An integrated system of inferential measurement and control of polymer extrusion for self-tuning optimisation and response to disturbances

Lead Research Organisation: Queen's University Belfast
Department Name: Sch Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering

Abstract

The process of extrusion, whereby polymer granules are melted and conveyed by a screw rotating in a heated barrel, forms the basis of practically all polymer processing operations. In this project an integrated framework for improved performance of extrusion processes will be developed through advances in process modelling, inferential measurement and a more intelligent approach to control of the process. This will require the development of transparent on-line models integrating first-principles' models with analysis of observable on-line data. It will enable inferential measurement of key performance indicators; identification of process faults; on-line optimisation of settings; and an ability to self-tune to changing feed materials and conditions. The end result will be a novel methodology for extrusion control which will provide a comprehensive framework for accurate, efficient and flexible extrusion processing. Such a device would have a major impact on achieving higher product quality and greater potential of recycled feed material while reducing downtime, energy consumption and wastage of valuable polyolefin resources. In order to develop this system, pivotal research is required in a number of areas. These include new theory (development of novel modelling techniques; robust on-line system identification for feed material changes); innovative practical measurements (real time data acquisition and processing of high frequency signals) and innovative data analysis for interpretation of complex data (correlation of data with non-homogenous melting, identification of material degradation, integration in a robust, adaptive control strategy). The development of techniques in this research will also provide an ideal platform for achieving greater success in emerging complex processing applications, for example in reactive extrusion, micro-extrusion and compounding of nanocomposites.

Publications

10 25 50
 
Description The polymer industry makes a major contribution to the UK economy, and extrusion is a fundamental polymer processing stage. However, considerable waste of both energy and raw materials can occur during lengthy change-over and start-up periods, and conservative operating conditions make this situation worse. Furthermore, the extrusion process is highly complex, and incomplete melting of the polymer may occur at inappropriate processing conditions that give rise to poor mixing and localised hot and cold spots, which in turn lead to pulsations in the throughput. As the key melt indicator, viscosity is difficult to monitor online, and as a result of this and the process characteristics described it is difficult to control the quality of an extrudate material and hence the final product. The aims of this research were to advance the state of the art in monitoring and control of polymer extrusion so as to reduce set-up times, waste and energy consumption and improve product quality. Considerable achievements have been made: 1) We have investigated the pressure model incorporating changes in the machine/die and material properties. 2) We have developed a model identification procedure based on grey-box modelling with a genetic algorithm for viscosity modelling, and further improved a soft sensor approach with a feedback structure to enable the online adaptability of the viscosity model in response to modelling errors and disturbances, hence producing a reliable estimate of viscosity. 3) We have developed a model free fuzzy controller to minimize the variation in melt pressure and temperature, thus reducing the variation of viscosity. 4) We have developed torque signal acquisition methods and investigated an inferential monitoring approach to the screw load torque signal in an extruder. 5) We have employed a thermocouple mesh technique developed by the University of Bradford to measure the die melt temperature profile of a single screw extruder and developed a nonlinear model to predict the die melt temperature profile from readily measured process parameters. The model was then used to identify the effects of individual processing parameters on the die melt flow homogeneity and to further identify the optimal process settings to minimise melt temperature variance across the melt flow. 6) We have explored energy constraints and developed a strategy for responding to process instabilities, then investigated a model based fuzzy control approach to maintain the die melt temperature variance across the melt flow while achieving the desired average die melt temperature. We have further developed a fuzzy controller for the control of the polymer melt quality including viscosity. 7) We have developed a novel nonlinear multivariate statistical approach based on neural networks for fault detection in polymer processing. 8) We have further proposed novel algorithms for the construction of neural networks and fuzzy neural systems, and nonlinear system modelling and classification. These methods have also been applied to the modelling and control of injection stretch blow moulding. All these new developments have taken into account in the industrial environment, and close collaborations with other leading research groups in the UK and with local industrial companies have created the potential of direct application of the techniques developed to maximize the impact. Theoretical results have been published in high quality peer reviewed journals, such as Polymer Engineering and Science, Control Engineering Practice, IEEE Transactions on Fuzzy Systems, and Journal of Process Control, and in leading conferences. The publication record, the award of prizes, a number of invited seminars and presentations, and the deployment of award winning Point Energy technologies (http://www.pointenergy.org/) have very effectively demonstrated the high quality of the research outputs.
Exploitation Route The award winning Point energy technology developed through this project and subsequent EPSRC project on thermal energy management is able to offer low-cost component level energy monitoring, providing actionable insights that reduce energy costs and optimise manufacturing processes. The technology has been currently deployed at several local companies from Polymer processing to food processing and package, including Irwin's Bakery, Greiner Packing, and the Coca-Cola Company, and it will be further deployed at other food processing and metallurgy industry including Tata Steel. The industrial field test has shown the potential of the new technologies, and the team is looking for a spin-off opportunity for the technology developed. Further, the research outputs will be disseminated through the first government funded UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research, funded by the BEIS and administrated through British Council, which brings together 6 Russell Group universities in partnership with 9 leading engineering universities in China to achieve both national ambitions in building low carbon economy and manufacturing. Prof Li led the proposal for establishing the transnational consortium. A number of education and research collaboration activities have been organised by the consortium since it was inaugurated in May 2017, including the establishment of the Future Engineers' Leadership and Innovation Academy, which was developed through the UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research (UK-China UCEER) and aims to build UK-China teams to support both countries manufacturing ambitions. The Consortium signed a Joint Declaration at the UK-China High Level People-to-People Dialogue took place in London in December 2017, under the witness by the Vice Premier Madam LIU Yandong from China and Secretary of State Jeremy Hunt. The UCEER will provide an international platform for disseminating the Point-Energy technologies to improve energy efficiency in manufacturing, leading to potential significant impact in the manufacturing industry in both UK and China, in particular for SMEs.
Sectors Education

Energy

Manufacturing

including Industrial Biotechology

URL http://www.qub.ac.uk/research-centres/media/Media,303557,en.pdf
 
Description The polymer industry makes a major contribution to the UK economy, and extrusion is a fundamental polymer processing stage. However, considerable waste of both energy and raw materials can occur during lengthy change-over and start-up periods, and conservative operating conditions make this situation worse. Furthermore, the extrusion process is highly complex, and incomplete melting of the polymer may occur at inappropriate processing conditions that give rise to poor mixing and localised hot and cold spots, which in turn lead to pulsations in the throughput. The aims of this research were to advance the state of the art in monitoring and control of polymer extrusion so as to reduce set-up times, waste and energy consumption and improve product quality. Considerable achievements have been made and all the new developments have taken into account in the industrial environment, and close collaborations with other leading research groups in the UK and with local industrial companies have created the potential of direct application of the techniques developed to maximize the impact. Theoretical results have been published in high quality peer reviewed journals, and in leading conferences. The publication record (11 journal papers and 16 conference papers, together with 1 PhD thesis, 1 MEng final year project report, and a few more in the pipeline), the award of an international conference prize, and a number of invited seminars and presentations have very effectively demonstrated the high quality of the research outputs. Further, two follow-on projected have been secured for knowledge transfer and potential commercialization of the technologies developed through the project. The polymer industry makes a major contribution to the UK economy, and extrusion is a fundamental polymer processing stage. However, considerable waste of both energy and raw materials can occur during lengthy change-over and start-up periods, and conservative operating conditions make this situation worse. Furthermore, the extrusion process is highly complex, and incomplete melting of the polymer may occur at inappropriate processing conditions that give rise to poor mixing and localised hot and cold spots, which in turn lead to pulsations in the throughput. As the key melt indicator, viscosity is difficult to monitor online, and as a result of this and the process characteristics described it is difficult to control the quality of an extrudate material and hence the final product. The aims of this research were to advance the state of the art in monitoring and control of polymer extrusion so as to reduce set-up times, waste and energy consumption and improve product quality. Considerable achievements have been made, new technologies developed have taken into account the industrial environment, and close collaborations with other leading research groups in the UK and with local industrial companies have created the potential of direct application of the techniques developed to maximize the impact. Theoretical results have been published in high quality peer reviewed journals, such as Polymer Engineering and Science, Control Engineering Practice, IEEE Transactions on Fuzzy Systems, and Journal of Process Control, and in leading conferences. The publication record (11 journal papers and 16 conference papers, together with 1 PhD thesis , 1 MEng final year project report, and a few more in the pipeline), the award of an international conference prize, and a number of invited seminars and presentations have very effectively demonstrated the high quality of the research outputs. Further, two immediate follow-on projects funded by Knowledge Transfer Partnership of TSB and Invest Northern Ireland have been secured for knowledge transfer and potential commercialization of the technologies developed through the project. The research has also led to 6 further funded projects which have generated wide impacts and significantly enhanced the international profile and visibility of the research outcomes. Beneficiaries: Both academics and plastics industrial companies Contribution Method: Considerable achievements have been made: 1) We have investigated the pressure model incorporating changes in the machine/die and material properties. 2) We have developed a model identification procedure based on grey-box modelling with a genetic algorithm for viscosity modelling, and further improved a soft sensor approach with a feedback structure to enable the online adaptability of the viscosity model. 3) We have developed a model free fuzzy controller to minimize the variation in melt pressure and temperature. 4) We have developed torque signal acquisition methods and investigated an inferential monitoring approach to the screw load torque signal in an extruder. 5) We have developed a nonlinear model to predict the die melt temperature profile. The model was then used to identify the effects of individual processing parameters on the die melt flow homogeneity and to further identify the optimal process settings to minimise melt temperature variance across the melt flow. 6) We have explored energy constraints and developed a strategy for responding to process instabilities. We have further developed a fuzzy controller for the control of the polymer melt quality including viscosity. 7) We have developed a novel nonlinear multivariate statistical approach based on neural networks for fault detection in polymer processing. 8) We have further proposed novel algorithms for the construction of neural networks and fuzzy neural systems, and nonlinear system modelling and classification. All these new developments have taken into account the industrial application environment, and close collaborations with other leading research groups in the UK and local industrial companies have created a potential of the direct application of the techniques developed to maximize the impact. Theoretical results have been published in high quality peer reviewed journals, such as Polymer Engineering and Science, Control Engineering Practice, IEEE Transactions on Fuzzy Systems, and Journal of Process Control, and in leading conferences. The publication record (11 journal papers and 16 conference papers, together with 1 PhD thesis , 1 MEng final year project report, and a few more in the pipeline), the award of an international conference prize, and a number of invited seminars and presentations have very effectively demonstrated the high quality of the research outputs. The research outcome has led to the development of a new generation of energy monitoring systems for energy intensive industry, and the new technology has won several awards, including 1) Invent2016 Category Winner, Point Energy Technology, Invent 2016, NISP CONNECT, Sept 29, 2016; 2) Finalist, Point Energy Technology, SEAI Sustainable Energy Awards 2016, 2016; 3) Institute of Measurement and Control ICI Prize, for the best paper published in Transactions in 2014, 'Low-cost process monitoring for polymer extrusion'; 4) Third prize, 2012 China (International) Transducer & Sensor Innovation Contest. The technology has attracted a number of interests from public and industry as well as angle investors, and the technology is currently used in several industrial companies from polymer processing to food processing (http://www.pointenergy.org/),
First Year Of Impact 2015
Sector Energy,Manufacturing, including Industrial Biotechology
Impact Types Societal

