AXA Research Fund. A short presentation. February 2013

Transcription

1 AXA Research Fund A short presentation February 2013

2 Through research, protection Protecting its clients and the community from risks is at the core of AXA s purpose Researching today will help better protecting tomorrow The AXA Research Fund will boost scientific progress and discoveries that contribute to understand and prevent environmental, life and societal risks. 2

3 Our Vision A wager on highly creative research Support scientific excellence Select only projects of the highest academic quality through robust and transparent procedures Provide researchers with the means to do their work - on a long term basis - in total liberty Boost true scientific innovation Bet on up and coming research talents as the best source of scientific innovation Foster daring and risky transdisciplinary projects Remain open and flexible Encourage applications coming from any discipline as long as they are related to the AXA RF research fields Remain open to out-of-the-box researchers in a position to make unpredictable scientific discoveries 3

4 Which fields do we support? Identifying Mitigation/Prevention Solutions One global objective: foster the understanding of major risks in 3 main fields Understanding Causes and Underlying Phenomena Environmental risks Climate Change Natural Hazards Human driven Environmental Changes Life risks Aging and Long-term Care Biomedical Risks Addictions and Risky Behaviors Socio-economic risks Geopolitical Risks Macroeconomic Risks Behaviors Towards Risks Large Corporate Risks Assessing the Social and/or Economic Impact Identifying the Mecanisms at stake 4 Measuring and Modeling the Risk

5 Progressively completing the knowledge puzzle: The Example of longevity MATTHEW TYE Ph.D. Increasing Longevity in Vietnam: Strategies for Long- Term Care - the Intergenerational Contract University of Oxford Identifying mitigation/ Prevention solutions Understanding the causes underlying phenomena GUIDO KROEMER Principal Investigator of the AXA project Promises of autophagy Gustave Roussy Institute, France ALEJANDRO DEL VALLE SUAREZ Ph.D Essays on Welfare and Social Protection, The Impact of Universal Health Insurance on Welfare: Evidence from Mexico s Seguro Popular 5 Paris School of Economics Assessing the social and economic impact Measuring and modeling the risk CAROL JAGGER Chairholder AXA Newcastle Chair on Longevity and Heakthy Active Life University of Newcastle, UK Identifying the mechanisms at stake TADDEI/KIRKWOOD/PA TRIDGE/VAUPPEL Chair A systems approach to individual differences in longevity Université Paris Descartes

6 Why is it important to support these fields now? To understand reality and the future of risks, we need to: Promote reason against historical consensus: the past will not explain the future anymore, even with some parameter adjustments > Scientists role is to challenge and build new models Take scientific progress and unsolved questions in the public debate: build a social consensus to implement scientific progress in the public debate > For Scientists to make and share progress, we have to be supportive and attentive. Environmental risks Model the influence of human activity on climate change Life risks Prevent new threats on human life notably due to population ageing Socio-economic risks Accessible data: from rarity to plenty 6

7 What Science Says About Risks 7 Sponsor Review - May 21, 2010 Risk in 10 Years of Scientific Littérature ISC for AXA Research Fund, November 2012

8 Funding initiatives Attracting Researchers towards risk research Endowed Chairs - Strengthening global excellencebased academia Encouraging the dissemination of research outcomes to a nonacademic public Outlooks - Developing Long-Term comprehensive relationships with top tier institutions worldwide Awards - TO BE ANNOUNCED IN MARCH TO BE ANNOUNCED IN MARCH 2013 Joint Research Initiatives Research Fellowships (Post-Docs fellowhips) - Ensuring diversity of research areas/disciplines - TO BE ANNOUNCED IN MARCH Linking with the upcoming generation of researchers who explore new approaches of risk and will be the experts in the public debate on risks

9 9 How do we select junior researchers?

10 Key figures Created in January M committed 3430 applications received since Jan projects funded or to be funded/ 436 projects selected 49 nationalities of researchers, working in 27 countries A dynamic research community: 1000 active referees working in 37 countries, 2000 people gathered around 20 major events 10

11 Key figures at a glance as of January 1st, 2013 Budget 99M* committed spread as follows: 40% Projects funded Transversal projects Socio-economic risks Environmental risks Life risks 49 nationalities of researchers granted in 27 countries 367 projects granted (186 institutions) spread as follows: 42% 7% 29% 24% 3% 21% 34% Transversal projects Socio-economic risks Environmental risks Life risks Applications applications received since March 2008 > with a global selection rate of 13% 942 institutions registered from 60 countries 11% 2% 22% 6,9% 0,5% 6% A dynamic research community active referees working from 37 countries AXA Research Fund events: 5 Talent Days 3 Pop Days 21% 17% 13% France UK + Ireland Northern Europe Southern Europe and Middle East Latin America North America Asia-Pac Africa 11 official opening ceremonies for the AXA chairs or projects *operations included 11

