The ATI is an interdisciplinary research institute addressing grand challenges in renewable energy, health care and information technology. Research is strongly supported by the research councils, industry and through our utilisation of the major international experimental facilities. Research activities are loosely divided into four thematic groupings: nanoelectronics, ion beams, photonics, and theory and computation, with shared interest in nanotechnology, quantum electronics, energy and biomedical applications.  The ATI houses extensive facilities which include:

• A 200-square metre clean-room complex with Class 1000 multi-purpose fabrication facilities and Class 100 standard ‘Yellow’ areas, housing advanced photo-lithography apparatus 
• The Ion Beam Centre – a national centre for materials, implantation and analysis 
• A nanofabrication laboratory including an ultrahigh vacuum combined scanning tunnelling and electron beam microscope and a dual beam focused ion beam system 
• An ultrafast laboratory containing femtosecond lasers for investigation of dynamics from ultraviolet to terahertz spectral regions 
• A supercomputer laboratory, comprising a 148 processor Opteron/Infinibond cluster along with an NEC SX-6B vector Supercomputer High Pressure Centre for material and device studies at extreme conditions
• Plastic electronic fabrication and large area characterisation including OPV and OLEDS

(Led by Professor Rahim Tafazolli)

The Centre for Communication Systems Research (CCSR) is the largest academic research group in Europe in the field of information and communication technologies, with over 150 researchers and strategic partnerships with international mobile operators and manufacturers.

CCSR has ongoing collaborations with top universities in India, China, Korea and the USA. The centre is a core member of UK MVCE (Virtual Centre of Excellence on Mobile and Personal Communications), WWRF (Wireless World Research Forum), EU technology platforms and a board member of UK FISG (Future Internet Strategy Group).

CCSR research covers a range of information and communication systems, including:

• B3G and 4G mobile cellular communications
• Broadband femto cells
• Satellite communications and broadcasting
• Future Internet
• Internet of things (IoT)
• Machine to machine communications
• Intelligent transportation
• Large-scale mobile ad hoc networks

The general theme is towards achieving energy, spectral and cost efficiency with robust and secure technologies.

The core research topics are:

• Air interface - covering a wide range of fundamental and applied research including: advanced modulation and coding, estimation, direction and synchronisation techniques, multi-user information theory, antenna and propagation.
• Radio Access System Optimisation - this focuses on different aspects of system-level efficienty in emerging wireless networks. This includes different topics: radio resource management (distributed and centralised), self-organising radio access, coverage, capacity, energy efficiency optimisation, multi-cell cooperation, interference management, advanced radio access architectures
• Cognitive Radio Technologies - CCSR works in close collaboration with industry and country regulators and participates in relevant standardisation bodies.
• Cognitive Networks and Future Internet - encompassing networking and network management technologies. These include both evolutionary and revolutionary designs of self-functionalities (for example, self-organisation, self-optimisation, self-healing, self-protection and self-configuration) in the next generation of communication networks, and also new architectures, protocols and mechanisms for the future internet.
• Security - the research topics relate to security at network, user, device and information levels.
• Semantic Web and Service Platforms - the research is focused on novel solutions relating to data processing for applications, networks and services. With the increase in bandwidth and capabilities on communication networks and mobile platforms, more applications and services are developed, adapted and deployed by service providers and users in different application domains. Discovery and utilisation of these services, and also creating stable and at the same time flexible platforms for often heterogeneous components which construct these networks, has been the main focus of the research community in recent years.

(Led by Professor Adrian Hilton)

The Centre for Vision, Speech and Signal Processing (CVSSP) is one of the largest and best established centres in the UK focused on research in image, video and audio processing. With over 110 staff and students and an annual multi-million pound budget, it provides unrivalled facilities for pursuing leading-edge research in a diverse range of both fundamental and applied research. Joint projects with leading international companies (for example, the BBC, Sony, BAE Systems and so on) ensure that the work is relevant to the real world.  The research output generated at CVSSP has received numerous academic and industry prizes at home and abroad.
Research in the centre is structured into the following main areas:

