UDLA 2527 Brunel University London

Brunel University London will use this EPSRC grant to train the next generation of engineers and scientists through a Doctoral Training Partnership, funding PhD students across a range of technical disciplines. This matters because the UK needs a steady pipeline of highly skilled researchers to keep its science and engineering sectors competitive. Without sustained investment in postgraduate training, the country risks losing expertise in fields that underpin everything from manufacturing and energy systems to digital infrastructure and medical technologies. The grant addresses a structural gap: how to fund, coordinate, and support doctoral students in a way that produces both excellent fundamental science and applied solutions. If this training succeeds, the immediate impact is a cohort of PhD graduates equipped to tackle complex technical problems. Over the longer term, these researchers will move into academia, industry, and public-sector roles, strengthening the UK’s capacity for innovation. The work is primarily about building human capital rather than delivering a specific product or discovery, but past doctoral training programmes have produced breakthroughs in materials science, computing, and healthcare that began as curiosity-driven PhD projects.