Economic

 
Description 2018 UK-China (Chongqing) Knowledge Exploitation and Standardization Forum
Geographic Reach Asia 
Policy Influence Type Influenced training of practitioners or researchers
URL http://ukchinaconsortium.com/chongqing-conferenceworkshop
 
Description UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research
Geographic Reach Multiple continents/international 
Policy Influence Type Influenced training of practitioners or researchers
Impact Establishment of the UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research in 2017, the first of its kind between UK and China. The consortium brings together 15 leading universities from UK and China to tackle the global challenges in sustainable energy and intelligent manufacturing, as one of the two education statements signed at the UK-China high-level people-to-people dialogue held in London in December 2017. Future Engineers' Leadership and Innovation Academy was established, which was developed through the UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research (UK-China UCEER) and aims to build UK-China teams to support both countries' manufacturing ambitions. First batch of 26 PhD students from across the Consortium met in Beijing in Nov 2017 to develop new technical and creative skills that will help them to solve global challenges. Working together in transnational teams the students have applied their innovation and leadership skills to topics such as disaster management using unmanned aerial vehicles. This is the first step in building enhanced transnational PhD educational opportunities between the UK and China in engineering. Jazreel Goh, Director Education China at the British Council, said: "The UK and China have a long history of education collaboration. Indeed, with more than 275 joint programmes and institutes, the UK and China are world-leading partners in transnational education. But if we want to take forward our shared ambitions of increasing international collaboration, accelerating the growth of world-class universities, and boosting our engineering capacity, we need to look beyond institution-to-institution partnerships. With the establishment of the UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research we have taken a significant step towards making those ambitions a reality and initiating a new era in UK-China education collaboration." Vivienne Stern, Director of Universities UK International, commented: "Universities UK welcome the provision of funding from the Department of Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy to support innovative initiatives in China such as this transnational Consortium. Having worked with BEIS and the British Council to design and secure funding for this initiative it is fantastic to see Queen's University Belfast and their partner UK universities success in delivering this programme, which promises to create long term benefit for both countries."
URL http://www.ukchinaengineering.com/
 
Description UK-China workshop on shaping a low carbon energy future
Geographic Reach Multiple continents/international 
Policy Influence Type Influenced training of practitioners or researchers
Impact The UK-China workshop on 'Shaping low carbon energy future', in junction with workshops on 'Intelligent computing and control for networked systems' & 'Smart grids and electric vehicles'', provided unique and exciting opportunities for researchers and industrialists worldwide, in particular early career researchers from UK and China to work together to generate innovative ideas for shaping low carbon energy future, which aimed to eventually generate impacts and benefit the society, in particular poor populations which still suffer from fuel poverty and poor access to bulk power. This was achieved via knowledge sharing, brain-storming, knowledge transfer trainings and social networking events. It contributed to the capacity building of early career researchers through mentoring scheme and training, and encouraged high-impact joint publications and help to foster long-term collaborations of researchers and industrialists through joint application of research grants and formation of a research consortium. Ultimately, it will help achieve the strategic plan of developing all around UK-China collaborations in science and technology in delivering impact, shaping capability and training future leaders. Attendees also include Consul General and Minister Counsellor from Chinese Embassy and NSFC Head of Department, who have since the workshop promoted the UK-China partnership on energy research. The workshop has trained a number of early career researchers, and a network has been established among attendees.
URL http://ukchinaenergy.com/
 
Description ICURe Innovation to Commercialisation
Amount £35,000 (GBP)
Funding ID 514603902 
Organisation Innovate UK 
Sector Public
Country United Kingdom
Start  
 
Description KTP project -'To embed in-house electronic software and hardware capability'
Amount £125,787 (GBP)
Funding ID KTP008909 
Organisation Innovate UK 
Sector Public
Country United Kingdom
Start 12/2012 
End 11/2014
 
Description Optimising energy management in industry ('OPTEMIN')
Amount £1,640,000 (GBP)
Funding ID EP/P004636/1 
Organisation Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) 
Sector Public
Country United Kingdom
Start 12/2016 
End 11/2019
 
Description Optimising energy management in industry ('OPTEMIN2')
Amount £1,640,000 (GBP)
Funding ID EP/P004636/1 
Organisation Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) 
Sector Public
Country United Kingdom
Start 12/2016 
End 11/2019
 
Description Proof of Concept Project: Integrating energy efficiency monitoring, control and optimization for plastics industry
Amount £106,000 (GBP)
Funding ID POC333 
Organisation Invest Northern Ireland 
Sector Public
Country United Kingdom
Start 03/2013 
End 01/2015
 
Description UK Consortium for the collaboration with Chinese Excellence League (E9) Group of Universities", UK-China Knowledge Economy Education Partnership
Amount £200,000 (GBP)
Organisation Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy 
Sector Public
Country United Kingdom
Start  
 
Description UK Consortium for the collaboration with Chinese Excellence League (E9) Group of Universities, UK-China Knowledge Economy Education Partnership
Amount £700,000 (GBP)
Funding ID P-CHN1-180053 
Organisation Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy 
Sector Public
Country United Kingdom
Start 02/2017 
End 02/2021
 
Description UK-China knowledge consortium on energy and manufacturing
Amount £7,000 (GBP)
Organisation British Council 
Sector Charity/Non Profit
Country United Kingdom
Start 05/2018 
End 03/2019
 
Title Low-cost process monitoring for polymer extrusion 
Description Polymer extrusion is regarded as an energy-intensive production process, and the real-time monitoring of both energy consumption and melt quality has become necessary to meet new carbon regulations and survive in the highly competitive plastics market. The use of a power meter is a simple and easy way to monitor energy, but the cost can sometimes be high. On the other hand, viscosity is regarded as one of the key indicators of melt quality in the polymer extrusion process. Unfortunately, viscosity cannot be measured directly using current sensory technology. The employment of on-line, in-line or off-line rheometers is sometimes useful, but these instruments either involve signal delay or cause flow restrictions to the extrusion process, which is obviously not suitable for real-time monitoring and control in practice. In this paper, simple and accurate real-time energy monitoring methods are developed. This is achieved by looking inside the controller, and using control variables to calculate the power consumption. For viscosity monitoring, a 'soft-sensor' approach based on an RBF neural network model is developed. The model is obtained through a two-stage selection and differential evolution, enabling compact and accurate solutions for viscosity monitoring. The proposed monitoring methods were tested and validated on a Killion KTS-100 extruder, and the experimental results show high accuracy compared with traditional monitoring approaches 
Type Of Material Technology assay or reagent 
Provided To Others? No  
Impact The method has led to the development of Point Energy technology which has won several awards and currently been implemented in several industrial companies for energy saving. 
URL http://www.pointenergy.org/
 
Title Viscosity inference 
Description A model identification procedure based on grey-box modelling with a genetic algorithm for viscosity modelling, and further improved a soft sensor approach with a feedback structure to enable the online adaptability of the viscosity model in response to modelling errors and disturbances, hence producing a reliable estimate of viscosity. 
Type Of Material Technology assay or reagent 
Year Produced 2012 
Provided To Others? Yes  
Impact Soft sensor technology for measuring the melt viscosity of polymer extrusion has won a Third prize in 2012 China (International) Transducer & Sensor Innovation Contest. 
 
Description Collaboration with Irwin's Bakery 
Organisation Irwin's Bakery
Country United Kingdom 
Sector Private 
PI Contribution Irwin's Bakery commits to providing a contribution 'in-kind' to the project in terms of engineering assistance. This support is £7500. The company have targeted a 10% reduction of energy costs and usage. Therefore Irwin's Bakery provides some funding towards purchases of equipment which will aid the monitoring of energy usage (electrical and gas) across the bakery operations. This funding is £1500.
Collaborator Contribution Our research has led to the development of a series of universal low-cost interface devices that will allow the measurement of a very wide range of data and can be used to provide predictive fault analysis and advice on energy saving. Based on two previous EPSRC and one POC projects, this novel award winning energy and health monitoring system has been developed for polymer processing and can be directly applied to other manufacturing areas. The system monitors energy consumption at deep level through non-invasive sensing technology. No modification to the existing processes is required, providing a flexible and non-intrusive metering solution. The acquired data is sent wirelessly to a remote data server through the 3G/4G network and useful information is extracted. Users can also access their data and key information through a web browser. The main advantage of our system compared to other alternatives is that information at different granularity levels is collected and linked to energy consumption. This provides better insights into energy usage and leads to substantial opportunities to save energy for energy intensive manufacturing industrial sectors. In order to accelerate the impact, we have collaborated with Irwin's Bakery and have deployed the system in the production line, and collected data are fed back to the company, and the company is taking various measures suggested by the team to improve their energy efficiency.
Impact The developed minimal invasive cloud-based energy monitoring system has been installed in Irwin's Bakery and up running for over a half year, and data collected are fed back to the companies, and insightful recommendations are given to the company to improve the energy efficiency which are currently under implementation by the company, The company has set a target to save energy 10%, and this system has paved the way to achieve its target.
Start Year 2015
 
Description Collaboration with Polymer IRC in University of Bradford 
Organisation University of Bradford
Country United Kingdom 
Sector Academic/University 
PI Contribution The project team has established close collaborations with IRC Polymer Process Engineering Laboratory in University of Bradford. The contribution includes the use of the facilities, assistance of experiments, and regular meetings with staffs in IRC. The partner offers access to the facilities for tests, attend regular meetings and give input to joint research publications.
Start Year 2008
 