• Multimedia Signal Processing and Interpretation – this area attempts to enable machines to understand and act on the information content of video and audio data. This involves extracting information that emphasises the semantics conveyed by the data. Major projects address fundamental aspects of pattern recognition in the context of biometrics (for example, face recognition) and audiovisual database search.  The long-term ambition is to develop cognitive systems that both learn and interact intelligently with their environment.
• Visual Media – the Visual Media Research Group (VMRG) conducts research that spans both computer vision and graphics and animation.  The ambition is to provide enabling technologies for next-generation communication and entertainment applications. Pioneering work on the automated construction of computer models and on the development of free-view point video (the construction of new virtual views from a limited set of real images) has put VMRG at the forefront of international research in this area. Current projects are looking at producing highly realistic models of real people which can
  be driven from speech for visual communication.
• Medical Imaging – a wide range of biomedical imaging research projects are carried out, encompassing research at all stages of the imaging chain, from the technology of image acquisition, reconstruction and image correction through to statistical image analysis and display. Biomedical imaging is fundamentally an interdisciplinary activity, involving collaboration with major clinical and biomedical partners at
  some of the country’s leading hospitals and biomedical companies.
• Robot Vision – mobile robots need to see in order to understand and interact with a real and ever-changing world. Therefore they need to be able to recognise and track objects as well as the actions of people. Current work in the robotics area encompasses visual surveillance and the classification of human actions. Novel techniques based on data mining to extract sophisticated signatures for gestures and actions are developed to enable a fleet of multiple robots to assist humans in an urban environment.
• Multimedia Signal Communication – this research focuses on 2D/3D audiovisual processing, coding and transmission. Current projects include the development of techniques for highly efficient 2D and 3D video compression, and robust transmission across congested, time-varying networks. Most of the research is conducted in the I-Lab, well known for its work in developing quality of experience measuring techniques, which can be used to configure the whole network (fixed and wireless) delivery chain to maximise media quality.

(Led by Professor Sir Martin N Sweeting)

The Surrey Space Centre (SSC) holds a unique place in satellite engineering research worldwide, having pioneered cost-effective satellite engineering techniques to develop a series of highly sophisticated, yet inexpensive, small satellites ranging from 6kg to 600kg. SSC, working together with Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd (SSTL), has launched 34 small satellites into low Earth orbit, carrying a wide range of satellite communications, space science, remote sensing, navigation and inorbit technology demonstration payloads.  The world’s first Earth observation satellite constellation, dedicated to monitoring and
mitigating disasters, was launched in 2003. This innovative Surrey-led project brought together an international consortium of six countries to design, build, launch and operate the Disaster Monitoring
Constellation (DMC).

SSC houses eight thriving academic research groups conducting research into cost-effective satellite engineering for affordable access to space. Research projects concentrate on: satellite onboard computers and data processing; spacecraft power systems and solar arrays; space propulsion, thrusters and rockets; radio communications and signal processing; space science; space radiation environment; satellite structures and mechanics; Earth observation cameras and remote sensing; orbit and attitude determination, control and stabilisation; space and planetary robotics and inorbit navigation using GPS; spacecraft and groundstation autonomy.

Experienced satellite engineers, engaged directly in satellite projects, bring relevant and timely experience to their lectures, with research projects involving actual space missions, from design and construction through to in-orbit operation. Surrey’s ground-station receives live data from satellites in orbit and its satellite development laboratories provide the focus for exciting research projects. For example, SSC is currently working with SSTL to build STRaND – an innovative 3U CubeSat carrying mobile phone technology, which will launch in 2012, and is working with CalTech and NASA-JPL to produce a new type of space telescope, which can automatically assemble and reconfigure itself in space.

The centre awards several PhD research studentships annually for exceptionally gifted researchers, and undertakes advanced research supported by SSTL, EPSRC and ESA (the European Space Agency). SSC staff and students are also helping in the development of geostationary and interplanetary platforms, always exploiting the cost-effective technologies and techniques that are the hallmarks of SSC’s work. SSTL, a University of Surrey spin-off company, runs the commercial activities of the Surrey Space Centre.