British Neuroscience Association

Liverpool Neuroscience Group is proudly affiliated with the British Neuroscience Association.

The BNA is the largest UK organisation representing and promoting neuroscience and neuroscientists. The BNA hosts the biennial Festival of Neuroscience, amd recognises, promotes and supports neuroscientific excellence via a number of prize & bursary schemes. There are many benefits of membership, including free or discounted registration for events, discounted Article Processing Charges, the BNA bulletin and much more. All members of BNA are eligible for free membership of the Federation of European Neuroscience Societies (FENS), and have access to the worldwide neuroscience community via the local group network, FENS, SfN and IBRO.

The LNG is the registered local group for Liverpool, and our Local Group Representative is:

Susannah Walker
Reader in Behavioural Neuroscience,
Liverpool John Moores University.
Email: s.c.walker@ljmu.ac.uk

BNA Updates (01/2020)

Join The BNA: Become part of the UK’s largest and longest running neuroscience community. https://bna.org.uk/register
(Membership Flyer – please feel free to distribute.)

Students: Apply to be an editor for the BNA Bulletin: ‘Bright Brains’ section
Our ‘Bright Brains’ section requires a new editor. This can either be for an issue, a year, or a few years, depending on ability, time commitment etc. For now, we’d like to see how many of you might be interested in this role. As editor, you will be required to think about topics you’d like your team of writers to write about. You will then need to set deadlines and edit writing that comes in, before sending the finished ‘Bright Brains’ to our Bulletin editor for checking. The Bulletin comes out three times a year. If you are interested in applying for this role – even if it’s only for one issue –  do let us know. We’d need to see some examples of your own writing along with any other details about your experience in writing or editing, plus a short letter from a supervisor, lecturer or someone else who could recommend you for the role.  If you are interested or have any questions, please contact at Alex.Campbell@bna.org.uk.

 

BNA2021: submit your proposals and make the Festival your own – Deadline 1st March
In April 2021, in partnership with the UK Dementia Research Institute, we will be holding BNA2021 in Brighton. We are now calling for symposia and workshop proposals, with a submission deadline of 1st March 2020.

This is a fantastic opportunity to raise the profile of research at your institute to an increasingly international audience at what will be the largest neuroscience event of its kind across Europe in 2021.  What’s more, speakers receive complimentary passes for the full Festival.
Full information can be found here.

BNA bursaries for FENS 2020, deadline 6th April 2020
We are offering bursaries of up to £300 to support student and Early Career researcher members to attend the 2020 FENS Forum, being held in Glasgow UK.

To be eligible for a BNA bursary you must meet the following criteria:

  • the applicant must be a member of BNA at the time of application and, in addition, must either:
    • have been a member of the BNA for a continuous period of at least 12 months prior to the deadline (i.e. since 6th April 2019 or before).

                      or

  • have their application supported by a Full Member of the BNA who is either the applicant’s supervisor, Principle Investigator, lab head, or another senior staff member of the institution at which the applicant is also based.

See full criteria and application information here.

Help out at FENS 2020 and get free registration: BNA members get priority!
Undergrad and postgraduate BNA members currently have an exclusive opportunity to get free registration for FENS 2020! By committing to work for 3 X 6 hour sessions during the course of the Forum, student volunteers will get their registration fees waived.*

This exclusive offer for only BNA student members runs until 17:00 GMT on Monday 17th February.
From 18th February, applications will be open to all students, both members and non-members.

The absolute deadline to apply is 17:00 GMT, Friday 28th February.
full details can be found here.  If someone is interested but isn’t a member, they can join straight away!

*If you have already registered for the FENS Forum and you are subsequently appointed as a volunteer, your registration fee can be refunded.

Introductory courses, 10th July, registration open!
One of our (BNA’s) roles as Host Society is to organise Introductory Courses held on Friday 10 July 2020 (the day prior to the FENS Forum itself).
These courses are a superb opportunity for neuroscientists at any stage of their career to gain a solid grounding of a whole topic in the space of one day, useful for ECRs just starting out or more senior researchers looking to extend their research in new directions.  Each course, which is kindly sponsored by the Gatsby Charitable Foundation or the BNA:

FENS early bird registration deadline 18th Feb
A reminder that the early bird deadline for the FENS 2020 Forum is 18th February, and BNA members can save up to €140! (on FENS member early bird rate €310). forum2020.fens.org/registration/

YITP applications open, deadline 14th Feb
Thank you to all of the LGRs who offered to host student in their labs as part of the Young Investigator Training Program (YITP) project. Applications are now open and full details can be found here. Please do circulate this where you see fit.

Brain Awareness Week, 9-14 March 2020
Our Outreach Ambassadors, Elena and Lydia, are busy compiling an online calendar of activities for Brain Awareness Week, this has proved very popular in previous years, (see here for the 2019 calendar).  In preparation for this we could be very grateful if you could send details of any planned BAW activities to Lydia Bown (lydia@bna.org.uk).