Recently in Innovation Category

Research and development is on the up in UK industry, well, it certainly was in 2007 according to data released last week by the Department for Innovation Universities and Skills.  The R&D scoreboard identifies the top spenders on R&D and shows that the total R&D spend in top 850 companies rose by about 7% in 2007/8.  

Of course, 2007 is a foreign country, economically speaking, and the list of top spenders is different there: in addition to the expected names, the pharmaceutical and aerospace companies, also included are a couple of large investment banks. It is a fairly safe bet that when the 2008 figures are reported early next year there will be some changes, but hopefully not too many: research and development is the engine of science-based companies - no R&D, then no new technologies, and no new products.

The Institute responded to the release of the scoreboard with a welcoming press release which made a point about the way data is collected: the scoreboard charts the performance of the largest UK R&D spenders, rather than the total UK spend. While it is true that the big companies are extremely important, smaller science-based businesses also conduct extensive R&D, and it is just as critical, if not more so, for a small company to be on the cutting edge of product innovation and scientific research. The Institute's own R&D calculations which use slightly different government data (the differences between the analyses are somewhat arcane, and each method has its merits, but the Institute's analysis also includes data from smaller business R&D in addition to the big spenders) show an overall downward trend in R&D spending in high-technology businesses, and that it has been going on for a few years now.

This may seem unimportant against the success of the big spenders, but small businesses are crucial parts of the engine of innovation in the UK and are especially important in moving research from physics laboratories to the marketplace, and they need to be supported. And, or course, while they are small businesses now, they just might be the large businesses of the future.

"I would like to thank the catering staff who ensured that everybody was served with food and politeness."

This was one of the more poetic comments received from a guest who attended the IOP's recent Open Evening late last year for which a colleague of mine recently collated the feedback.  It was a fine event, with the CEO of the Institute presenting an overview of the services we offer to members and Dr Paul Stevenson giving a very well received talk on the applications of radioactive materials.

My long forgotten education tells me that the comment is an example of zeugma, or syllepsis, to be precise (as one must be in these areas) - one verb carrying two clauses with different meanings and senses. I don't know whether the person who made the comment knew quite how clever and knowledgeable they were being, maybe they did, but I choose to believe that they didn't and instead just said what came naturally to convey their sentiments.

Grammar is much like physics in this way: you use it without really thinking about it. If you throw a ball to someone, you aren't consciously calculating the trajectories, distances and forces required for it to reach its destination; you just throw it where you want to throw it.  And the same is true of almost everything you do; the complexity of the physics is not considered - it is taken as read.

The same principle applies to physics in industry.  Lots of companies employ physics graduates, many with day jobs actually doing physics research or experiments, but they will be referred to as engineers, or analysts, or technicians, and work in R&D, or electronics, or instrumentation departments.  Physics and physicists are not words that are readily used in industry, but of course they should be.

To help make it happen, the IOP works to raise the profile of physics, and has a standing campaign called Physicists.Think. which aims to emphasise the role of physics knowledge, and the value of physics training. If employers specifically advertise for physics graduates, then they will get the workers they need. But, beyond that, it is just possible that by highlighting the jobs that physics graduates already hold, we may also end up with more people choosing to study physics, and so more graduates to employ - and that benefits everybody.  It could be that to get what you want, all you have to do is ask.  It works the same way with our highly recommended catering team.