Description Consultancy work for GSK 
Organisation GlaxoSmithKline (GSK)
Country Global 
Sector Private 
PI Contribution The work on extrusion has attracted the interest from GSK which has requested consultancy work for a new production process where extrusion control is a critical part. The consultancy work has started in 2015, and contract has been signed.
Collaborator Contribution GSK will provide consultancy fee to the university.
Impact Initial meetings and discussions have been made.
Start Year 2015
 
Description Industrial collaboration with Greiner Packaging 
Organisation Greiner Packaging
Country United Kingdom 
Sector Private 
PI Contribution Greiner Packaging in Killyman Road Industrial Estate, DUNGANNON, BT71 6LN, County Tyrone is part of the Greiner Packaging International, one of the leading European packaging producers. The project team has worked closely with Greiner Packaging, and Greiner Packaging has supported the research in a number of ways, including contributing raw materials for testing, and joining regulation meetings and allowing researchers to get access to the facilities in the company and carry out a number of tests. The collaboration with Greiner Packaging Ltd has been intensive, the contributions include contribution of raw polymer materials for experiments, regular meeting with the engineering team in Greiner Packaging, and allowing research team to get access to the facilities for various of tests. The company has also supported the application of a new funding for a Proof of Concept project from Invest Northern Ireland.
Collaborator Contribution Project meeting, access to their processing machines
Impact Energy monitoring for the processing machine installed, and some feedback on machine condition potentially saved them time and money.
Start Year 2008
 
Description UK Consortium for the collaboration with Chinese Excellence League (E9) Group of Universities 
Organisation Beijing Institute of Technology
Country China 
Sector Academic/University 
PI Contribution UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research is the first university consortium co-established by UK and China specializing in engineering education and research. The partnership was set up following a prestigious award by BEIS and administrated by the British Council, which is aimed at building higher education links and helping to improve the quality of engineering research and teaching in China. The consortium is the first of its kind to partner leading UK universities with the top nine engineering research institutions in China. It will be led by Queen's University Belfast, and includes the University of Birmingham, Cardiff University, University College London, The University of Nottingham and The University of Warwick. The secretariat is at Queen's University Belfast. The Chinese universities include Southeast University, Beijing Institute of Technology, Chongqing University, Dalian University of Technology, Harbin Institute of Technology, Northwestern Polytechnical University, South China University of Technology, Tianjin University, and Tongji University. The secretariat is located in Southeast University. During a delegation to Shanghai by Jo Johnson MP in September, the Department of Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy agreed to fund the significant £200,000 award through the British Council with second year follow-on funding of another £200,000.The funding will enable the successful universities to work closely with the top nine engineering institutions in China, which will allow the UK universities to create a critical mass on a cluster of key engineering areas, such as energy and advanced manufacturing, and will help maintain the UK's global standing in light of increasing international competition. It will also allow China to make the transition from a big manufacturer to a manufacturing industry superpower. QUB is the secretariat institution, hosting management team for the consortium, and support all activities on engineering research and collaboration with E9 partner institutions in China, and in addition Queen's University invests £80,000 to support research student and staff mobility to these partner universities in China.
Collaborator Contribution All UK and Chinese partner universities contribute significantly to staff and research student mobility among partner universities in the UK and China University Consortium, organise and host research seminars, and carry out joint research projects. One of the activities is to establish the future Engineers' Leadership and Innovation Academy, which was developed through the UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research (UK-China UCEER) and aims to build UK-China teams to support both countries manufacturing ambitions. The academy received the first batch of 26 PhD students from across the Consortium, and over two weeks period these students met in Beijing to develop new technical and creative skills that will help them to solve global challenges. The Academy is hosted by the Beijing Institute of Technology (BIT) and delivered by staff from Queen's University Belfast and BIT. Working together in transnational teams the students have applied their innovation and leadership skills to topics such as disaster management using unmanned aerial vehicles. This is the first step in building enhanced transnational PhD educational opportunities between the UK and China in engineering.
Impact UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research was established in May 2017, the first of its kind between UK and China. The consortium brings together 18 leading universities from UK and China to tackle the global challenges in sustainable energy and intelligent manufacturing, as one of the two education statements signed at the UK-China high-level people-to-people dialogue held in London in December 2017. The future Engineers' Leadership and Innovation Academy has been established with the first batch of 26 PhD students from across the Consortium met in Beijing in Nov 2017, and over two weeks period these students met in Beijing to develop new technical and creative skills that will help them to solve global challenges. The Academy was hosted by the Beijing Institute of Technology (BIT) and delivered by staff from Queen's University Belfast and BIT. Working together in transnational teams the students have applied their innovation and leadership skills to topics such as disaster management using unmanned aerial vehicles. This is the first step in building enhanced transnational PhD educational opportunities between the UK and China in engineering. The second batch of students attended the Academy in Nov 2018, which began with the President's Forum of the UK-China Consortium on Engineering Education and Research, which brought together Vice-Chancellors and representatives of all the partner universities, and the British Council. The Forum shared ideas on international research and innovation between UK and Chinese universities, as well as collaboration between universities and industry. After the Forum, the students undertook a mini-MBA, delivered by the William J Clinton Leadership Institute from Queen's University Belfast. The course covered finance essentials, marketing strategies, to leading teams, cumulating with a presentation on consultancy task - where groups competed throughout the week. On the following week, they had seminars on design and innovation, as well as a crash course in machine learning and neural networks, run by academics from Southeast University and researchers from Huawei. Throughout this exchange, the group went on several site visits, from industrial parks, research centres, and Huawei's headquarters in Nanjing. Over the weekends, students visited various cultural and historic sites of significance (from the city walls, the Nanjing Museum, Confucius Temple, and the Presidential Palace, as well as country walks). The Academy was a thoroughly insightful experience for both the UK and Chinese students - from viewpoints on engineering education and research, to sharing and learning about each other's culture. Further, a UK-China Knowledge Exploitation Forum was launched in September 2018 in Chongqing, which brought together leading figures from the government, academia and industry to discuss the impact of policy, the role of incubators and catapults, and work out how the consortium can develop mechanisms to facilitate UK-China knowledge transfer collaborations.
Start Year 2017
 
Description UK Consortium for the collaboration with Chinese Excellence League (E9) Group of Universities 
Organisation Cardiff University
Department School of Engineering
Country United Kingdom 
Sector Academic/University 
PI Contribution UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research is the first university consortium co-established by UK and China specializing in engineering education and research. The partnership was set up following a prestigious award by BEIS and administrated by the British Council, which is aimed at building higher education links and helping to improve the quality of engineering research and teaching in China. The consortium is the first of its kind to partner leading UK universities with the top nine engineering research institutions in China. It will be led by Queen's University Belfast, and includes the University of Birmingham, Cardiff University, University College London, The University of Nottingham and The University of Warwick. The secretariat is at Queen's University Belfast. The Chinese universities include Southeast University, Beijing Institute of Technology, Chongqing University, Dalian University of Technology, Harbin Institute of Technology, Northwestern Polytechnical University, South China University of Technology, Tianjin University, and Tongji University. The secretariat is located in Southeast University. During a delegation to Shanghai by Jo Johnson MP in September, the Department of Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy agreed to fund the significant £200,000 award through the British Council with second year follow-on funding of another £200,000.The funding will enable the successful universities to work closely with the top nine engineering institutions in China, which will allow the UK universities to create a critical mass on a cluster of key engineering areas, such as energy and advanced manufacturing, and will help maintain the UK's global standing in light of increasing international competition. It will also allow China to make the transition from a big manufacturer to a manufacturing industry superpower. QUB is the secretariat institution, hosting management team for the consortium, and support all activities on engineering research and collaboration with E9 partner institutions in China, and in addition Queen's University invests £80,000 to support research student and staff mobility to these partner universities in China.
Collaborator Contribution All UK and Chinese partner universities contribute significantly to staff and research student mobility among partner universities in the UK and China University Consortium, organise and host research seminars, and carry out joint research projects. One of the activities is to establish the future Engineers' Leadership and Innovation Academy, which was developed through the UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research (UK-China UCEER) and aims to build UK-China teams to support both countries manufacturing ambitions. The academy received the first batch of 26 PhD students from across the Consortium, and over two weeks period these students met in Beijing to develop new technical and creative skills that will help them to solve global challenges. The Academy is hosted by the Beijing Institute of Technology (BIT) and delivered by staff from Queen's University Belfast and BIT. Working together in transnational teams the students have applied their innovation and leadership skills to topics such as disaster management using unmanned aerial vehicles. This is the first step in building enhanced transnational PhD educational opportunities between the UK and China in engineering.
Impact UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research was established in May 2017, the first of its kind between UK and China. The consortium brings together 18 leading universities from UK and China to tackle the global challenges in sustainable energy and intelligent manufacturing, as one of the two education statements signed at the UK-China high-level people-to-people dialogue held in London in December 2017. The future Engineers' Leadership and Innovation Academy has been established with the first batch of 26 PhD students from across the Consortium met in Beijing in Nov 2017, and over two weeks period these students met in Beijing to develop new technical and creative skills that will help them to solve global challenges. The Academy was hosted by the Beijing Institute of Technology (BIT) and delivered by staff from Queen's University Belfast and BIT. Working together in transnational teams the students have applied their innovation and leadership skills to topics such as disaster management using unmanned aerial vehicles. This is the first step in building enhanced transnational PhD educational opportunities between the UK and China in engineering. The second batch of students attended the Academy in Nov 2018, which began with the President's Forum of the UK-China Consortium on Engineering Education and Research, which brought together Vice-Chancellors and representatives of all the partner universities, and the British Council. The Forum shared ideas on international research and innovation between UK and Chinese universities, as well as collaboration between universities and industry. After the Forum, the students undertook a mini-MBA, delivered by the William J Clinton Leadership Institute from Queen's University Belfast. The course covered finance essentials, marketing strategies, to leading teams, cumulating with a presentation on consultancy task - where groups competed throughout the week. On the following week, they had seminars on design and innovation, as well as a crash course in machine learning and neural networks, run by academics from Southeast University and researchers from Huawei. Throughout this exchange, the group went on several site visits, from industrial parks, research centres, and Huawei's headquarters in Nanjing. Over the weekends, students visited various cultural and historic sites of significance (from the city walls, the Nanjing Museum, Confucius Temple, and the Presidential Palace, as well as country walks). The Academy was a thoroughly insightful experience for both the UK and Chinese students - from viewpoints on engineering education and research, to sharing and learning about each other's culture. Further, a UK-China Knowledge Exploitation Forum was launched in September 2018 in Chongqing, which brought together leading figures from the government, academia and industry to discuss the impact of policy, the role of incubators and catapults, and work out how the consortium can develop mechanisms to facilitate UK-China knowledge transfer collaborations.
Start Year 2017
 
