Research Councils adopt new reporting platform

The seven UK Research Councils have announced they are to begin using a uniform digital platform for collecting outputs from research they support. ResearchFish will allow the funding bodies – who fund £4.5bn of research every year – to track research productivity across funding grants and any research can be retrospectively attributed to those grants. This means the impact of past funding can be seen comprehensively for the first time. The platform connects researchers with the funding bodies and universities that support them. Funding bodies will be able to capture the output from specific research grants, allowing them to see the value of their funding both now and well beyond the lifetime of the grant. The system provided a simple, consistent and accurate report of research outputs and enables a single point of data entry for researchers who need to communicate with multiple funders. “This is a fantastic step forward for harmonising how research outputs are reported in the UK,” said ResearchFish Director, Frances Buck. “We are delighted that all of the Research Councils will now be using Research Fish to track their researcher outputs and funding. The potential this opens up for cross sector advances and analysis of research funding is huge.” ResearchFish has already been successfully used by the Science & Technology Facilities Council and the Medical Research Council, and will now be joined by the remaining five Councils: The Arts and Humanities Research Council; Biotechnology & Biological Sciences Research Council; Engineering & Physical Sciences Research Council; Economic & Social Research Council; and the Natural Environment Research Council. It also supports 70 other research funding bodies including Cancer Research UK, the British Heart Foundation and Medicins Sans Fronteires.