Now it has already been 6 months since I took over as head of department at K2. Time has flown by and Christmas is already next week! I’m almost done with my performance appraisals (all associate professors and professors with 50%-100% position), only a few remain. It has been very useful to get to know the people who make up our academic backbone better, and I have received a lot of good input. Here again a reminder to the research group leaders to ensure that all our employees have the opportunity for an employee interview, and at the same time those who have not yet been offered can request it as well.

As we know, the economy is very tough, and we must continue to reduce our expenses and at the same time increase revenues in 2025. This is what we are working on! Again, an invitation to actively use our core facilities (https://www.uib.no/klin2/63499/kjernefasiliteter), use buy-out of your own time or a technician in applications and consider opportunities to offer continuing and further education (EVU; https://www.uib.no/utdanning/evu).

Despite all the challenges, 2024 has been a successful year for K2 with many awards from external financiers as well as many awards to researchers and teachers associated with K2 (including “Søren Falch and Øienlæge Sigurd Falch’s Foundation’s Junior Prize for Young Researchers” to Marc Vaudel and “Søren Falch and Øienlæge Sigurd Falch’s Award for Outstanding Leadership in Medical Research” to Eva Gerdts, to name a few). Thank you so much for your efforts, everyone!

I wish you all a peaceful and Merry Christmas!

Silke

The research conducted by PhD candidates constitutes an important part of UiB’s overall research efforts. In 2023, PhD candidates were the sole or co-authors on 30 percent of UiB’s publications. Of the 215 completed PhDs at UiB in 2023, the Faculty of Medicine accounted for 80. Of these, 25 were completed at K2, 28 at IGS, and 17 at K1, while IBM and IKO each had 5. For 2024, a total of 26 PhD candidates will receive their doctorates at K2. This is a great.

In recent years, there has been a decline in the number of joint announcements of PhD positions at the faculty, with only two such positions advertised in the fall of 2024, with nearly 50 applicants. Unfortunately, there will be no room for announcing PhD positions at all in the spring of 2025. The reason for this is increasingly constrained budgets, the use of PhD positions as a co-payment in larger applications and rewards for grants, as well as delays in PhD completion, making the budgets more uncertain for the faculty.

In terms of completion, K2 is fairly stable. About 70% of all started PhDs have defended their dissertations within 6 years. Staff appraisals should be actively used to uncover and remedy delaying factors where possible.

Furthermore, all postdocs who wish to continue an academic career are encouraged to apply for the Momentum program, for which MedFak has 4 spots, with an application deadline of March 21.

The Christmas tree shows the research areas of permanent scientific staff at K2. If you believe your area is not included, please send up to 10 keywords to our research advisor Susanna Pakkasmaa. This will help her send targeted information about relevant announcements.
Merry Christmas!

Kurt

Dear everyone,

We are approaching Christmas, and many groups have slowly started with Christmas celebrations. Remember that the whole of K2 is invited to a joint little Christmas gathering with mulled wine and gingerbread cookies on December 13th at 11:30, 5th floor lab building.

True to tradition, we have invited our professors emeritus/emerita to a Christmas lunch. It was very nice to have many of the older generation visit us, and our research leader Kurt Hanevik gave an exciting presentation about his research (even though diarrhea maybe wasn’t the most appropriate topic to hear about during lunch).

On the same day, we celebrated together with the faculty that Marc Vaudel received an ERC Consolidator Grant. This is really big, congratulations again!

And then we learned that Oleksii Nikolaienko from the Mohn Cancer Research Laboratory has received FRIPRO funding from the Research Council of Norway! Congratulations! We can happily continue in this way 😊 

Otherwise, many of us were involved in the implementation of OSKE12 on Thursday 5 December – thank you very much to everyone who participated! Without all of you, it would not have been possible to carry out such a resource-intensive exam that is highly appreciated by the students! A special thanks to Ingvil that had her last working day at K2 today. She is starting new adventures in Sjøforsvaret.

Finally, I would just like to mention that the Faculty has announced education awards and requests that nominations for the education awards come from an environment, not from individuals. The department is happy to collect proposals here. The internal deadline is set for 1 February 2025.

The Faculty has also announced research prizes for the best publication, best doctoral degree, researcher/research group, dissemination and innovation. Here it is the departments that can nominate 1 candidate in each category (except PhD work, then we can nominate 2 candidates). Proposals can be submitted here. Our internal deadline is set for February 1, 2025.

Have a great weekend!

Silke

Dear all,

These days, we have many happy recipients of Western Norway Regional Health Authority research funding in the form of grants, multi-year project funding and strategic initiatives. There is an incredible amount of exciting clinically relevant research that is done by great K2ers in collaboration with the hospitals here in Western Norway. Congratulations!