Description UK Consortium for the collaboration with Chinese Excellence League (E9) Group of Universities 
Organisation Chongqing University
Country China 
Sector Academic/University 
PI Contribution UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research is the first university consortium co-established by UK and China specializing in engineering education and research. The partnership was set up following a prestigious award by BEIS and administrated by the British Council, which is aimed at building higher education links and helping to improve the quality of engineering research and teaching in China. The consortium is the first of its kind to partner leading UK universities with the top nine engineering research institutions in China. It will be led by Queen's University Belfast, and includes the University of Birmingham, Cardiff University, University College London, The University of Nottingham and The University of Warwick. The secretariat is at Queen's University Belfast. The Chinese universities include Southeast University, Beijing Institute of Technology, Chongqing University, Dalian University of Technology, Harbin Institute of Technology, Northwestern Polytechnical University, South China University of Technology, Tianjin University, and Tongji University. The secretariat is located in Southeast University. During a delegation to Shanghai by Jo Johnson MP in September, the Department of Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy agreed to fund the significant £200,000 award through the British Council with second year follow-on funding of another £200,000.The funding will enable the successful universities to work closely with the top nine engineering institutions in China, which will allow the UK universities to create a critical mass on a cluster of key engineering areas, such as energy and advanced manufacturing, and will help maintain the UK's global standing in light of increasing international competition. It will also allow China to make the transition from a big manufacturer to a manufacturing industry superpower. QUB is the secretariat institution, hosting management team for the consortium, and support all activities on engineering research and collaboration with E9 partner institutions in China, and in addition Queen's University invests £80,000 to support research student and staff mobility to these partner universities in China.
Collaborator Contribution All UK and Chinese partner universities contribute significantly to staff and research student mobility among partner universities in the UK and China University Consortium, organise and host research seminars, and carry out joint research projects. One of the activities is to establish the future Engineers' Leadership and Innovation Academy, which was developed through the UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research (UK-China UCEER) and aims to build UK-China teams to support both countries manufacturing ambitions. The academy received the first batch of 26 PhD students from across the Consortium, and over two weeks period these students met in Beijing to develop new technical and creative skills that will help them to solve global challenges. The Academy is hosted by the Beijing Institute of Technology (BIT) and delivered by staff from Queen's University Belfast and BIT. Working together in transnational teams the students have applied their innovation and leadership skills to topics such as disaster management using unmanned aerial vehicles. This is the first step in building enhanced transnational PhD educational opportunities between the UK and China in engineering.
Impact UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research was established in May 2017, the first of its kind between UK and China. The consortium brings together 18 leading universities from UK and China to tackle the global challenges in sustainable energy and intelligent manufacturing, as one of the two education statements signed at the UK-China high-level people-to-people dialogue held in London in December 2017. The future Engineers' Leadership and Innovation Academy has been established with the first batch of 26 PhD students from across the Consortium met in Beijing in Nov 2017, and over two weeks period these students met in Beijing to develop new technical and creative skills that will help them to solve global challenges. The Academy was hosted by the Beijing Institute of Technology (BIT) and delivered by staff from Queen's University Belfast and BIT. Working together in transnational teams the students have applied their innovation and leadership skills to topics such as disaster management using unmanned aerial vehicles. This is the first step in building enhanced transnational PhD educational opportunities between the UK and China in engineering. The second batch of students attended the Academy in Nov 2018, which began with the President's Forum of the UK-China Consortium on Engineering Education and Research, which brought together Vice-Chancellors and representatives of all the partner universities, and the British Council. The Forum shared ideas on international research and innovation between UK and Chinese universities, as well as collaboration between universities and industry. After the Forum, the students undertook a mini-MBA, delivered by the William J Clinton Leadership Institute from Queen's University Belfast. The course covered finance essentials, marketing strategies, to leading teams, cumulating with a presentation on consultancy task - where groups competed throughout the week. On the following week, they had seminars on design and innovation, as well as a crash course in machine learning and neural networks, run by academics from Southeast University and researchers from Huawei. Throughout this exchange, the group went on several site visits, from industrial parks, research centres, and Huawei's headquarters in Nanjing. Over the weekends, students visited various cultural and historic sites of significance (from the city walls, the Nanjing Museum, Confucius Temple, and the Presidential Palace, as well as country walks). The Academy was a thoroughly insightful experience for both the UK and Chinese students - from viewpoints on engineering education and research, to sharing and learning about each other's culture. Further, a UK-China Knowledge Exploitation Forum was launched in September 2018 in Chongqing, which brought together leading figures from the government, academia and industry to discuss the impact of policy, the role of incubators and catapults, and work out how the consortium can develop mechanisms to facilitate UK-China knowledge transfer collaborations.
Start Year 2017
 
Description UK Consortium for the collaboration with Chinese Excellence League (E9) Group of Universities 
Organisation Dalian University of Technology
Country China 
Sector Academic/University 
PI Contribution UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research is the first university consortium co-established by UK and China specializing in engineering education and research. The partnership was set up following a prestigious award by BEIS and administrated by the British Council, which is aimed at building higher education links and helping to improve the quality of engineering research and teaching in China. The consortium is the first of its kind to partner leading UK universities with the top nine engineering research institutions in China. It will be led by Queen's University Belfast, and includes the University of Birmingham, Cardiff University, University College London, The University of Nottingham and The University of Warwick. The secretariat is at Queen's University Belfast. The Chinese universities include Southeast University, Beijing Institute of Technology, Chongqing University, Dalian University of Technology, Harbin Institute of Technology, Northwestern Polytechnical University, South China University of Technology, Tianjin University, and Tongji University. The secretariat is located in Southeast University. During a delegation to Shanghai by Jo Johnson MP in September, the Department of Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy agreed to fund the significant £200,000 award through the British Council with second year follow-on funding of another £200,000.The funding will enable the successful universities to work closely with the top nine engineering institutions in China, which will allow the UK universities to create a critical mass on a cluster of key engineering areas, such as energy and advanced manufacturing, and will help maintain the UK's global standing in light of increasing international competition. It will also allow China to make the transition from a big manufacturer to a manufacturing industry superpower. QUB is the secretariat institution, hosting management team for the consortium, and support all activities on engineering research and collaboration with E9 partner institutions in China, and in addition Queen's University invests £80,000 to support research student and staff mobility to these partner universities in China.
Collaborator Contribution All UK and Chinese partner universities contribute significantly to staff and research student mobility among partner universities in the UK and China University Consortium, organise and host research seminars, and carry out joint research projects. One of the activities is to establish the future Engineers' Leadership and Innovation Academy, which was developed through the UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research (UK-China UCEER) and aims to build UK-China teams to support both countries manufacturing ambitions. The academy received the first batch of 26 PhD students from across the Consortium, and over two weeks period these students met in Beijing to develop new technical and creative skills that will help them to solve global challenges. The Academy is hosted by the Beijing Institute of Technology (BIT) and delivered by staff from Queen's University Belfast and BIT. Working together in transnational teams the students have applied their innovation and leadership skills to topics such as disaster management using unmanned aerial vehicles. This is the first step in building enhanced transnational PhD educational opportunities between the UK and China in engineering.
Impact UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research was established in May 2017, the first of its kind between UK and China. The consortium brings together 18 leading universities from UK and China to tackle the global challenges in sustainable energy and intelligent manufacturing, as one of the two education statements signed at the UK-China high-level people-to-people dialogue held in London in December 2017. The future Engineers' Leadership and Innovation Academy has been established with the first batch of 26 PhD students from across the Consortium met in Beijing in Nov 2017, and over two weeks period these students met in Beijing to develop new technical and creative skills that will help them to solve global challenges. The Academy was hosted by the Beijing Institute of Technology (BIT) and delivered by staff from Queen's University Belfast and BIT. Working together in transnational teams the students have applied their innovation and leadership skills to topics such as disaster management using unmanned aerial vehicles. This is the first step in building enhanced transnational PhD educational opportunities between the UK and China in engineering. The second batch of students attended the Academy in Nov 2018, which began with the President's Forum of the UK-China Consortium on Engineering Education and Research, which brought together Vice-Chancellors and representatives of all the partner universities, and the British Council. The Forum shared ideas on international research and innovation between UK and Chinese universities, as well as collaboration between universities and industry. After the Forum, the students undertook a mini-MBA, delivered by the William J Clinton Leadership Institute from Queen's University Belfast. The course covered finance essentials, marketing strategies, to leading teams, cumulating with a presentation on consultancy task - where groups competed throughout the week. On the following week, they had seminars on design and innovation, as well as a crash course in machine learning and neural networks, run by academics from Southeast University and researchers from Huawei. Throughout this exchange, the group went on several site visits, from industrial parks, research centres, and Huawei's headquarters in Nanjing. Over the weekends, students visited various cultural and historic sites of significance (from the city walls, the Nanjing Museum, Confucius Temple, and the Presidential Palace, as well as country walks). The Academy was a thoroughly insightful experience for both the UK and Chinese students - from viewpoints on engineering education and research, to sharing and learning about each other's culture. Further, a UK-China Knowledge Exploitation Forum was launched in September 2018 in Chongqing, which brought together leading figures from the government, academia and industry to discuss the impact of policy, the role of incubators and catapults, and work out how the consortium can develop mechanisms to facilitate UK-China knowledge transfer collaborations.
Start Year 2017
 
