members of the WUN Student Mental Health Working Group. This will be followed by a broader discussion with all attendees.

To enable WUN as a network to best address research needs triggered by the Covid-19 pandemic, WUN is making available a limited number of grants for collaborative projects that focus on research challenges related to the present pandemic, and are urgent and of the moment.

We therefore welcome special requests to support projects that a) should be undertaken now, because circumstances will be less favourable later; b) benefit particularly from collaboration among WUN partners (e.g., capitalize on the geographical and cultural diversity of the network).

Click through for full details.

Although we won’t be able to gather this year for the 2020 WUN Annual General Meeting (AGM), we are excited to announce the dates for WUN AGM 2021!

Working with Tecnológico de Monterrey, we have been able to confirm arrangements for the WUN AGM 2021, which will take place in Monterrey, Mexico from 17-21 May 2021. 

While disasters and environmental factors have always been important drivers of migration, even more people are expected to move as they face the projected impacts of climate change, including more extreme weather events, changes in water quality and availability, and interactions with conflict. 

A recent ruling of the UN Human Rights Committee, which stated that people cannot be sent back to countries where climate change impacts place them in immediate danger, was treated by many commentators as a landmark protection for environmental migrants. As Professor Andreas Neef (University of Auckland) explains in this feature, the reality is more complex. Recipient of a 2020 WUN Research Development Fund award, a WUN member consortium will advance interdisciplinary research into climate-induced migration. It aims to help improve policies through a better understanding of the complex drivers of migration and displacement associated with climatic changes.  Click through for the full story.

UPDATE: The WUN Summer School, originally scheduled for July 2020, has been postponed to 2021 due to covid-19 developments.  The information and application website will be re-opened for the 2021 program in due course. 

In 2015 a WUN-funded research collaboration among the Universities of Bergen, Cape Town, and Southampton set out to understand whether parasite exposure is having an impact on allergy rates. Their research since suggests that the answer is yes, but exactly what is happening and why remains a mystery.  Click through to read the full story.

WUN is pleased to announce the results of the 2019 round of the Research Development Fund (RDF) applications.  These awards, which facilitate collaborative research among WUN universities, will bring our financial investment in establishing new WUN Interdisciplinary Research Groups (IRGs) to more than £170,000 over the past six months.

From among 31 applications, we have been able to support 15 projects from the RDF.  Notably, all 23 WUN member universities are represented on awarded projects research teams in this round.  These new projects join 88 existing IRGs that have engaged over 2300 researchers across the Network.

Since 2009 the WUN Research Development Fund (RDF) has directly invested over £2 million to establish research projects on problems of global significance, and on which member universities, working together, can make distinctive progress.

Public debates about marriage migration are vulnerable to a series of misconceptions, often conflating migration with trafficking and undermining the agency of the women who migrate. The WUN Marriage Migrants in Asia research group is addressing these misconceptions with interdisciplinary research that aims to inform regional policy. Click through to read more about their activities and the thinking behind them.

Not just talking, but doing: with funding from the WUN Research Development Fund, academics from four WUN universities got together with experts and decision-makers in Accra to combine forces on global waste management. Professor Shyama V. Ramani and PhD researcher Ms Maria Tomai talk here about their recent activities.

New technologies are capturing different information about health and treatments, opening up new pathways for more efficient and effective care. With its distinctive collaborative model, the WUN Digital Health Research Network has founded a new international society and is developing methodologies for studying and evaluating digital health innovations.  Click through for the full story.

WUN’s Legume Network is building a global reputation for research excellence – paving the way for pulses to be embraced as crucial allies in the fight against climate change, hunger, obesity and other threats to world health.

In 2018, the network was awarded a sustainability grant from WUN to bolster its efforts to secure large-scale, transnational funding to establish a centre of excellence and associated nodes of research.  “Large-scale funding will ensure we tackle major challenges in legume biology as a unified world-leading academic community of excellence, driving WUN bioscience forward in this key area,” says PI Associate Professor Michael Considine (UWA). 