12 Grantees to date Amounts allocated per country of host institution 0.1% 1% Post-Doc 3 Ph.D. 4 6% Chair 1 Project 2 Post-Doc 8 1% Project 1 Ph.D. 4 15% Chair 3 Project 9 Post-Doc 37 Ph.D % 1% Project 2 2% Project 2 Post-Doc 3 Ph.D % GLOBAL FIGURES TO DATE: 21 Chairs 39 Projects 174 PostDoc 131 Ph.D > 367 projects funded > In 27 countries 2% Chair 1 Post-Doc 3 4% Chair 1 Project 1 1% Chair 1 Ph.D 1 0.3% Post-Doc 2 Asia Pacific 12 45% Chair 9 Project 15 Post-Doc 64 Ph.D % Post-Doc 3 Ph.D. 2 6% Chair 2 Project 3 Post-Doc 2 Ph.D. 3 4% Chair 2 Project 1 Post-Doc 5 Ph.D. 1 7% Chair 1 Project 3 1 Ph.D % 0.1% 0.1% 0.5% Post-Doc 5 0.1% 0.1% Middle East Africa 0.5% Post-Doc 3 Ph.D. 2 2% 4 Ph.D % Projet 1 Post-Doc 2 North America Latin America

13 Building a Research Community The AXA Research Fund wants to give more than money. That s why, three times a year, a «Talent Days» or a «Pop Day» event is organized, gathering 20 AXA fellows working in similar research field at AXA Headquarters in Paris. Talent Days aim at boosting the young researchers' career and help them to network with peers, share knowledge and best practice, notably during a plenary session by a world class academic : highly appreciated by attendees as is a privileged opportunity to learn from a leading scientist in the field. During Pop Days, the grantees are helped to better popularize their research in order to play a role in the public debate. 13

14 Focus on a Chair: AXA Newcastle University Chair on Longevity and healthy active Life hold by Carol JAGGER, Professor of Epidemiology and based in the multidisciplinary Institute for Ageing and Health (IAH) in Newcastle. Three interlinked major research themes will be explored: Understanding variations in Healthy Active Life Expectancy; Disability and functioning in later life; Ageing population projections for policy. The objective of this Chair is to advance The findings will be used in a unique knowledge on healthy longevity and the projection model to ascertain future trends impacts of increasing life expectancy for in disability and associated long term-care society in the 21st century. It will study needs. how and why healthy longevity varies between and within countries and between individuals. 14

15 Focus on a Chair AXA University of Bristol The recent, and though small, eruption of Eyafjallajokull in Iceland dramatically highlighted the vulnerability of modern society to volcanic events. Key aspects of the eruption that have exacerbated its impact include effects that were singularly concentrated on critical transportation infrastructure, and problems in assessing the actual hazard, in part because of fundamental gaps in scientific knowledge about the physical properties of the volcanic plume. Prof. Kathy Cashman has been studying volcanoes for 30 years and teached in the most prestigious volcanology centers new ways to study them such as what she call the «fudge factor» or how melting chocolate observation can help to foresee how the lava flows! To fill in these knowledge gaps and meet societal demands for realtime assessment of volcanic hazards, AXA Research Fund funded her with 600k for a 3 years Chair on Volcanology in the internationally renowned University of Bristol. This will allow Pr. Cashman to investigate a novel approach considering that the physical characteristics of a volcanic ash cloud could be calculated as a response function to an evolving set of internal and extensive parameters such as magma composition, temperature and pressure or magma ascent path, regional stress field, and icecap melting. 15

16 Focus on a Project AXA Exeter: European windstorms in a Changing Climate The objective of the project is to assess the potential evolution in European windstorm events in a changing climate focusing to aspects directly relevant to insured losses over Europe. This project addresses windstorms making landfall over Europe from a large scale perspective, the occurrence of extreme wind speeds and precipitation and the question of a clustering of extremes. The statistical modelling will allow to properly quantify the effect of clustering and multi-peril dependency on estimates of stormrelated risk and how it might change in the future. To support his research on European Windstorms, AXA Research Fund funded Prof David Stephenson with 275k for a 3 years Project at the University of Exeter (UK) on Storm Tracks, Clustering and Multi-peril Extremes. The set-up of a European windstorm research network is a major focus of the project. The excellent international reach of the project is driven by the collaboration with the Hadley Centre of the UK Met Office, contribution of the Prof Stephenson both in several international committees and expert teams and links with the ENSEMBLES project. 16

17 17

18 18 Sponsor Review - May 21, 2010