At the Western Norway Regional Health Authority Education Conference in Stavanger, representatives from the educational institutions and hospitals in Western Norway are focusing on how we can have a sustainable health service in our elongated country in the future with a good balance between broad knowledge and cutting-edge expertise. It is a clear yes to both – with a need to ensure that we are all generalists in addition to what we are extra good at, while at the same time interdisciplinary collaboration must be increased. Good professionally updated guidelines that are easy to find and holistic thinking. – We all make mistakes. Sharing experiences about mistakes reduces the risk of the same mistakes happening again and again by continuously increasing competence and improving routines.

The education award went to solid teachers in obstetrics who, through VR glasses and self-developed software, allow students to enter the female body and take the fetus’s perspective. Learning with “aha” experiences and in-depth understanding. Collaboration across educational institutions and hospitals will enable more people to learn more and ensure that our loved ones are well taken care of when there is a need for health care.

Have a nice weekend!

Camilla

Dear everyone,

I want to use today’s editorial to brag a little about all of you at K2 and highlight what we are good at. I also would like to acknowledge the incredible effort and dedication you all show!

K2 is the department with the highest BOA activity at the faculty, and just last week we celebrated the allocation of funds for 2 new projects from the Norwegian Cancer Society to K2 (Oleksii Nikolaienko and Bjørn Tore Gjertsen). We have a lot of talented students, PhD candidates, postdocs and researchers who show a fantastic effort. Through the technician mapping that is underway, I also see how many dedicated technicians we have who keep the wheels turning and ensure that we carry out and maintain the research (and partly also the teaching) at the level we do. With the help of our core facilities and the expertise of technicians associated with them, many master’s and doctoral degrees, publications and, not least, new research results have been produced with great benefit to patients. And speaking of the wheels that must keep turning: without our employees in the administration, we would not have been able to do it. There are so many invisible tasks that we get good help with.

When it comes to teaching, we have many enthusiastic teachers who have the student’s learning in focus. OSKE12 is just around the corner with contributions from many from K2, not least the administration, who make sure we make it happen!

Let’s continue to have a positive attitude and support each other, smile at each other and give a little extra praise every now and then. I am incredibly proud to be part of this fantastic institute.

Have a great weekend!

Silke

It’s time for something more pleasant than just talking about negative numbers and the difficult economic situation: Congratulations to Bjørn Tore Gjertsen on receiving the Helse Vest research award!

And now there are more opportunities to nominate someone you know for an award:

The Meltzer Fund has announced three different awards with a deadline of December 1st.

Meltzer’s Prize for Outstanding Research

The prize is awarded to a researcher or a research group that has distinguished itself through outstanding research. The prize winner must be nationally leading in their field and, if the field exists in other countries, also be well recognized by leading international academic communities. Researchers who are nominated must be permanently employed at UiB.

Meltzer’s Prize for Young Researchers

Up to two prizes can be awarded annually for outstanding scientific work carried out by young researchers. In awarding the prize, particular emphasis will be placed on the researcher’s independence and ability to innovate. Emphasis will also be placed on whether the relevant research contributions appear particularly outstanding or promising, assessed based on the researcher’s age, the nature of the research project, and the research traditions in the relevant field. Researchers who are nominated must be employed at the University of Bergen at the time of nomination. The prize winner must not be over 40 years old in the award year. Researchers who have had parental leave and/or been on sick leave for a period can have this time deducted from the age requirement (relevant documentation must be attached to the nomination).

Meltzer’s Prize for Outstanding Research Communication

The prize for outstanding research communication is awarded for particularly outstanding communication of research. Researchers who are nominated must be permanently employed at UiB. The proposer must justify the nomination based on the candidate’s contribution to the university fulfilling its task of spreading information about research and the importance of research for society.

And the chairman of the board of the Consul Søren Falch and ophthalmologist Sigurd Falch’s fund for medical science, Per Bakke, has requested proposals for the Falch Lecture 2025 with a deadline of December 8th. Here, generally recognized researchers at Nobel Prize level or very high international level will be invited to give a guest lecture and/or seminar at the Faculty of Medicine.

So don’t wait to submit your proposals!

Have a great weekend!

Silke

The harvest is great, but the workers few

As an employee at the University of Bergen and Haukeland University Hospital for almost 30 years, I have been able to take part in and witness a fantastic development of research and competence in our institutions. All colleagues who are employed in so-called dual positions are in many ways the hub of this collaboration and are key people in driving clinical research forward. Therefore, I would like to ask the question – can we build on and expand this strategy?