WUN’s Legumes Network comprises dozens of leading scientists across 12 institutions from five continents. Since its launch in 2015, the number of papers published relating to legumes and climate change has tripled from under 20 to more than 60 per annum – many connected directly to the network.  (Click through to full story.)

The convergence of data and diplomacy and its far-reaching effects are the focus of a new academic paper by WUN-affiliated researchers published in Science & Diplomacy.

Data Diplomacy was co-authored by Andy Boyd (Bristol), Jane Gatewood, (Rochester), Stuart Thorson, (Syracuse)  and Timothy Dye (Rochester).  The publication reflects insights from the Worldwide Universities Network (WUN) symposium on data diplomacy held at the Academy of Medicine in New York in October 2015.  It also names symposium delegates who lent their expertise in the areas of public health and translational research, governance and public policy, and data sharing and management to investigate the intersection of data and diplomatic engagement.

The paper shows data to be a two-edged sword: used to empower communities by granting them cultural capital and opening diplomatic possibilities, and as a tool to manage citizens’ behaviour. (Click through to full story.)

The University of Alberta set the stage for student discovery in the areas of traditional energy development, future energy systems, environment, and land reclamation by hosting the Worldwide Universities Network Summer School this July. 

WUN member Maastricht University, which leads the Young Universities for the Future of Europe alliance, has recently been awarded a large grant by the European Commission to set up one of the very first models of European Universities.  WUN is strengthened when our member universities extend their reach internationally, and we congratulate Maastricht University on this notable achievement.

From 19-24 May, 230 participants from WUN member universities came together for the Network’s Annual General Meeting Week 2019, hosted by University College Dublin.

Peter Lennie, Executive Director of WUN noted, “Our hosts at UCD provided a marvellous environment for a most productive meeting that highlighted both the achievements and the great potential of WUN. Several important initiatives have resulted from the meeting, and I’m confident they will bring considerable benefit to the partnership.”

WUN would once again like once again to thank President Andrew Deeks and the organising team at University College Dublin for their generous support in hosting WUN AGM 2019. The 2020 edition will be held in Monterrey, Mexico with the support of host member Tecnològico de Monterrey from 17-22 May 2020.

Click through for the full article and further images from the week.

Led by the University of Auckland at number one, WUN universities make a strong showing in a new ranking that assesses the social and economic impact of universities based on the UN Sustainable Development Goals.

Using advanced computer models, CUHK researchers found that intercropping enables higher productivity in crops with less synthetic fertilizers and hence reduces the air pollutants being volatilized from the cropland soil. This sustainable farming practice may help maintain a stable food supply and mitigate the air pollution problem in China. 

WUN is pleased to announce an internship opportunity for a doctoral researcher at IOM GMDAC in Berlin.

To be held from 19-21 June 2019 at Maastricht University.

Held 19-24 May in Dublin, Ireland.

Prof Hon-ming Lam, CUHK professor and WUN IRG leader, completed the world’s first reference-grade wild soybean genome.

WUN Summer School on Energy Transitions, 8-19 July 2019, University of Alberta.

“Exploring resilient peacebuilding actors, cultures and policy transfer in West Africa”.

Open: call for research proposals on Marriage Migrants and Care, deadline 15 March 2019. 

CUHK established partnerships with ETH Zurich, Imperial College London and Johns Hopkins University to deepen ties on transdisciplinary medical robotics research.

Implementing the SDGs in East Africa: Translating collaborative research into policy impact.

Michielse returned to Edmonton in the fall of 2018 to join Malykhin in his lab as part of a larger partnership the University of Alberta has with the Worldwide Universities Network (WUN).

Sixteen projects have been awarded funds to begin in 2019.

National conference on the role of Norwegian universities in relation to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

Apply for a travel grant by 15 January 2019 and submit your abstract by 15 February 2019.

