Ulster University has launched a major five-year strategy strengthening its position in research and innovation.
The strategy, which runs from 2023 to 2028, will deliver research excellence, inclusion and impact. It builds on the success of the University’s previous five-year plan, which has seen Ulster establish itself as one of the top partners in research on the island of Ireland.
The new strategy also clearly aligns Ulster University research with major global challenges, enabling it to respond to, and impact on, society’s most pressing needs both around the corner and around the world.
It identifies the five key research themes that will enable it to carry out the kind of world-class research most likely to have a transformative impact.
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These are: challenging inequality and division; building the sustainable world; accelerating data futures; transforming health; and inspiring creativity and innovation.
The new strategy also focuses on supporting the people behind the research, developing the University’s research community and increasing the excellence, intensity, value and impact of their work.
As part of that it lays out the University’s plan to develop and promote an open, diverse, supportive and sustainable research culture.
Building on success
Ulster University, which has three campuses across Northern Ireland, is in the top 10 per cent of universities for research impact in the UK.
Some 97 per cent of its research output is deemed as having ‘outstanding or very considerable impacts in reach and significance’, while 80 per cent is ‘world leading’ or ‘internationally excellent’, according to Research Excellence Framework, the UK’s system for assessing the excellence of research in higher education providers.
A key part of these results stem from its success in growing partnerships with business and other research institutions.
“Over the last five years we have seen a very rapid and unprecedented amount of growth in research activities at Ulster University,” says Tim Brundle, the University’s director of research and innovation.
The amount of research income into the University more than doubled over that period, and the number of people involved in research grew by over 20 per cent.
“Therein lies the central part of this new strategy,” he explains. “Where we were five years ago, compared to where we are today, has all come about as a result of a growth in partnerships, partnering with industry and with other universities, to address both future challenges and industrial opportunities.”
Tackling challenges, developing opportunities
The five key themes were selected on the basis that not alone will they help address the biggest challenges facing society, but they also represent the biggest industrial opportunities.
Establishing the five topics was a consultative task which included input from 330 people across a range of departments, including professors, PhD students, research technicians and non-academic staff.
“We had to ask ourselves where do we have the research capacity at scale? Where does industry want to invest over the long term? And, scientifically, what are the future technologies over which we need mastery?” explains Brundle.
“By a process of triage we reached the five key areas into which we will now aggregate our capabilities and respond to industrial challenges and the opportunities within them.”
The new strategy supports Ulster University’s leadership within the Northern Ireland £1.3 billion (€1.4 billion) City and Growth Deals, which are aimed at harnessing additional investment, creating new jobs and speeding up inclusive economic growth.
As part of the deals, global centres of innovation excellence are to be established in key growth sectors, providing opportunities for businesses in and outside Northern Ireland to collaborate with universities to create breakthrough technologies, products and services.
“It is the largest ever investment in economic infrastructure in Northern Ireland’s history. Companies working with these centres will have access to intellectual property and to academic resources, equipment and facilities,” says Brundle.
“These innovation centres will be drivers of economic activity and Ulster University is either key to, or leading, one third of them.”
Research with impact
Ulster University is already making an impact under its five strategic research themes:
Challenging inequality and division
Its multi-disciplinary research will help shape our world for the better by informing social, economic and political thinking and decision-making to create an equal, cohesive, safe and sustainable society.
One example includes the Every Voice Matters - Violence Against Women in Northern Ireland report from Ulster University which uncovered eye-watering levels of violence against women in NI and was commissioned by The Executive Office.
Building the sustainable world
The University’s research-led approach to understanding the environment enables it to inform communities, policy-makers and businesses on challenges such as climate change, energy, food and water security, as well as social inclusion and deprivation.
It is already contributing to major governmental projects including being part of a consortium creating a new £21.3million (€24 million) national research hub to decarbonise the UK’s maritime sector. It is also part of a group that has just mapped, for the very first time, changes to Northern Ireland’s coastline over 190 years as a result of coastal erosion and advancement. This will shape policy and decision making for sustainable coastal and waste management.
Accelerating data futures
Technological innovation is revolutionising the ways in which societies function at all levels with digital prediction and data insights transforming decision-making in all sectors. Ulster University is leading major AI research projects as part of a network established by the Alan Turing Institute to build and share knowledge around digital twin research.
Transforming health
Its researchers are working to improve dementia diagnosis, on novel treatments for Alzheimer’s, and on drug-gene testing to alleviate healthcare waiting times, through personalised medicine. There are also research projects into multiple other long-term conditions including cardiovascular disease, diabetes, blood cancers, vision, neurodegenerative disorders and arthritis.
Inspiring creativity and innovation
The University’s creative and artistic research spans a variety of disciplines, incorporating practice-based research and digital tools. Studio Ulster is a large-scale virtual production campus at Belfast Harbour Studios which will help drive the next generation of visual effects technologies to revolutionise the film, TV and performing arts industries.
“At Ulster University we have already proven ourselves as business partners in research and innovation,” says Brundle. “We can see that from the impact of our last research strategy. What we are doing now is taking things up a level.”
Find out more about Ulster University’s research and innovation strategy 2023 to 2028 here