Scholarships Information: Big Data Ecosystems and Port Resilience

Closing Date Monday, 1st June 2015
Department Business School – ESRC DTC PhD with the UK Department for Transport (Maritime Security and Resilience)

Applications are invited for a 4 year ESRC DTC PhD studentship at Nottingham University Business School in collaboration with the Department for Transport. A full-time, yearly tax free stipend at current RCUK rates (£14,057 for 2015/16, updated each year) will be paid, plus tuition fees (£4,060 for 2015/16) and additional research funds. The studentship will commence on 1 October 2015 and is open to Home/EU candidates, subject to eligibility requirements.

The topic of focus is Big Data Ecosystems and Port Resilience:

Port resilience seeks to make ports more able to stand up to crises – such as in response to a severe tidal surge (e.g. the one experienced on 5 December 2013), maritime accidents, and transport network failures (Grainger, A and Achuthan, K, “Port Resilience: a primer”, 2014: Nottingham eprints, http://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/2279/).
Port resilience planning seeks to mitigate the effects of unforcastable crises and their duration. This PhD studentship will address this need by critically examining how the sector, with the encouragement of policy makers, can share information to improve upon port resilience planning.
Necessary data to plan ahead and mitigate the impact of any crisis and aid recovery (i.e. to increase resilience) includes: operational shipping data, environmental and geographical data, metrological data, human resource data, manufacturing data, capacity and utilisation data, and data about assets and equipment. Much of this data is currently not readily available for resilience planning purposes; leaving those concerned with ensuring that ports are operational, poorly equipped.

The studentship will:

Identify the stakeholder’s respective requirements for data and information relevant to port resilience planning;
Develop a framework that defines obstacles to information sharing, especially with regard to confidentiality and privacy issues; and
Explore with the sector and UK policy makers how such obstacles can be overcome.

The project will use an Action Research approach and seek to foster greater information sharing within the sector and thus help mitigate the impact of a major disruptive event to the UK.
The studentship will require both qualitative and quantitative research skills, and will require the study and application of complex social theories.

Applying for the Studentships

Applicants should:

Have a 2.1 or higher Honours or Master’s degree in a relevant discipline
An interest in international trade, transport, supply chains, ports and logistics
An interest in how data is starting to be used to improve businesses and other operations.

The successful applicant will be based with Doctoral Researchers at Nottingham University Business School. Depending on the candidates training requirements the DTC pathway will either be the 1+3 Business and Management route or the 4 year Digital Society route. The candidate will be expected to visit research sites on a regular basis, and so should be able to travel freely across the UK and beyond. The studentship is open to Home/EU candidates only (due to funding restrictions) and will commence on 1 October 2015.

To apply for this studentship, applicants should initially provide the following:

A full CV;
A personal statement (2 sides of A4 maximum, size 10 font minimum) clearly indicating why you want to undertake this study, what you have to offer and any other information that you think we should know;
An example of academic writing;
Supporting information (e.g. academic transcripts, research skills, computing skills and experience, English Language proficiency, etc.) in order to verify that you meet the entry requirements for our PhD programme: https://www.nottingham.ac.uk/business/programmes/phd/apply.aspx
The names, postal and email address of two referees, one of which must be an academic who knows your work.

Application Process (Stage One)

Applications should be sent to: Andrea Tomlinson, Nottingham University Business School, Jubilee Campus, Nottingham, NG8 1BB, UK, or by email to Andrea.Tomlinson@nottingham.ac.uk. Please quote ref: AG-ESRC; closing date: 23.59pm on Monday 1 June 2015. Applications submitted after this time will not be considered.

Short-listed candidates at Stage One of the application process will be invited to attend an interview, which will be held in Nottingham on 15 June 2015.

Application Process (Stage Two)

The successful candidate at Stage One will then be required to complete a further ESRC DTC application form, in conjunction with the Supervisors by Friday 10 July 2015. The final ESRC DTC application will then be submitted to the ESRC DTC Panel by Friday 17July 2015 and the candidate will be notified of the final outcome following the ESRC DTC Panel on or soon after Friday 24 July 2015.

For further information:

E-mail: