Computer Science and Informatics: Unit of Assessment 23

The majority of research in UoA 23 Computer Science and Informatics  is officially classified as world-leading or internationally excellent in terms of originality, significance and rigour, having been placed in the highest categories of 4*and 3* in the 2008 Research Assessment Exercise.

Quality Level 4* 3* 2* 1* Unclassified
% of research activity 20 50 30 0 0

This UoA is sited entirely within the School of Computing Science. Our primary research groups indicate the areas in which Newcastle has major expertise and which form the basis for the implementation of our vision. These research groups are:

  • Dependability: researching the development and deployment of trustworthy computer-based systems;
  • Distributed Systems: conducting fundamental research in protocols, algorithms and middleware, and constructing realistic applications to demonstrate and to evaluate the viability of ideas;
  • Modelling and Reasoning: modelling systems and formal reasoning about their properties; and
  • Scaleable Information Management: researching the organisation of and user access to information, and including interdisciplinary informatics research.

Themes combine members of several groups, in some cases drawing on other disciplines; they are stimulated by a collective interest, a research synergy within the School or the challenge of a new research initiative. Research students are full participants in all the research activities of the UOA, and are treated as junior members of staff. They are attached to groups and participate in themes.

Our strategy is to support research through a variety of sources. Our current portfolio combines EPSRC £6.1m, EU £1.9m, BBSRC £650k, BAE Systems £980k and DTI £1.4m which, when incorporated with smaller sources of funding, totals £11.7m. All our research groups are supported by, and in many cases lead, large multi-site national and international projects involving the active engagement of both industry and other research disciplines.

The Centre for Software Reliability (CSR), the North Eastern Regional e-Science centre (NEReSC) and the Digital Insitute (formerly the Informatics Research Institute) are research units based within the School.

CSR's function is translational, using our research expertise to inform industry. It organises industrially relevant conferences and holds numerous tutorials and workshops tailored specially to the requirements of industry.

NEReSC and IRI are important research enablers, providing flexible, responsive resources for research demands and allowing expertise to reach other disciplines. NEReSC has brought over £17m project funding to Newcastle, supported by EPSRC, DTI, BBSRC, MRC and industry.

The IRI provides specialist resources and supports and funds a number of priming activities which link Computing Science with:

IRI's resources include a Virtual Reality facility, high performance computing and a large-scale database supported by £1.5m of SRIF funds. It also has space in the SRIF-funded (£3.2m) Culture Lab, where ubiquitous computing systems can be developed and evaluated in a specially constructed, technology-enriched environment.

These resources act as 'glue' for connecting a variety of disciplines with computing science, forging new links and providing drivers for innovative research areas.