Achievements

The Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) has licensed the immunotherapy drug, Lecanemab, for use in the early stages of Alzheimer’s disease in the UK, following decades of work supported by UCL research.

This top accolade follows a series of strong achievements for UCL, London’s Global University, that have collectively reflected our academic excellence, our interdisciplinary approach to teaching and pioneering research, which creates real-world impact.

UCL came second in research power in the UK - only to Oxford (1st) - and first in London in research power. UCL also maintained its position as top in the UK for research power in medicine, health and life sciences as well as social sciences.

The REF is carried out approximately every six to seven years to assess the quality of research across 157 UK universities and to share how this research benefits society both in the UK and globally.

A new independent report into the university’s economic and social impact found that UCL’s annual impact of £9.9bn across the UK economy is comparable to the trade boost delivered by the London 2012 Olympics.

The first direct visual evidence of a supermassive black hole and its shadow were unveiled by the Event Horizon Telescope(EHT) collaboration involving UCL researchers.

“We have accomplished something many thought impossible by imaging the shadow of a black hole and it provides the strongest evidence to date that such evasive and enigmatic entities do indeed exist” said Dr Ziri Younsi (UCL Mullard Space Science Laboratory), part of the EHT collaboration.

A new record for the fastest ever data rate for digital information was set by UCL researchers in the Optical Networks Group. They achieved a rate of 1.125 Tb/s as part of research on the capacity limits of optical transmission systems, designed to address the growing demand for fast data rates.

A new treatment used ‘molecular scissors’ to edit genes and create designer immune cells, programmed to hunt out and kill drug resistant leukaemia. The treatment was used at Great Ormond Street Hospital (GOSH) on a one-year-old baby who had relapsed acute lymphoblastic leukaemia (ALL). Following treatment, the baby was cancer free.

UCL research found a third of oil reserves, half of gas reserves and over 80% of current coal reserves globally should remain in the ground and not be used before 2050 if global warming is to stay below the 2°C target agreed by policy makers. The research had a significant impact on policy.

UCL is the top-rated university in the UK for research strength.

UCL computer scientists make a groundbreaking transatlantic 'virtual handshake' over the internet with counterparts at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in 2002.

UCL Slade School graduate Antony Gormley begins work on the iconic Angel of the North sculpture. He wins the Turner Prize the same year.

UCL's Professor Robin Weiss and colleagues discover that the CD4 molecule on lymphocytes is the binding receptor for HIV, crucial to early understanding of how HIV infects cells.

Under the stewardship of UCL's Professor Peter Kirstein, UCL makes the first network connection to the USA – a precursor of the modern internet.

Dame Mary Douglas publishes Purity and Danger: An Analysis of the Concepts of Pollution and Taboo, which is later named as one of the 100 most influential non-fiction books since 1945.

Sir Harrie Massey, Head of the Department of Physics, leads a team of UK government and UCL academics to launch the first successful British scientific rocket.

Professor Lord Holford is appointed as the planning consultant for the City of London's post-war rebuilding.

Known as the father of modern library science, former student Shiyali Ramamrita Ranganathan establishes the Five Laws of Library Science in 1931.

In 1921, former student Marie Stopes opens the first-ever family planning clinic in London. It made one of the greatest social impacts of the 20th century.

King George V and Queen Mary visited UCL during UCL's Centenary celebrations in 1927, which also included a series of lectures, exhibitions and dinners.

In 1904, Ambrose Fleming, UCL's first Professor of Electrical Engineering, invents the thermionic valve, a device controlling the movement of electrons in a vacuum. The valve signalled the birth of electronics.

The discovery in the 1890s of all five of the noble gases, including neon, later earned UCL's Professor William Ramsay the first Nobel Prize for a British scientist.

In an 1888 paper, Sir Francis Galton (1822-1911), founder of UCL's Galton Laboratory, estimates the probability of two people having the same fingerprint. He went on to create a model of fingerprint analysis, leading to its use in forensic science.

Less well known and less cause for celebration is his work on eugenics. Galton coined the term ‘eugenics’ to refer to his belief in selectively breeding human populations, to supposedly improve society. He endowed UCL with his personal collection and archive along with a bequest for the country’s first professorial Chair of Eugenics. Following the recommendations of the Inquiry into the History of Eugenics at UCL, UCL decided to de-name the Galton Lecture Theatre in July 2020. This change is one of a number of actions aimed at acknowledging and addressing the impact of the university’s historical links with the eugenics movement. 

Thomas Donaldson, Professor of Architecture at UCL, pioneers architecture as an academic discipline and becomes a co-founder of the Royal Institute of British Architects, winning its Gold Medal in 1851.

Robert Liston performs the first operation under anaesthetic in Europe at University College Hospital. Liston is known for his dexterity with a knife, and is said to be able to amputate a leg in 20 seconds. The patient is anaesthetised with ether before having a limb amputated.

Professor of Psychiatry at UCL John Conolly revolutionises the treatment of mentally ill patients, overturning the harsh practice of mechanically restraining patients.