WUN academic workshop report: The Shiloh Project In Ghana. An Intersectional Exploration of Religion and Gender-Based Violence.

What does mobile phone usage in Africa and small-town hospitality to queer people in South Africa reveal about globalisation as it’s encountered in the margins and peripheries?

A new platform to identify climate-smart adaptations in Fiji and Tonga will assist communities vulnerable to climate change.

WUN research: an inexpensive and easily replicable journalling exercise can build resilience in pregnant women affected by natural disaster.

CUHK will host Stanford University’s Bing Overseas Studies Program in Hong Kong from fall 2019. 

Several WUN members join the Global AI Academic Alliance that seeks to boost academic exchanges on AI and promote international communication and cooperation. 

The RDF provides researchers in WUN universities with grants of up to £10,000 to foster research collaborations across the network.

The Canmore Declaration is defined as the interdependent vitality of all natural and anthropogenic ecosystems: social, political and otherwise.

Tinashe Jakwa volunteered at the Worldwide Universities Network Conference, AGM, and Presidents Forum 2018

Leeds joins the University of Oxford and the LSHT in the top three.

Forty-five students of 19 nationalities gathered at CUHK for the Association of Commonwealth Universities (ACU) Summer School on Designing and Creating Sustainable Communities during 1-9 July 2018.

WUN Understanding Cultures Global Challenge Workshop: how heritage can help people deal with trauma of forced and unsafe migration 

WUN Responding to Climate Change Global Challenge Workshop 

Promoting adaptability across the life course

What 21st Century challenges for higher education should inform GHEAR’s research agenda?

We have got the talent, the knowledge, and the vehicles through the policy institutes

Migration Data Portal Blog

Conference and AGM round-up

Professor Peter Lennie will be the network’s new Executive Director, commencing in August.

CUHK and  one of the University of Exeter launched a new HK$20m joint research centre to embark on large, impactful interdisciplinary collaborations to tackle emerging issues related to a changing environment and human health and well being.

Monday 9 – Thursday 12 July 2018, Bristol Marriott Hotel

A unique book that captures the diverse experiences of first generation higher education students and explores ways universities might better serve them was launched on May 24 at the WUN AGM. 

Details of the Migration Data for Policy Summer School hosted by the University of Bristol and the IOM’s GMDAC

Op-ed from UWA VC Professor Dawn Freshwater on international engagement. 

Professor Mamokgethi Phakeng, currently the deputy vice-chancellor for research and internationalisation at the University of Cape Town (UCT), has been appointed by Council as the new vice-chancellor of the university with effect from 1 July 2018. 

The Worldwide Universities Network Global Policy Research Group (WUN GPRG) was launched (stage 1) at Renmin University of China (RUC) on 24 March 2018 during the RUC-WUN Think Tank Conference.

International Inflammation Network announces name change

WUN-Universities are high in the ranking with no less than eight members in the Top 60. This score illustrates the fact that WUN members are committed to an international outlook in their research and in increasing the mobility of their staff and students.   

GCRF-AFRICAP project has been launched in Pretoria.

WUN member, The University of Bergen (UiB), will be climate-neutral by 2030 thanks to a commitment to sustainability announced at the first SDG Conference Bergen held in February 2018.

University of Leeds one of the most international universities in the world.

A grant of 3 million US dollars from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation is enabling the University of Bergen professor Ole Frithjof Norheim and his research group to teach health priorities to Ethiopian students.

The fellowship will be offered for visits between 4 and 6 weeks per year and applicants may request funding for up to £2,500.

The program comprises lectures on various Brazilian-related topics, Portuguese classes and cultural activities. The Summer School will take place at UFMG main campus in Belo Horizonte and all activities will be conducted in English.

Closing date 28 February 2018   

Digital technologies enable the creation of personal connection with Holocaust survivors.