Description UK Consortium for the collaboration with Chinese Excellence League (E9) Group of Universities 
Organisation Harbin Institute of Technology
Country China 
Sector Academic/University 
PI Contribution UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research is the first university consortium co-established by UK and China specializing in engineering education and research. The partnership was set up following a prestigious award by BEIS and administrated by the British Council, which is aimed at building higher education links and helping to improve the quality of engineering research and teaching in China. The consortium is the first of its kind to partner leading UK universities with the top nine engineering research institutions in China. It will be led by Queen's University Belfast, and includes the University of Birmingham, Cardiff University, University College London, The University of Nottingham and The University of Warwick. The secretariat is at Queen's University Belfast. The Chinese universities include Southeast University, Beijing Institute of Technology, Chongqing University, Dalian University of Technology, Harbin Institute of Technology, Northwestern Polytechnical University, South China University of Technology, Tianjin University, and Tongji University. The secretariat is located in Southeast University. During a delegation to Shanghai by Jo Johnson MP in September, the Department of Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy agreed to fund the significant £200,000 award through the British Council with second year follow-on funding of another £200,000.The funding will enable the successful universities to work closely with the top nine engineering institutions in China, which will allow the UK universities to create a critical mass on a cluster of key engineering areas, such as energy and advanced manufacturing, and will help maintain the UK's global standing in light of increasing international competition. It will also allow China to make the transition from a big manufacturer to a manufacturing industry superpower. QUB is the secretariat institution, hosting management team for the consortium, and support all activities on engineering research and collaboration with E9 partner institutions in China, and in addition Queen's University invests £80,000 to support research student and staff mobility to these partner universities in China.
Collaborator Contribution All UK and Chinese partner universities contribute significantly to staff and research student mobility among partner universities in the UK and China University Consortium, organise and host research seminars, and carry out joint research projects. One of the activities is to establish the future Engineers' Leadership and Innovation Academy, which was developed through the UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research (UK-China UCEER) and aims to build UK-China teams to support both countries manufacturing ambitions. The academy received the first batch of 26 PhD students from across the Consortium, and over two weeks period these students met in Beijing to develop new technical and creative skills that will help them to solve global challenges. The Academy is hosted by the Beijing Institute of Technology (BIT) and delivered by staff from Queen's University Belfast and BIT. Working together in transnational teams the students have applied their innovation and leadership skills to topics such as disaster management using unmanned aerial vehicles. This is the first step in building enhanced transnational PhD educational opportunities between the UK and China in engineering.
Impact UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research was established in May 2017, the first of its kind between UK and China. The consortium brings together 18 leading universities from UK and China to tackle the global challenges in sustainable energy and intelligent manufacturing, as one of the two education statements signed at the UK-China high-level people-to-people dialogue held in London in December 2017. The future Engineers' Leadership and Innovation Academy has been established with the first batch of 26 PhD students from across the Consortium met in Beijing in Nov 2017, and over two weeks period these students met in Beijing to develop new technical and creative skills that will help them to solve global challenges. The Academy was hosted by the Beijing Institute of Technology (BIT) and delivered by staff from Queen's University Belfast and BIT. Working together in transnational teams the students have applied their innovation and leadership skills to topics such as disaster management using unmanned aerial vehicles. This is the first step in building enhanced transnational PhD educational opportunities between the UK and China in engineering. The second batch of students attended the Academy in Nov 2018, which began with the President's Forum of the UK-China Consortium on Engineering Education and Research, which brought together Vice-Chancellors and representatives of all the partner universities, and the British Council. The Forum shared ideas on international research and innovation between UK and Chinese universities, as well as collaboration between universities and industry. After the Forum, the students undertook a mini-MBA, delivered by the William J Clinton Leadership Institute from Queen's University Belfast. The course covered finance essentials, marketing strategies, to leading teams, cumulating with a presentation on consultancy task - where groups competed throughout the week. On the following week, they had seminars on design and innovation, as well as a crash course in machine learning and neural networks, run by academics from Southeast University and researchers from Huawei. Throughout this exchange, the group went on several site visits, from industrial parks, research centres, and Huawei's headquarters in Nanjing. Over the weekends, students visited various cultural and historic sites of significance (from the city walls, the Nanjing Museum, Confucius Temple, and the Presidential Palace, as well as country walks). The Academy was a thoroughly insightful experience for both the UK and Chinese students - from viewpoints on engineering education and research, to sharing and learning about each other's culture. Further, a UK-China Knowledge Exploitation Forum was launched in September 2018 in Chongqing, which brought together leading figures from the government, academia and industry to discuss the impact of policy, the role of incubators and catapults, and work out how the consortium can develop mechanisms to facilitate UK-China knowledge transfer collaborations.
Start Year 2017
 
Description UK Consortium for the collaboration with Chinese Excellence League (E9) Group of Universities 
Organisation Northwestern Polytechnical University
Country China 
Sector Academic/University 
PI Contribution UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research is the first university consortium co-established by UK and China specializing in engineering education and research. The partnership was set up following a prestigious award by BEIS and administrated by the British Council, which is aimed at building higher education links and helping to improve the quality of engineering research and teaching in China. The consortium is the first of its kind to partner leading UK universities with the top nine engineering research institutions in China. It will be led by Queen's University Belfast, and includes the University of Birmingham, Cardiff University, University College London, The University of Nottingham and The University of Warwick. The secretariat is at Queen's University Belfast. The Chinese universities include Southeast University, Beijing Institute of Technology, Chongqing University, Dalian University of Technology, Harbin Institute of Technology, Northwestern Polytechnical University, South China University of Technology, Tianjin University, and Tongji University. The secretariat is located in Southeast University. During a delegation to Shanghai by Jo Johnson MP in September, the Department of Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy agreed to fund the significant £200,000 award through the British Council with second year follow-on funding of another £200,000.The funding will enable the successful universities to work closely with the top nine engineering institutions in China, which will allow the UK universities to create a critical mass on a cluster of key engineering areas, such as energy and advanced manufacturing, and will help maintain the UK's global standing in light of increasing international competition. It will also allow China to make the transition from a big manufacturer to a manufacturing industry superpower. QUB is the secretariat institution, hosting management team for the consortium, and support all activities on engineering research and collaboration with E9 partner institutions in China, and in addition Queen's University invests £80,000 to support research student and staff mobility to these partner universities in China.
Collaborator Contribution All UK and Chinese partner universities contribute significantly to staff and research student mobility among partner universities in the UK and China University Consortium, organise and host research seminars, and carry out joint research projects. One of the activities is to establish the future Engineers' Leadership and Innovation Academy, which was developed through the UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research (UK-China UCEER) and aims to build UK-China teams to support both countries manufacturing ambitions. The academy received the first batch of 26 PhD students from across the Consortium, and over two weeks period these students met in Beijing to develop new technical and creative skills that will help them to solve global challenges. The Academy is hosted by the Beijing Institute of Technology (BIT) and delivered by staff from Queen's University Belfast and BIT. Working together in transnational teams the students have applied their innovation and leadership skills to topics such as disaster management using unmanned aerial vehicles. This is the first step in building enhanced transnational PhD educational opportunities between the UK and China in engineering.
Impact UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research was established in May 2017, the first of its kind between UK and China. The consortium brings together 18 leading universities from UK and China to tackle the global challenges in sustainable energy and intelligent manufacturing, as one of the two education statements signed at the UK-China high-level people-to-people dialogue held in London in December 2017. The future Engineers' Leadership and Innovation Academy has been established with the first batch of 26 PhD students from across the Consortium met in Beijing in Nov 2017, and over two weeks period these students met in Beijing to develop new technical and creative skills that will help them to solve global challenges. The Academy was hosted by the Beijing Institute of Technology (BIT) and delivered by staff from Queen's University Belfast and BIT. Working together in transnational teams the students have applied their innovation and leadership skills to topics such as disaster management using unmanned aerial vehicles. This is the first step in building enhanced transnational PhD educational opportunities between the UK and China in engineering. The second batch of students attended the Academy in Nov 2018, which began with the President's Forum of the UK-China Consortium on Engineering Education and Research, which brought together Vice-Chancellors and representatives of all the partner universities, and the British Council. The Forum shared ideas on international research and innovation between UK and Chinese universities, as well as collaboration between universities and industry. After the Forum, the students undertook a mini-MBA, delivered by the William J Clinton Leadership Institute from Queen's University Belfast. The course covered finance essentials, marketing strategies, to leading teams, cumulating with a presentation on consultancy task - where groups competed throughout the week. On the following week, they had seminars on design and innovation, as well as a crash course in machine learning and neural networks, run by academics from Southeast University and researchers from Huawei. Throughout this exchange, the group went on several site visits, from industrial parks, research centres, and Huawei's headquarters in Nanjing. Over the weekends, students visited various cultural and historic sites of significance (from the city walls, the Nanjing Museum, Confucius Temple, and the Presidential Palace, as well as country walks). The Academy was a thoroughly insightful experience for both the UK and Chinese students - from viewpoints on engineering education and research, to sharing and learning about each other's culture. Further, a UK-China Knowledge Exploitation Forum was launched in September 2018 in Chongqing, which brought together leading figures from the government, academia and industry to discuss the impact of policy, the role of incubators and catapults, and work out how the consortium can develop mechanisms to facilitate UK-China knowledge transfer collaborations.
Start Year 2017
 
