Our Communities
To date (June 2021) the GW4 Alliance has invested over £3.1m in 112 collaborative research communities, which have generated nearly £50m in research income. This means that for every £1 GW4 spends on collaborative research communities, GW4 captures an impressive £16 in external research awards.
The GW4 Alliance has adopted the Russell Group Research Integrity Statement of cooperation in cross-institutional research misconduct allegations, which aims to support the efforts of researcher communities to foster research integrity (also known as good practice in research or the responsible conduct of research).
Explore our GW4 research communities by keyword or theme. (All communities are also listed below in alphabetical order).
Aerospace and Advanced Engineering
Creative and Cultural Economy
Digital Innovation
Living Well
New Energy Systems
Resilience, Environment and Sustainability
Dying with Reduced Agency- People, Places, Principles and Policies
Accelerator Fund
Project period: May to November 2015
GW4 community leads
University of Bath: Jeremy Dixon
University of Bristol: Richard Huxtable
Cardiff University: Jenny Kitzinger (PI)
University of Exeter: Linda Clare
Project overview
Demographic, technological, organisational, political and social changes create new challenges at the end of life. This GW4 community is focused on understanding and improving the end of life for the growing number of people with reduced agency (e.g. linked to dementia, disorders of consciousness or frailty/chronic conditions in advanced old age).
Emotion and Non-verbal Communication in Social and Economic Interactions
INITIATOR FundProject period: October 2014 – January 2015 GW4 community leadsUniversity of Bath: Alan Lewis |
Flexible Formwork
INITIATOR FundProject period: May – July 2014 GW4 community leads University of Bath: John Orr Project overview This collaboration will bring together experts in structural engineering, serviceability, materials characterisation, durability, sustainable materials, and composites to consider the specific future research required to fully realise this field. |
Functional Materials Far from Equilibrium
INITIATOR Fund
Project period: October 2014 – January 2015
GW4 community leads
University of Bath: Johannes Zimmer (PI), Chris Bowen
University of Bristol: Isaac Chenchiah
Cardiff University: Nicolas Dirr
University of Exeter: David Wright
Project overview
This collaboration brings together all GW4 universities to nucleate a new community that will address an important bottleneck in the development of novel technological devices: the nonequilibrium evolution of material microstructure and its impact on macroscopic material behaviour.
Global Challenges ‘Low Carbon Energy Access’ Hub
ACCELERATOR FUND
Project period: July – December 2017
GW4 community leads
University of Bath: Philippe Blondel
University of Bristol: Sam Williamson
Cardiff University: Kersty Hobson (PI)
University of Exeter: Philipp Thies
Project overview
The goal was to bring together researchers from a wide range of disciplines to build a community around key issues in Low Carbon Energy Access in Overseas Development Assistance Countries, in order to formulate a proposal to be taken forward to the forthcoming RCUK collective fund interdisciplinary hub call.
GW4 Biosensor Network
INITIATOR FUND
Project period: February – May 2016
GW4 community leads
University of Bath: Pedro Estrela (PI)
University of Bristol: Mervyn Miles
Cardiff University: Niklaas Buurma
University of Exeter: Peter Winlove
Project overview
The GW4 Biosensor Network will bring together researchers from different disciplines with an interest on biosensors. Biosensors measure chemical or biological molecules in complex samples (e.g. blood, water, air) for a wide range of applications including medical diagnosis, monitoring of therapies, personalised medicine, drug discovery and water quality control.
GW4 Bio-X
INITIATOR Fund
Project period: May to August 2015
GW4 community leads
University of Bath: Christopher R Pudney (PI)
University of Bristol: Adrian Mulholland
Cardiff University: Rudolf Allemann
University of Exeter: Christian Soeller
Project overview
GW4 Bio-X exists to identify, frame and address the ‘unanswerable’ biological questions using ‘breaking’ and ‘in development’ methods, models and tools from the physical sciences. Our community is in place to make GW4 the national powerhouse in innovative, molecular bioscience and to develop novel capacity and capability.
GW4 Cancer Research Consortium
INITIATOR FUND
Project period: February – May 2016
GW4 community leads
University of Bath: Adele Murrell, Lorenzo Caggiano (joint PIs)
University of Bristol: Paul Martin, Axel Walther
Cardiff University: Matt Smalley
University of Exeter: David Allard, Jackie Whatmore, Willie Hamilton
Project overview
The GW4 Cancer Research Consortium aims to foster cross-disciplinary collaboration, by capitalising on the breadth of complementary expertise and high-impact cancer research across GW4.