Both HUS and UiB have financial challenges that require restructuring. At the same time, the number of medical students will be greatly increased and clinical teaching will be spread to many hospitals in the region. Stavanger University Hospital has already established a full clinical study for medical students, and Haugesund and Førde will eventually follow suit. This will require a lot of teaching staff of people with formal pedagogical competence who will also preferably conduct research at the top of the world and at the same time preferably bring in millions of competitive research funds

The autumn is great, but the workers are few, it is written somewhere – can we obtain more workers for this big task? Can more health personnel with formal research competence be linked to UiB without necessarily having a part-time position and thus be qualified to be main supervisors for PhD students? Can such an affiliation oblige to some teaching at “Vestland Medical School” according to a system similar to that of “Harvard Medical School”? In return for this, these doctors (or other professions) who want to conduct research will have access to the university’s systems and resources for pedagogical education.

I am convinced that both UiB, HUS and the individual medical researcher will benefit from such cooperation. The medical community in Bergen at large will also be better armed in the battle for scarce national resources.

HUS + UiB is true?

Have a good weekend when the time comes,

Eystein
Deputy director

I continue to nag a little about employee interviews. The responsibility for carrying them out is assigned to the research group leaders, and it is therefore important that all employees at K2 belong to a research group. Susanne is working on updating the overview of the research groups, so feel free to check with her if you do not know who your research group leader is. Remember that this year I will have an employee appraisal with all associate professors and professors in a 50% position or more, I will send out possible dates to those concerned during the next week.

In order to follow up on my desire for closer dialogue with the teaching group, research group and core facility leaders, it will be a little more often that we have joint meetings with the management group. The next time will be:

29 October: UGLE meeting with all Teaching Group Leaders (UGLE) and vice-UGLE

26 November: FORUM meeting with all research group and core facility leaders

Have a great weekend! Remember to set the clock on Sunday 😊

Silke

Dear everyone,

For those who do not know me, my name is Svein Skeie, and I am the Research Director at Stavanger University Hospital (SUS) and an Associate Professor at the Faculty of Medicine/K2. My professional background includes specialties in internal medicine, geriatrics, and endocrinology. I am pleased to be part of the leadership team at K2, and it is natural for me to write a leader’s note from time to time.

At SUS, we are now well underway with Vestlandslegen – both with students and positions. It is a significant challenge to implement the study plan in the hospital. We are also building a new hospital (new SUS), where most of the somatic inpatient activities will move in November 2025. This also needs to be prepared for UiB. In the new hospital, UiB has about 1000m² of its own space, providing a much better starting point than we previously had for practice students (2015 plan). Alongside building the education, research activities will also be developed. Research has not been the main focus so far, but with more employees in part-time positions, new opportunities arise, also for colleagues employed in Bergen. The research opportunities at SUS are good, and increased collaboration can provide new research opportunities for the subjects under K2. In 2023, SUS and UiB had a total of 163 co-publications, showing that there is already significant activity.

Perhaps you have colleagues at SUS with whom it would be natural to collaborate more? Maybe you want to collaborate but are unsure how to establish it? If you need help finding your way into SUS, please feel free to contact me.

Have an excellent weekend!

Svein

On September 20th, the Innovation Festival at the University of Bergen (UiB) was arranged for the first time. It brought together staff and students from all faculties, as well as representatives from companies and organizations that have made significant progress in innovation and establishment processes, or can contribute to such efforts (e.g. the Norwegian Industrial Property Office).

The program struck a good balance between inspiration and specific advice concerning the innovation process and support functions. Some important reminders surfaced, such as: protecting an invention does not necessarily mean applying for a patent. Depending on the product, idea and purpose, one can, for example, enter into a licensing agreement with a company that uses a method or protocol but keeps it secret, or register a trademark.

There were also reflections on the idea that, in our era of open access, one should not necessarily share ideas or inventions just for the sake of openness, but consider the values of one’ inventions and how they can be exploited. Once published, it is usually too late, so this needs to be considered early on.

Professor Daniela Elena Costea from the Department of Clinical Medicine gave an exciting presentation on targeted drug delivery using nanodiamonds. However, innovation can also be an integral part of dissemination. Researcher Irene Baug from the Department of Archaeology, History, Cultural Studies and Religion demonstrated how virtual reconstructions of medieval buildings can give a vivid impression of Bergen’s past. There should be ample opportunities for disseminating results from medical research in a similar manner.

The day concluded with the awarding of this year’s UiB Idea grants. Two of the student projects awarded with grants originate from K2: A new external defibrillator by Mads Malm Svenningsson (supervisor Vegard Tuseth) and Kasi – a case study app for medical students by Erlend Thue, Jesper Andreas Viste, Gard Andreas Svendal, Jonas Hodneland Sundfjord, and Trond August Flatås (supervisor Harald Gotten Wiker). Congratulations!

More detailed coverage of the event can be found here.

When the second Innovation Festival is hopefully held in 2025, I hope more K2 staff will take the time to participate.