Description UK Consortium for the collaboration with Chinese Excellence League (E9) Group of Universities 
Organisation South China University of Technology
Country China 
Sector Academic/University 
PI Contribution UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research is the first university consortium co-established by UK and China specializing in engineering education and research. The partnership was set up following a prestigious award by BEIS and administrated by the British Council, which is aimed at building higher education links and helping to improve the quality of engineering research and teaching in China. The consortium is the first of its kind to partner leading UK universities with the top nine engineering research institutions in China. It will be led by Queen's University Belfast, and includes the University of Birmingham, Cardiff University, University College London, The University of Nottingham and The University of Warwick. The secretariat is at Queen's University Belfast. The Chinese universities include Southeast University, Beijing Institute of Technology, Chongqing University, Dalian University of Technology, Harbin Institute of Technology, Northwestern Polytechnical University, South China University of Technology, Tianjin University, and Tongji University. The secretariat is located in Southeast University. During a delegation to Shanghai by Jo Johnson MP in September, the Department of Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy agreed to fund the significant £200,000 award through the British Council with second year follow-on funding of another £200,000.The funding will enable the successful universities to work closely with the top nine engineering institutions in China, which will allow the UK universities to create a critical mass on a cluster of key engineering areas, such as energy and advanced manufacturing, and will help maintain the UK's global standing in light of increasing international competition. It will also allow China to make the transition from a big manufacturer to a manufacturing industry superpower. QUB is the secretariat institution, hosting management team for the consortium, and support all activities on engineering research and collaboration with E9 partner institutions in China, and in addition Queen's University invests £80,000 to support research student and staff mobility to these partner universities in China.
Collaborator Contribution All UK and Chinese partner universities contribute significantly to staff and research student mobility among partner universities in the UK and China University Consortium, organise and host research seminars, and carry out joint research projects. One of the activities is to establish the future Engineers' Leadership and Innovation Academy, which was developed through the UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research (UK-China UCEER) and aims to build UK-China teams to support both countries manufacturing ambitions. The academy received the first batch of 26 PhD students from across the Consortium, and over two weeks period these students met in Beijing to develop new technical and creative skills that will help them to solve global challenges. The Academy is hosted by the Beijing Institute of Technology (BIT) and delivered by staff from Queen's University Belfast and BIT. Working together in transnational teams the students have applied their innovation and leadership skills to topics such as disaster management using unmanned aerial vehicles. This is the first step in building enhanced transnational PhD educational opportunities between the UK and China in engineering.
Impact UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research was established in May 2017, the first of its kind between UK and China. The consortium brings together 18 leading universities from UK and China to tackle the global challenges in sustainable energy and intelligent manufacturing, as one of the two education statements signed at the UK-China high-level people-to-people dialogue held in London in December 2017. The future Engineers' Leadership and Innovation Academy has been established with the first batch of 26 PhD students from across the Consortium met in Beijing in Nov 2017, and over two weeks period these students met in Beijing to develop new technical and creative skills that will help them to solve global challenges. The Academy was hosted by the Beijing Institute of Technology (BIT) and delivered by staff from Queen's University Belfast and BIT. Working together in transnational teams the students have applied their innovation and leadership skills to topics such as disaster management using unmanned aerial vehicles. This is the first step in building enhanced transnational PhD educational opportunities between the UK and China in engineering. The second batch of students attended the Academy in Nov 2018, which began with the President's Forum of the UK-China Consortium on Engineering Education and Research, which brought together Vice-Chancellors and representatives of all the partner universities, and the British Council. The Forum shared ideas on international research and innovation between UK and Chinese universities, as well as collaboration between universities and industry. After the Forum, the students undertook a mini-MBA, delivered by the William J Clinton Leadership Institute from Queen's University Belfast. The course covered finance essentials, marketing strategies, to leading teams, cumulating with a presentation on consultancy task - where groups competed throughout the week. On the following week, they had seminars on design and innovation, as well as a crash course in machine learning and neural networks, run by academics from Southeast University and researchers from Huawei. Throughout this exchange, the group went on several site visits, from industrial parks, research centres, and Huawei's headquarters in Nanjing. Over the weekends, students visited various cultural and historic sites of significance (from the city walls, the Nanjing Museum, Confucius Temple, and the Presidential Palace, as well as country walks). The Academy was a thoroughly insightful experience for both the UK and Chinese students - from viewpoints on engineering education and research, to sharing and learning about each other's culture. Further, a UK-China Knowledge Exploitation Forum was launched in September 2018 in Chongqing, which brought together leading figures from the government, academia and industry to discuss the impact of policy, the role of incubators and catapults, and work out how the consortium can develop mechanisms to facilitate UK-China knowledge transfer collaborations.
Start Year 2017
 
Description UK Consortium for the collaboration with Chinese Excellence League (E9) Group of Universities 
Organisation Southeast University China
Country China 
Sector Academic/University 
PI Contribution UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research is the first university consortium co-established by UK and China specializing in engineering education and research. The partnership was set up following a prestigious award by BEIS and administrated by the British Council, which is aimed at building higher education links and helping to improve the quality of engineering research and teaching in China. The consortium is the first of its kind to partner leading UK universities with the top nine engineering research institutions in China. It will be led by Queen's University Belfast, and includes the University of Birmingham, Cardiff University, University College London, The University of Nottingham and The University of Warwick. The secretariat is at Queen's University Belfast. The Chinese universities include Southeast University, Beijing Institute of Technology, Chongqing University, Dalian University of Technology, Harbin Institute of Technology, Northwestern Polytechnical University, South China University of Technology, Tianjin University, and Tongji University. The secretariat is located in Southeast University. During a delegation to Shanghai by Jo Johnson MP in September, the Department of Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy agreed to fund the significant £200,000 award through the British Council with second year follow-on funding of another £200,000.The funding will enable the successful universities to work closely with the top nine engineering institutions in China, which will allow the UK universities to create a critical mass on a cluster of key engineering areas, such as energy and advanced manufacturing, and will help maintain the UK's global standing in light of increasing international competition. It will also allow China to make the transition from a big manufacturer to a manufacturing industry superpower. QUB is the secretariat institution, hosting management team for the consortium, and support all activities on engineering research and collaboration with E9 partner institutions in China, and in addition Queen's University invests £80,000 to support research student and staff mobility to these partner universities in China.
Collaborator Contribution All UK and Chinese partner universities contribute significantly to staff and research student mobility among partner universities in the UK and China University Consortium, organise and host research seminars, and carry out joint research projects. One of the activities is to establish the future Engineers' Leadership and Innovation Academy, which was developed through the UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research (UK-China UCEER) and aims to build UK-China teams to support both countries manufacturing ambitions. The academy received the first batch of 26 PhD students from across the Consortium, and over two weeks period these students met in Beijing to develop new technical and creative skills that will help them to solve global challenges. The Academy is hosted by the Beijing Institute of Technology (BIT) and delivered by staff from Queen's University Belfast and BIT. Working together in transnational teams the students have applied their innovation and leadership skills to topics such as disaster management using unmanned aerial vehicles. This is the first step in building enhanced transnational PhD educational opportunities between the UK and China in engineering.
Impact UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research was established in May 2017, the first of its kind between UK and China. The consortium brings together 18 leading universities from UK and China to tackle the global challenges in sustainable energy and intelligent manufacturing, as one of the two education statements signed at the UK-China high-level people-to-people dialogue held in London in December 2017. The future Engineers' Leadership and Innovation Academy has been established with the first batch of 26 PhD students from across the Consortium met in Beijing in Nov 2017, and over two weeks period these students met in Beijing to develop new technical and creative skills that will help them to solve global challenges. The Academy was hosted by the Beijing Institute of Technology (BIT) and delivered by staff from Queen's University Belfast and BIT. Working together in transnational teams the students have applied their innovation and leadership skills to topics such as disaster management using unmanned aerial vehicles. This is the first step in building enhanced transnational PhD educational opportunities between the UK and China in engineering. The second batch of students attended the Academy in Nov 2018, which began with the President's Forum of the UK-China Consortium on Engineering Education and Research, which brought together Vice-Chancellors and representatives of all the partner universities, and the British Council. The Forum shared ideas on international research and innovation between UK and Chinese universities, as well as collaboration between universities and industry. After the Forum, the students undertook a mini-MBA, delivered by the William J Clinton Leadership Institute from Queen's University Belfast. The course covered finance essentials, marketing strategies, to leading teams, cumulating with a presentation on consultancy task - where groups competed throughout the week. On the following week, they had seminars on design and innovation, as well as a crash course in machine learning and neural networks, run by academics from Southeast University and researchers from Huawei. Throughout this exchange, the group went on several site visits, from industrial parks, research centres, and Huawei's headquarters in Nanjing. Over the weekends, students visited various cultural and historic sites of significance (from the city walls, the Nanjing Museum, Confucius Temple, and the Presidential Palace, as well as country walks). The Academy was a thoroughly insightful experience for both the UK and Chinese students - from viewpoints on engineering education and research, to sharing and learning about each other's culture. Further, a UK-China Knowledge Exploitation Forum was launched in September 2018 in Chongqing, which brought together leading figures from the government, academia and industry to discuss the impact of policy, the role of incubators and catapults, and work out how the consortium can develop mechanisms to facilitate UK-China knowledge transfer collaborations.
Start Year 2017
 
Description UK Consortium for the collaboration with Chinese Excellence League (E9) Group of Universities 
Organisation Tianjin University
Country China 
Sector Academic/University 
PI Contribution UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research is the first university consortium co-established by UK and China specializing in engineering education and research. The partnership was set up following a prestigious award by BEIS and administrated by the British Council, which is aimed at building higher education links and helping to improve the quality of engineering research and teaching in China. The consortium is the first of its kind to partner leading UK universities with the top nine engineering research institutions in China. It will be led by Queen's University Belfast, and includes the University of Birmingham, Cardiff University, University College London, The University of Nottingham and The University of Warwick. The secretariat is at Queen's University Belfast. The Chinese universities include Southeast University, Beijing Institute of Technology, Chongqing University, Dalian University of Technology, Harbin Institute of Technology, Northwestern Polytechnical University, South China University of Technology, Tianjin University, and Tongji University. The secretariat is located in Southeast University. During a delegation to Shanghai by Jo Johnson MP in September, the Department of Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy agreed to fund the significant £200,000 award through the British Council with second year follow-on funding of another £200,000.The funding will enable the successful universities to work closely with the top nine engineering institutions in China, which will allow the UK universities to create a critical mass on a cluster of key engineering areas, such as energy and advanced manufacturing, and will help maintain the UK's global standing in light of increasing international competition. It will also allow China to make the transition from a big manufacturer to a manufacturing industry superpower. QUB is the secretariat institution, hosting management team for the consortium, and support all activities on engineering research and collaboration with E9 partner institutions in China, and in addition Queen's University invests £80,000 to support research student and staff mobility to these partner universities in China.
Collaborator Contribution All UK and Chinese partner universities contribute significantly to staff and research student mobility among partner universities in the UK and China University Consortium, organise and host research seminars, and carry out joint research projects. One of the activities is to establish the future Engineers' Leadership and Innovation Academy, which was developed through the UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research (UK-China UCEER) and aims to build UK-China teams to support both countries manufacturing ambitions. The academy received the first batch of 26 PhD students from across the Consortium, and over two weeks period these students met in Beijing to develop new technical and creative skills that will help them to solve global challenges. The Academy is hosted by the Beijing Institute of Technology (BIT) and delivered by staff from Queen's University Belfast and BIT. Working together in transnational teams the students have applied their innovation and leadership skills to topics such as disaster management using unmanned aerial vehicles. This is the first step in building enhanced transnational PhD educational opportunities between the UK and China in engineering.
Impact UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research was established in May 2017, the first of its kind between UK and China. The consortium brings together 18 leading universities from UK and China to tackle the global challenges in sustainable energy and intelligent manufacturing, as one of the two education statements signed at the UK-China high-level people-to-people dialogue held in London in December 2017. The future Engineers' Leadership and Innovation Academy has been established with the first batch of 26 PhD students from across the Consortium met in Beijing in Nov 2017, and over two weeks period these students met in Beijing to develop new technical and creative skills that will help them to solve global challenges. The Academy was hosted by the Beijing Institute of Technology (BIT) and delivered by staff from Queen's University Belfast and BIT. Working together in transnational teams the students have applied their innovation and leadership skills to topics such as disaster management using unmanned aerial vehicles. This is the first step in building enhanced transnational PhD educational opportunities between the UK and China in engineering. The second batch of students attended the Academy in Nov 2018, which began with the President's Forum of the UK-China Consortium on Engineering Education and Research, which brought together Vice-Chancellors and representatives of all the partner universities, and the British Council. The Forum shared ideas on international research and innovation between UK and Chinese universities, as well as collaboration between universities and industry. After the Forum, the students undertook a mini-MBA, delivered by the William J Clinton Leadership Institute from Queen's University Belfast. The course covered finance essentials, marketing strategies, to leading teams, cumulating with a presentation on consultancy task - where groups competed throughout the week. On the following week, they had seminars on design and innovation, as well as a crash course in machine learning and neural networks, run by academics from Southeast University and researchers from Huawei. Throughout this exchange, the group went on several site visits, from industrial parks, research centres, and Huawei's headquarters in Nanjing. Over the weekends, students visited various cultural and historic sites of significance (from the city walls, the Nanjing Museum, Confucius Temple, and the Presidential Palace, as well as country walks). The Academy was a thoroughly insightful experience for both the UK and Chinese students - from viewpoints on engineering education and research, to sharing and learning about each other's culture. Further, a UK-China Knowledge Exploitation Forum was launched in September 2018 in Chongqing, which brought together leading figures from the government, academia and industry to discuss the impact of policy, the role of incubators and catapults, and work out how the consortium can develop mechanisms to facilitate UK-China knowledge transfer collaborations.
Start Year 2017
 
