The Sargent Centre, a joint Centre between UCL and Imperial shortlisted for Bhattacharyya Award 2023

Finalist: Imperial College London, UCL and the Sargent Centre Industrial Consortium
Unleashing the power of process systems engineering research

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The Sargent Centre is the world’s largest multidisciplinary research centre in Process Systems Engineering, combining a deep understanding of chemical and biochemical processes with the ability to make fundamental advances across a wide range of systems and digital technologies for the benefit of society and industry. Bringing fundamental research advances to practice is deeply embedded in the Sargent Centre’s approach. For over 30 years, Sargent Centre researchers and process industry partners (e.g., ABB, BP, Eli Lilly and Company, Petronas, Pfizer, Procter and Gamble, Siemens, Shell, Syngenta) have collaborated to address challenges in manufacturing, decarbonisation, energy efficiency, optimisation, data science, multi-scale modelling, risk and uncertainty. This has resulted in successful spin-out creation and software licensing, with tools used across the pharmaceutical, agrochemical, consumer goods, food and energy sectors.

Professor Eva Sorensen, Head of Department at UCL Chemical Engineering, said: “The Department of Chemical Engineering at UCL is a founding member of the Sargent Centre and has, since its foundation in 1989, worked closely with our Imperial College London colleagues and the Centre’s Industrial Consortium to solve challenging problems within a wide range of application areas using the tools and expertise we have developed within process systems engineering. For this, we need fundamental knowledge within the sciences in order to model complex systems ranging from human bodies to large enterprises, as well as a deep understanding of how advanced computational tools can be used to solve these problems.”

About the Bhattacharyya Award 2023

The Bhattacharyya Award is a tribute to Professor Lord Kumar Bhattacharyya KT CBE FREng FRS, the Regius Professor of Manufacturing at the University of Warwick and founder of WMG who advocated for greater collaboration between industry and universities. Funded by the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology, the annual Bhattacharyya Award is open to UK universities and colleges that have demonstrated a sustained, strategic industrial partnership that has benefitted society and is deserving of national recognition. Industry–academia partnerships from any academic discipline are eligible for the Bhattacharyya Award.

Professor Dame Ann Dowling OM DBE FREng FRS, former President of the Royal Academy of Engineering and Chair of the judging panel for the Bhattacharyya Award, said: “The six finalists for this year’s Award are inspiring and diverse examples of successful collaboration between academia and industry—it’s terrific to be able to highlight and to celebrate their innovation and impact and I hope they will provide inspiration for others. We know that there are other great partnerships like these between universities and colleges and industries across the UK in all sectors but that we need many more if we are to fully reap the economic and societal benefit of our research investment and capability.”

The Bhattacharyya Award 2023 and a cash prize of £25,000 will be presented on 24 October 2023 to the team who best demonstrate how industry and universities can work together. 

Links

• Press relase - The Royal Academy of Engineering Bhattacharyya Award Finalists 2023
• View the videos of all shortlisted partnerships