On 24th March 2018, the RUC-WUN Think Tank Summit will be held on the campus of Renmin University. Springtime Beijing and Renmin University of China welcome experts and colleagues from WUN partner universities.

Scholarship Opportunity for early career researchers to participate in WUN academic workshop Promoting Adaptability across the Life Course held in Perth on 21-22 May 2018.

CUHK and the Hong Kong Jockey Club Charities Trust join hands to co-host the Hong Kong chapter of the UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network.  

WUN New Year Newsletter available online

First stage of ongoing progress to develop a “one-stop-shop” for international data

The Worldwide Universities Network (WUN) is pleased to announce the results of the 2017 round of the annual Research Development Fund, marking a direct investment in international, interdisciplinary research collaboration among WUN member universities of over £130,000.

WUN welcomes UCD, one of Europe’s leading research-intensive universities, currently ranked within the top 1% of institutions world-wide and home to over 33.000 students drawn from over 120 countries.

Director of the British Antarctic Survey, Professor Dame Jane Francis, has been announced as the new Chancellor of the University of Leeds.

A team from the Faculty of Medicine at CUHK has developed a Chinese medicine MOOC in English and Asia’s first Chinese medicine clinical evidence online portal which gathers studies from around the world.

CUHK announces the launch of the world’s first Child Heritage Chinese Language Corpus and the establishment of the University of Cambridge–CUHK Joint Laboratory for Bilingualism.

WUN researcher to address International Forum on Migration Data Statistics in Paris

WUN member The University of Bergen is organising a major conference on the role of Norwegian universities in relation to the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDG).

The CUHK-DGIST-ETH Zurich Joint Research Laboratory on Innovative Nanotechnology for Medicine and Healthcare was recently formed to promote the R&D of innovative technologies for the diagnosis and treatment of gastrointestinal and cardiovascular diseases.

WUN members Maastricht and York have agreed a major partnership in which they will establish joint research projects, teaching collaborations, knowledge exchange, student exchanges and sharing best practice among their staff. 

The UNESCO Institute of Statistics 

Major findings WUN Responding to Climate Change research group published in science journal Atmospheric Environment.

The next WUN Conference & AGM will be held in Perth, Australia from 20 to 25 May 2018. 

Helping adolescents and the people who work with them adapt positively to adversity is the aim of this ambitious collaboration between researchers in South Africa, the UK & China.

How life-course research can help more of us stay healthy as we age

Early Career Researcher travel grant opportunity to attend the International Inflammation Network (inFLAME) annual meeting in Canmore, Canada, 4-6 April 2018

Bristol to host major international workshop on livestock and SDGs

Professor Jill Walker Rettberg studies how humans use technology and what it means to us as a culture.

WUN welcomes its 22nd member, UFMG, one of the leading institutions of higher education in Brazil. 

WUN Project the DREAMS Network organised second workshop. 

WUN expands its global network to Latin America. 

Prof. Rocky S. Tuan, an eminent biomedical scientist from the University of Pittsburgh, will become the eighth Vice-Chancellor of CUHK effective 1 January 2018, succeeding Prof. Joseph Sung.

Two research projects led by the University of Leeds have been awarded £16million to build resilience in African businesses and communities. 

The Research Development Fund 2017 Round is open.

There’s increasing recognition within science, engineering and medicine that arts and humanities involvement in development projects is essential,

The Europe University Ranking 2017 by Times Higher Education.

CUHK has been selected to play host to the next Association of Commonwealth Universities Summer School on 1-9 July 2018.

The World Universities Network Global Africa Group launched its inaugural Strategic Research Workshop, hosted by the University of Ghana, in July 2017.

The WUN Symposium cum Research Summit on Impacts of Grain Legume Research and Development in Developing Countries held at CUHK on 8-17 June 2017 brought together over 100 participants from six continents to exchange knowledge and ideas on the development of legumes research.