Description UK Consortium for the collaboration with Chinese Excellence League (E9) Group of Universities 
Organisation Tongji University
Country China 
Sector Academic/University 
PI Contribution UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research is the first university consortium co-established by UK and China specializing in engineering education and research. The partnership was set up following a prestigious award by BEIS and administrated by the British Council, which is aimed at building higher education links and helping to improve the quality of engineering research and teaching in China. The consortium is the first of its kind to partner leading UK universities with the top nine engineering research institutions in China. It will be led by Queen's University Belfast, and includes the University of Birmingham, Cardiff University, University College London, The University of Nottingham and The University of Warwick. The secretariat is at Queen's University Belfast. The Chinese universities include Southeast University, Beijing Institute of Technology, Chongqing University, Dalian University of Technology, Harbin Institute of Technology, Northwestern Polytechnical University, South China University of Technology, Tianjin University, and Tongji University. The secretariat is located in Southeast University. During a delegation to Shanghai by Jo Johnson MP in September, the Department of Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy agreed to fund the significant £200,000 award through the British Council with second year follow-on funding of another £200,000.The funding will enable the successful universities to work closely with the top nine engineering institutions in China, which will allow the UK universities to create a critical mass on a cluster of key engineering areas, such as energy and advanced manufacturing, and will help maintain the UK's global standing in light of increasing international competition. It will also allow China to make the transition from a big manufacturer to a manufacturing industry superpower. QUB is the secretariat institution, hosting management team for the consortium, and support all activities on engineering research and collaboration with E9 partner institutions in China, and in addition Queen's University invests £80,000 to support research student and staff mobility to these partner universities in China.
Collaborator Contribution All UK and Chinese partner universities contribute significantly to staff and research student mobility among partner universities in the UK and China University Consortium, organise and host research seminars, and carry out joint research projects. One of the activities is to establish the future Engineers' Leadership and Innovation Academy, which was developed through the UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research (UK-China UCEER) and aims to build UK-China teams to support both countries manufacturing ambitions. The academy received the first batch of 26 PhD students from across the Consortium, and over two weeks period these students met in Beijing to develop new technical and creative skills that will help them to solve global challenges. The Academy is hosted by the Beijing Institute of Technology (BIT) and delivered by staff from Queen's University Belfast and BIT. Working together in transnational teams the students have applied their innovation and leadership skills to topics such as disaster management using unmanned aerial vehicles. This is the first step in building enhanced transnational PhD educational opportunities between the UK and China in engineering.
Impact UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research was established in May 2017, the first of its kind between UK and China. The consortium brings together 18 leading universities from UK and China to tackle the global challenges in sustainable energy and intelligent manufacturing, as one of the two education statements signed at the UK-China high-level people-to-people dialogue held in London in December 2017. The future Engineers' Leadership and Innovation Academy has been established with the first batch of 26 PhD students from across the Consortium met in Beijing in Nov 2017, and over two weeks period these students met in Beijing to develop new technical and creative skills that will help them to solve global challenges. The Academy was hosted by the Beijing Institute of Technology (BIT) and delivered by staff from Queen's University Belfast and BIT. Working together in transnational teams the students have applied their innovation and leadership skills to topics such as disaster management using unmanned aerial vehicles. This is the first step in building enhanced transnational PhD educational opportunities between the UK and China in engineering. The second batch of students attended the Academy in Nov 2018, which began with the President's Forum of the UK-China Consortium on Engineering Education and Research, which brought together Vice-Chancellors and representatives of all the partner universities, and the British Council. The Forum shared ideas on international research and innovation between UK and Chinese universities, as well as collaboration between universities and industry. After the Forum, the students undertook a mini-MBA, delivered by the William J Clinton Leadership Institute from Queen's University Belfast. The course covered finance essentials, marketing strategies, to leading teams, cumulating with a presentation on consultancy task - where groups competed throughout the week. On the following week, they had seminars on design and innovation, as well as a crash course in machine learning and neural networks, run by academics from Southeast University and researchers from Huawei. Throughout this exchange, the group went on several site visits, from industrial parks, research centres, and Huawei's headquarters in Nanjing. Over the weekends, students visited various cultural and historic sites of significance (from the city walls, the Nanjing Museum, Confucius Temple, and the Presidential Palace, as well as country walks). The Academy was a thoroughly insightful experience for both the UK and Chinese students - from viewpoints on engineering education and research, to sharing and learning about each other's culture. Further, a UK-China Knowledge Exploitation Forum was launched in September 2018 in Chongqing, which brought together leading figures from the government, academia and industry to discuss the impact of policy, the role of incubators and catapults, and work out how the consortium can develop mechanisms to facilitate UK-China knowledge transfer collaborations.
Start Year 2017
 
Description UK Consortium for the collaboration with Chinese Excellence League (E9) Group of Universities 
Organisation University College London
Department Department of Electronic and Electrical Engineering
Country United Kingdom 
Sector Academic/University 
PI Contribution UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research is the first university consortium co-established by UK and China specializing in engineering education and research. The partnership was set up following a prestigious award by BEIS and administrated by the British Council, which is aimed at building higher education links and helping to improve the quality of engineering research and teaching in China. The consortium is the first of its kind to partner leading UK universities with the top nine engineering research institutions in China. It will be led by Queen's University Belfast, and includes the University of Birmingham, Cardiff University, University College London, The University of Nottingham and The University of Warwick. The secretariat is at Queen's University Belfast. The Chinese universities include Southeast University, Beijing Institute of Technology, Chongqing University, Dalian University of Technology, Harbin Institute of Technology, Northwestern Polytechnical University, South China University of Technology, Tianjin University, and Tongji University. The secretariat is located in Southeast University. During a delegation to Shanghai by Jo Johnson MP in September, the Department of Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy agreed to fund the significant £200,000 award through the British Council with second year follow-on funding of another £200,000.The funding will enable the successful universities to work closely with the top nine engineering institutions in China, which will allow the UK universities to create a critical mass on a cluster of key engineering areas, such as energy and advanced manufacturing, and will help maintain the UK's global standing in light of increasing international competition. It will also allow China to make the transition from a big manufacturer to a manufacturing industry superpower. QUB is the secretariat institution, hosting management team for the consortium, and support all activities on engineering research and collaboration with E9 partner institutions in China, and in addition Queen's University invests £80,000 to support research student and staff mobility to these partner universities in China.
Collaborator Contribution All UK and Chinese partner universities contribute significantly to staff and research student mobility among partner universities in the UK and China University Consortium, organise and host research seminars, and carry out joint research projects. One of the activities is to establish the future Engineers' Leadership and Innovation Academy, which was developed through the UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research (UK-China UCEER) and aims to build UK-China teams to support both countries manufacturing ambitions. The academy received the first batch of 26 PhD students from across the Consortium, and over two weeks period these students met in Beijing to develop new technical and creative skills that will help them to solve global challenges. The Academy is hosted by the Beijing Institute of Technology (BIT) and delivered by staff from Queen's University Belfast and BIT. Working together in transnational teams the students have applied their innovation and leadership skills to topics such as disaster management using unmanned aerial vehicles. This is the first step in building enhanced transnational PhD educational opportunities between the UK and China in engineering.
Impact UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research was established in May 2017, the first of its kind between UK and China. The consortium brings together 18 leading universities from UK and China to tackle the global challenges in sustainable energy and intelligent manufacturing, as one of the two education statements signed at the UK-China high-level people-to-people dialogue held in London in December 2017. The future Engineers' Leadership and Innovation Academy has been established with the first batch of 26 PhD students from across the Consortium met in Beijing in Nov 2017, and over two weeks period these students met in Beijing to develop new technical and creative skills that will help them to solve global challenges. The Academy was hosted by the Beijing Institute of Technology (BIT) and delivered by staff from Queen's University Belfast and BIT. Working together in transnational teams the students have applied their innovation and leadership skills to topics such as disaster management using unmanned aerial vehicles. This is the first step in building enhanced transnational PhD educational opportunities between the UK and China in engineering. The second batch of students attended the Academy in Nov 2018, which began with the President's Forum of the UK-China Consortium on Engineering Education and Research, which brought together Vice-Chancellors and representatives of all the partner universities, and the British Council. The Forum shared ideas on international research and innovation between UK and Chinese universities, as well as collaboration between universities and industry. After the Forum, the students undertook a mini-MBA, delivered by the William J Clinton Leadership Institute from Queen's University Belfast. The course covered finance essentials, marketing strategies, to leading teams, cumulating with a presentation on consultancy task - where groups competed throughout the week. On the following week, they had seminars on design and innovation, as well as a crash course in machine learning and neural networks, run by academics from Southeast University and researchers from Huawei. Throughout this exchange, the group went on several site visits, from industrial parks, research centres, and Huawei's headquarters in Nanjing. Over the weekends, students visited various cultural and historic sites of significance (from the city walls, the Nanjing Museum, Confucius Temple, and the Presidential Palace, as well as country walks). The Academy was a thoroughly insightful experience for both the UK and Chinese students - from viewpoints on engineering education and research, to sharing and learning about each other's culture. Further, a UK-China Knowledge Exploitation Forum was launched in September 2018 in Chongqing, which brought together leading figures from the government, academia and industry to discuss the impact of policy, the role of incubators and catapults, and work out how the consortium can develop mechanisms to facilitate UK-China knowledge transfer collaborations.
Start Year 2017
 
