Surrey to train scientists and engineers for Britain’s future

Friday 5 December 2008

The new centres at Surrey are worth nearly £12m and will train over 100 researchers at doctoral level. They are 2 of 17 industrial doctoral centres, announced nationally that will equip their doctoral research engineers with “state-of-the-art” research expertise and the necessary business skills to turn pioneering ideas into products and services, boosting their impact on the UK’s economy.

Professor Christopher Snowden, Vice Chancellor of the University of Surrey, said: “We are absolutely delighted, these new industrial doctoral training centres build on the University of Surrey’s excellent track record of postgraduate development, active knowledge exchange, innovation and collaboration with industry and its ability to provide a stimulating and transformative research environment for its researchers.”

Both of the new centres address clear areas of national need and provide an innovative approach, which transcends traditional discipline boundaries. One of the new centres in Sustainability for Engineering and Energy Systems is led by Dr Lucia Elghali from the Centre for Environmental Strategy and builds on the highly successful Engineering Doctorate in Environmental Technology which EPSRC has described as “an excellent EngD Centre that should act as an exemplar to others.” The new centre takes this excellent approach to the next level and offers a multi-disciplinary programme, bringing in research expertise from across the University to meet the growing challenges in increasing the sustainability of industrial practices in the UK, and its energy systems in particular.

The second of the new centres in Micro- and NanoMaterials and Technologies is led by Dr Julie Yeomans from the Surrey Materials Institute and offers solutions to academically challenging and industrially relevant processing-microstructure-property relationship problems, which are keystones of the discipline. This will be possible because research engineers within the new centre will interact with internationally leading academics and have access to a suite of state-of-the-art characterisation instrumentation, enabling them to obtain extensive hands on experience and translate their research back into the industrial environment.

Minister of State for Science and Innovation, Lord Drayson, announced the £250 million initiative which will create 44 training centres (17 industrial doctoral training centres and 27 doctoral training centres) across the UK and generate over 2000 PhD students. They will tackle some of the biggest problems currently facing Britain such as climate change, energy, our ageing population, and high-tech crime.

Lord Drayson said: “Britain faces many challenges in the 21st Century and needs scientists and engineers with the right skills to find answers to these challenges, build a strong economy and keep us globally competitive. EPSRC’s Centres for Doctoral Training will provide a new wave of engineers and scientists to do the job.”

He continued: “These new centres will help to develop clean renewable energy, fight high-tech crime, assist in reducing carbon emissions, and discover new healthcare solutions for an ageing population. This is an exciting, innovative approach to training young researchers and will help build a better future for Britain.”

EPSRC Centres for Doctoral Training are a bold new approach to training PhD students, creating communities of researchers working on current and future challenges. 17 of the new centres will be industrial training centres that will equip their students with the business skills they need to turn pioneering ideas into products and services, boosting their impact on the UK’s economy.

Professor Dave Delpy, chief executive of EPSRC, said: “People are the heart of our future strategy. We want to drive a modern economy and meet the challenges of tomorrow by investing in talented people and inspiring the next generation of scientists and engineers.”

He continued: “EPSRC Centres for Doctoral Training expand our existing training portfolio, focus on priority themes for the UK, emerging and multidisciplinary research, and greater collaboration with business.”

The initiative is widely supported by business and industry. Professor Jeremy Watson, global director of research at Arup, said: “Businesses like Arup need a good supply of highly-qualified scientists with the right skills to further innovation in the design of sustainable towns, cities and the wider environment. They need to understand how business works and also be able to turn their best ideas into a successful business proposition.”

This approach to training has been extensively piloted by EPSRC through a small number of thriving Engineering Doctorate Centres (2 of which are based at Surrey) and Doctoral Training Centres in Complexity Science, Systems Biology and at the Life Sciences Interface. This new investment builds on the success of these and will establish a strong group of centres which will rapidly establish a pre-eminent international reputation for doctoral training.

The multi-disciplinary centres bring together diverse areas of expertise to train engineers and scientists with the skills, knowledge and confidence to tackle today’s evolving issues. They also create new working cultures, build relationships between teams in universities and forge lasting links with industry.

Students in these centres will receive a formal programme of taught coursework to develop and enhance their technical interdisciplinary knowledge, and broaden their set of skills. Alongside this they will undertake a challenging and original research project at PhD level.

Media Enquiries

Peter La, Press Office at the University of Surrey, Tel: +44 (0)1483 689191, or Email mediarelations@surrey.ac.uk