Eight countries across Sub-Saharan Africa are set to take part in the world’s largest ever radio astronomy initiative – and the University of Leeds is spearheading a project aimed at ensuring they can make the most of this opportunity.

This year’s AGM provided a key opportunity for all stakeholders to form a fit-for-purpose strategic plan to carry WUN into the next decade.

CUHK and the University of Sydney established a joint laboratory to share the best of information technology, data analysis, and clinical research for the advancement of evidence-based integrative medicine.  

A statement from the Senior Leadership Group of the University of Cape Town.

CUHK and the University of Southampton formed a joint laboratory to conduct high impact research in the areas of stem cells, developmental biology and regenerative medicine.

Professor Dr Martin Paul reflects on the consequences of Brexit for higher education.

Developing countries struggling to cope with huge volumes of human waste may finally get some relief – and a new business opportunity.

The Chinese University of Hong Kong has been awarded some HK$8m from the Hong Kong University Grants Committee to lead the AoE Centre for Genomic Studies on Plant-Environment Interaction for Sustainable Agriculture and Food Security from 2017 to 2025. The new AoE Centre will develop new plant and agricultural technology with a view to striking a better balance between sustainable agriculture and food security. 

Sir Keith Burnett reflects on what he learned about international students while in India with the UK prime minister.

Research in Focus: in-FLAME

WUN supported research group has introduced novel Glucose-Responsive Hydrogels for Glucose Detection. 

The Institute of Future Cities at CUHK has developed the first platform in Hong Kong for integrating and analysing urban big data in an effort to help Hong Kong to become a smart city in the areas of personalized health monitoring, urban planning, air quality, and social care.

WUN announces the results of the 2016 Research Development Fund round.

WUN is delighted to announce that the University of Nairobi (UoN) has joined the Worldwide Universities Network. We welcome Vice Chancellor Professor Peter Mbithi and his colleagues to the WUN Board, research teams and programs. The Worldwide Universities Network looks forward to a valuable and productive partnership.

International symposium involving MDGT group to be held in Bristol in March 2017.

We are delighted to announce that National Cheng Kung University (NCKU) has joined the Worldwide Universities Network. 

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“It has been very difficult to get these [results] published, because the concept of adolescent boys, having impact on their offspring born years later is new and editors could not believe our findings. I think that the WUN can inspire further research to support our findings and convey the new concepts to public health policy makers…”

Migration governance continues to fail in several key areas such as labour rights, employment opportunities and social protection.

On 12 November 2016 

CUHK engineers have invented the most efficient asymmetric supercapacitors and the flow batteries with the highest volumetric capacity reported to date.

Congratulations to the WUN international team that has achieved this highly competitive support. 

CUHK was ranked the most innovative university in Hong Kong and 21^st in the Asia-Pacific region by the latest “Reuters Top 75: Asia’s Most Innovative Universities”.

We are delighted to announce that Renmin University has joined the Worldwide Universities Network. 

The Climate- Resilient Open Partnership for Food Security project (CROP-FS) published in Nature magazine. 

Multi-disciplinary team from the Worldwide Universities Network (WUN) publishes in Nature Plants.

CUHK has conducted the world’s largest study that examines the prevalence and progression of non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) in diabetic patients, in order to determine whether screening should be recommended.

The Institute of Future Cities at CUHK has conducted a comprehensive research on low-carbon transport practices and policies with the objective of formulating a strategy for Hong Kong’s future low-carbon transport system initiatives.

Professor Dr Martin Paul reflects on the consequences of Brexit for higher education.

Prof. Joseph J.Y. Sung, Vice-Chancellor and President of CUHK, recently took the helm of the Worldwide Universities Network (WUN) as Chair of its Partnership Board, a role elected from among the presidents of member universities. 

