University of Bristol EPSRC Future Opportunities Fund

The University of Bristol is delighted to announce seven new studentship positions supporting postgraduate cross-disciplinary research on the frontlines of Science and Engineering, in partnership with the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC).

Cybersecurity

Cybersecurity is concerned with the protection of data, software, networks and hardware against disruption and misappropriation. It is an emerging area of research that has acquired critical national and international importance. It is also a broad and exciting field, covering a range of overlapping disciplines in pure mathematics, statistics and computer science. Available opportunities include cross-disciplinary projects and joint studentships with the Heilbronn Institute for Mathematical Research.

Contact: cyber-phd@bristol.ac.uk

Digital Innovations

1) The knowledge-based Internet

The growing complexity of Internet, the resultant data explosion, and the deployment of Internet of Things technologies, have all significantly increased the need for smart coordination, configuration and control of various elements of the global communications network. Knowledge-based networking, leveraging on machine learning, artificial intelligence (AI) and data analytics, opens up new opportunities for solving emerging and critical problems of the current Internet. This theme aims to investigate, design and implement knowledge based solutions for the future Internet.

Contact: Dr. Reza Nejabati (reza.nejabati@bristol.ac.uk) or Professor Dimitra Semeonidou (Dimitra.simeonidou@bristol.ac.uk)

2) Computational behaviour analysis of social interactions

Digital technologies allow us to perform activity recognition for a patient using machine learning. These activities provide a good proxy for the characterisation of patients’ lifestyles over time. This project will focus on the analysis of the interaction between individuals living in the same house. We conjecture that by identifying behavioural patterns in these sets of sequences of activities, we will be able to understand how the participant's mental health affects their social behaviour and vice versa.

Contact: Dr. Raul Santos-Rodriguez (enrsr@bristol.ac.uk)

Natural Hazards

1) Seismic

Anthropogenic earthquakes pose a rapidly increasing threat to society, infrastructure and the energy sector. Currently, neither the physics nor the expected hazard levels of induced seismicity are well understood. This cross-faculty PhD project will assess differences between induced and tectonic earthquakes in terms of source properties and ground motions in order to exploit a better understanding of the mechanics and shaking for risk assessments of induced seismic hazards.

Contact: Dr. Max Werner (Max.werner@bristol.ac.uk)

2) Water

Our environment is changing rapidly due to climate change, land management and other human impacts. These changes have significant implications for the water cycle, especially hydrologic hazards (floods and droughts) and our understanding of how catchments will respond to more extreme weather patterns. This cross-faculty PhD project will work on reducing this uncertainty by improving the process basis of current models of hydrologic extremes.

Contact: Professor Thorsten Wagener (thorsten.wagener@bristol.ac.uk)

Synthetic Biology

Synthetic Biology inhabits the frontier between Engineering, Physical and Life Science, specifically the rational design or redesign of living things and their components. This emerging, dynamic field has the potential to provide solutions to some of the key challenges faced by society in healthcare, energy and the environment. PhD subject areas within this theme include design and engineering of biological molecules and systems.

Contact: synbio-cdt@bristol.ac.uk

Further Information

Visit the website for full application details and eligibility criteria:

• The studentships provide UK/EU tuition fees and the standard RCUK stipend, currently £14,296 pa (EPSRC eligibility criteria apply), for a duration of 3.5 years
• Studentships are tenable from September 2017. Earlier or later start dates may be possible by mutual agreement
• Applications will remain open until filled