Applications of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Games for health, life and accessibility

Artificial Intelligence, games, intelligent and interactive applications are becoming more integrated in our everyday lives, as well as becoming important areas of focus within the fields of Creative Computing, Digital Media, Artificial Intelligence and Human-Computer Interaction research. Such applications often take advantage of the benefits of creative computing, specifically games and AI, to improve people's lives and support people of various backgrounds in the areas of accessibility & accessibility design, decision making and stress, and health.

From computational challenges, 3D visualisation, simulations and optimisation, gamification and serious games, augmented, virtual and mixed reality to machine learning, neural networks, evolutionary computing and reinforcement learning, a wide range of topics and areas contribute and combine for improving our lives.

Such applications often use sensor-base techniques and large datasets informed by IoT wearables, physiological responses, facial and gestural inputs and natural language understanding (NLU), taking advantage of techniques such as cloud computing. Whilst AI and Game based applications have now entered our daily lives, most of these applications are targeted at entertainment, finance and marketing, staying very much in the margins of our lives. Still little effort has been devoted to exploring the applications of these technologies to meaningfully impacting and improving people’s lives within the areas of health, accessibility and quality of living.

Therefore, we invite applications from candidates that have an interest in creative computing and the areas of artificial intelligence and/or digital games, and exploring the potentials to design, develop and evaluate applications within the health, life and accessibility domains. Candidates should have good game/software/prototype design and development skills. Knowledge of AI and machine learning, experience of carrying out user-centred research and collecting and analysing both qualitative and quantitative data is also desirable.

Digital Media’s research focus is in the multidisciplinary area of creative computing, which lies at the intersection of artificial intelligence and machine learning, serious and fun gaming, and cognitive modelling in extended reality. The research enables the use of wearable technologies in developing IoT apps in several areas, such as mobile e-health and e-fitness, digital games, 3D computer vision, and computer generated music, achieved through the application of HCI, gamification, digital asset accessibility design and management, and other relevant techniques.

Research journey

Doctoral research programmes (PhDs) take a proud place in the world-class research environment and community at Brunel. PhD students are recognised and valued by their supervisors as an essential part of their departments and a key component of the university's overall strategy to develop and deliver world-class research.

A PhD programme is expected to take 3 years full-time or 6 years part-time, with intakes starting in January, April or October.

The general University entrance requirement for registration for a research degree is normally a First or Upper Second Class Honours degree (1st or 2:1) or an international equivalent. A Masters degree is a welcome, but not required, qualification for entry.

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Excellent research support and training

The Graduate School provides a range of personal, professional and career development opportunities. This includes workshops, online training, coaching and events, to enable you to enhance your professional profile, refine your skills, and plan your next career steps as part of the Researcher Development Programme. The researcher development programme (RDP) offers workshops and seminars in a range of areas including progression, research management, research dissemination, and careers and personal development. You will also be offered a number of online, self-study courses on BBL, including Research Integrity, Research Skills Toolkit, Research Methods in Literature Review and Principles of Research Methods.

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You will receive tailored careers support during your PhD and for up to three years after you complete your research at Brunel. We encourage you to actively engage in career planning and managing your personal development right from the start of your research, even (or perhaps especially) if you don't yet have a career path in mind. Our careers provision includes online information and advice, one-to-one consultations and a range of events and workshops. The Professional Development Centre runs a varied programme of careers events throughout the academic year. These include industry insight sessions, recruitment fairs, employer pop-ups and skills workshops.