Higher education and research are no longer privileged pursuits pursued by high priests in isolated ivory towers. That history and stereotype, itself only partly true, has given way to the increasing catalysis of change. The change is fuelled by rapid development and competition, and by a concert of factors and global dynamics affecting the international research universities that are the subject of this discussion.

CUHK forms tri-continental partnership with the University of Toronto and Utrecht University for innovative solutions on urban issues

Researchers have used ‘network theory’ for the first time to visually depict the movement of dinosaurs around the world during the Mesozoic Era – including a curious exodus from Europe. The research, led by the University of Leeds and published in the Journal of Biogeography, also reaffirms previous studies that have found that dinosaurs continued to migrate to all parts of the world after the ‘supercontinent’ Pangaea split into land masses that are separated by oceans.

Large animals play a key role in mitigating climate change in tropical forests by spreading the seeds of large trees that have a high capacity to store carbon, new research has found. The research, co-led by the University of Leeds and published in the journal Nature Communications, sheds important new light on the role seed dispersal by animals plays in mitigating climate change, and how this role can vary in tropical forests across the world.

On 7 April, WUN Presidents, as well as distinguished representatives from the European Parliament, European Commission, European Research Council and national embassies, convened in Brussels for the sixth annual WUN Presidents Forum. Titled ‘Open Doors: European Opportunities in Research & Education,’ the Forum took place alongside the WUN Conference and AGM 2016.

From 2-7 April, close to 400 academics and university leaders from around the world participated in the WUN Conference & AGM 2016, hosted by Maastricht University.

A top-class conference, one might say: four hundred academics from all corners of the world, spending a week debating subjects of interest for the whole world. Migration of course, but also health care, climate change and emerging economies.

Maastricht University (UM) has climbed to the fourth place in the Times Higher Education (THE) 150 Under 50 ranking for best young universities in the world. After maintaining the sixth place since 2013 in the former THE 100 under 50, this fourth place can be considered as a compliment and congratulations in Maastricht Universities 40th anniversary year. The list has been published at the Young Universities Summit in Barcelona on April 6th.

On 7 April, WUN Presidents, as well as distinguished representatives from the European Parliament, European Commission and European Research Council, will convene in Brussels for the sixth annual Presidents Forum.

Scientists from the University of Leeds have solved a 25-year-old question about how a family of proteins allow bacteria to resist the effects of certain antibiotics. Proteins of the ABC-F protein family are a major source of antibiotic resistance in ‘superbugs’ such as Staphylococcus aureus, a group of bacteria that includes MRSA. The findings, published in the American Society for Microbiology journal mBio, provide the first direct evidence of how this family of proteins ‘protect’ the bacterial ribosome, the protein makers in cells, from being blocked by antibiotics.

On 4 April, # international researchers came together at the second WUN China FDI Workshop to examine the progress of President Xi Jinping’s Belt and Road Initiative, which is designed to build knowledge and innovation partnerships and accelerate business development. 

On 2-7 April, close to 400 academics and university leaders from around the world will descend on Maastricht for the WUN Conference & AGM 2016, hosted by Maastricht University.

On 2 April, the Worldwide Universities Network (WUN) and the Global Migration Data Analysis Centre in Berlin of the International Organization for Migration (IOM GMDAC) signed a collaboration agreement at the second WUN Migration Conference in Maastricht.

Environmental health science researcher Richard Peltier at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, with others around the world, is launching a series of webinars and events for a Do-It-Yourself, citizen science campaign called “Air Sensors Everywhere.” It aims to bring small air pollution sensors to the developed and developing world “to empower people everywhere to use low-cost pollution sensors to reduce pollution-linked disease.”

Prof. Hon-Ming Lam, Director of the Centre for Soybean Research of the Partner State Key Laboratory of Agrobiotechnology at The Chinese University of Hong Kong, and his team have uncovered the structure and functions of the Rice YchF-type G Protein for the first time. The new findings help improve plants’ defense response and stress tolerance, and maintain a higher agricultural productivity under adverse conditions.