Description UK Consortium for the collaboration with Chinese Excellence League (E9) Group of Universities 
Organisation University of Birmingham
Country United Kingdom 
Sector Academic/University 
PI Contribution UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research is the first university consortium co-established by UK and China specializing in engineering education and research. The partnership was set up following a prestigious award by BEIS and administrated by the British Council, which is aimed at building higher education links and helping to improve the quality of engineering research and teaching in China. The consortium is the first of its kind to partner leading UK universities with the top nine engineering research institutions in China. It will be led by Queen's University Belfast, and includes the University of Birmingham, Cardiff University, University College London, The University of Nottingham and The University of Warwick. The secretariat is at Queen's University Belfast. The Chinese universities include Southeast University, Beijing Institute of Technology, Chongqing University, Dalian University of Technology, Harbin Institute of Technology, Northwestern Polytechnical University, South China University of Technology, Tianjin University, and Tongji University. The secretariat is located in Southeast University. During a delegation to Shanghai by Jo Johnson MP in September, the Department of Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy agreed to fund the significant £200,000 award through the British Council with second year follow-on funding of another £200,000.The funding will enable the successful universities to work closely with the top nine engineering institutions in China, which will allow the UK universities to create a critical mass on a cluster of key engineering areas, such as energy and advanced manufacturing, and will help maintain the UK's global standing in light of increasing international competition. It will also allow China to make the transition from a big manufacturer to a manufacturing industry superpower. QUB is the secretariat institution, hosting management team for the consortium, and support all activities on engineering research and collaboration with E9 partner institutions in China, and in addition Queen's University invests £80,000 to support research student and staff mobility to these partner universities in China.
Collaborator Contribution All UK and Chinese partner universities contribute significantly to staff and research student mobility among partner universities in the UK and China University Consortium, organise and host research seminars, and carry out joint research projects. One of the activities is to establish the future Engineers' Leadership and Innovation Academy, which was developed through the UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research (UK-China UCEER) and aims to build UK-China teams to support both countries manufacturing ambitions. The academy received the first batch of 26 PhD students from across the Consortium, and over two weeks period these students met in Beijing to develop new technical and creative skills that will help them to solve global challenges. The Academy is hosted by the Beijing Institute of Technology (BIT) and delivered by staff from Queen's University Belfast and BIT. Working together in transnational teams the students have applied their innovation and leadership skills to topics such as disaster management using unmanned aerial vehicles. This is the first step in building enhanced transnational PhD educational opportunities between the UK and China in engineering.
Impact UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research was established in May 2017, the first of its kind between UK and China. The consortium brings together 18 leading universities from UK and China to tackle the global challenges in sustainable energy and intelligent manufacturing, as one of the two education statements signed at the UK-China high-level people-to-people dialogue held in London in December 2017. The future Engineers' Leadership and Innovation Academy has been established with the first batch of 26 PhD students from across the Consortium met in Beijing in Nov 2017, and over two weeks period these students met in Beijing to develop new technical and creative skills that will help them to solve global challenges. The Academy was hosted by the Beijing Institute of Technology (BIT) and delivered by staff from Queen's University Belfast and BIT. Working together in transnational teams the students have applied their innovation and leadership skills to topics such as disaster management using unmanned aerial vehicles. This is the first step in building enhanced transnational PhD educational opportunities between the UK and China in engineering. The second batch of students attended the Academy in Nov 2018, which began with the President's Forum of the UK-China Consortium on Engineering Education and Research, which brought together Vice-Chancellors and representatives of all the partner universities, and the British Council. The Forum shared ideas on international research and innovation between UK and Chinese universities, as well as collaboration between universities and industry. After the Forum, the students undertook a mini-MBA, delivered by the William J Clinton Leadership Institute from Queen's University Belfast. The course covered finance essentials, marketing strategies, to leading teams, cumulating with a presentation on consultancy task - where groups competed throughout the week. On the following week, they had seminars on design and innovation, as well as a crash course in machine learning and neural networks, run by academics from Southeast University and researchers from Huawei. Throughout this exchange, the group went on several site visits, from industrial parks, research centres, and Huawei's headquarters in Nanjing. Over the weekends, students visited various cultural and historic sites of significance (from the city walls, the Nanjing Museum, Confucius Temple, and the Presidential Palace, as well as country walks). The Academy was a thoroughly insightful experience for both the UK and Chinese students - from viewpoints on engineering education and research, to sharing and learning about each other's culture. Further, a UK-China Knowledge Exploitation Forum was launched in September 2018 in Chongqing, which brought together leading figures from the government, academia and industry to discuss the impact of policy, the role of incubators and catapults, and work out how the consortium can develop mechanisms to facilitate UK-China knowledge transfer collaborations.
Start Year 2017
 
Description UK Consortium for the collaboration with Chinese Excellence League (E9) Group of Universities 
Organisation University of Cambridge
Country United Kingdom 
Sector Academic/University 
PI Contribution UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research is the first university consortium co-established by UK and China specializing in engineering education and research. The partnership was set up following a prestigious award by BEIS and administrated by the British Council, which is aimed at building higher education links and helping to improve the quality of engineering research and teaching in China. The consortium is the first of its kind to partner leading UK universities with the top nine engineering research institutions in China. It will be led by Queen's University Belfast, and includes the University of Birmingham, Cardiff University, University College London, The University of Nottingham and The University of Warwick. The secretariat is at Queen's University Belfast. The Chinese universities include Southeast University, Beijing Institute of Technology, Chongqing University, Dalian University of Technology, Harbin Institute of Technology, Northwestern Polytechnical University, South China University of Technology, Tianjin University, and Tongji University. The secretariat is located in Southeast University. During a delegation to Shanghai by Jo Johnson MP in September, the Department of Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy agreed to fund the significant £200,000 award through the British Council with second year follow-on funding of another £200,000.The funding will enable the successful universities to work closely with the top nine engineering institutions in China, which will allow the UK universities to create a critical mass on a cluster of key engineering areas, such as energy and advanced manufacturing, and will help maintain the UK's global standing in light of increasing international competition. It will also allow China to make the transition from a big manufacturer to a manufacturing industry superpower. QUB is the secretariat institution, hosting management team for the consortium, and support all activities on engineering research and collaboration with E9 partner institutions in China, and in addition Queen's University invests £80,000 to support research student and staff mobility to these partner universities in China.
Collaborator Contribution All UK and Chinese partner universities contribute significantly to staff and research student mobility among partner universities in the UK and China University Consortium, organise and host research seminars, and carry out joint research projects. One of the activities is to establish the future Engineers' Leadership and Innovation Academy, which was developed through the UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research (UK-China UCEER) and aims to build UK-China teams to support both countries manufacturing ambitions. The academy received the first batch of 26 PhD students from across the Consortium, and over two weeks period these students met in Beijing to develop new technical and creative skills that will help them to solve global challenges. The Academy is hosted by the Beijing Institute of Technology (BIT) and delivered by staff from Queen's University Belfast and BIT. Working together in transnational teams the students have applied their innovation and leadership skills to topics such as disaster management using unmanned aerial vehicles. This is the first step in building enhanced transnational PhD educational opportunities between the UK and China in engineering.
Impact UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research was established in May 2017, the first of its kind between UK and China. The consortium brings together 18 leading universities from UK and China to tackle the global challenges in sustainable energy and intelligent manufacturing, as one of the two education statements signed at the UK-China high-level people-to-people dialogue held in London in December 2017. The future Engineers' Leadership and Innovation Academy has been established with the first batch of 26 PhD students from across the Consortium met in Beijing in Nov 2017, and over two weeks period these students met in Beijing to develop new technical and creative skills that will help them to solve global challenges. The Academy was hosted by the Beijing Institute of Technology (BIT) and delivered by staff from Queen's University Belfast and BIT. Working together in transnational teams the students have applied their innovation and leadership skills to topics such as disaster management using unmanned aerial vehicles. This is the first step in building enhanced transnational PhD educational opportunities between the UK and China in engineering. The second batch of students attended the Academy in Nov 2018, which began with the President's Forum of the UK-China Consortium on Engineering Education and Research, which brought together Vice-Chancellors and representatives of all the partner universities, and the British Council. The Forum shared ideas on international research and innovation between UK and Chinese universities, as well as collaboration between universities and industry. After the Forum, the students undertook a mini-MBA, delivered by the William J Clinton Leadership Institute from Queen's University Belfast. The course covered finance essentials, marketing strategies, to leading teams, cumulating with a presentation on consultancy task - where groups competed throughout the week. On the following week, they had seminars on design and innovation, as well as a crash course in machine learning and neural networks, run by academics from Southeast University and researchers from Huawei. Throughout this exchange, the group went on several site visits, from industrial parks, research centres, and Huawei's headquarters in Nanjing. Over the weekends, students visited various cultural and historic sites of significance (from the city walls, the Nanjing Museum, Confucius Temple, and the Presidential Palace, as well as country walks). The Academy was a thoroughly insightful experience for both the UK and Chinese students - from viewpoints on engineering education and research, to sharing and learning about each other's culture. Further, a UK-China Knowledge Exploitation Forum was launched in September 2018 in Chongqing, which brought together leading figures from the government, academia and industry to discuss the impact of policy, the role of incubators and catapults, and work out how the consortium can develop mechanisms to facilitate UK-China knowledge transfer collaborations.
Start Year 2017
 
Description UK Consortium for the collaboration with Chinese Excellence League (E9) Group of Universities 
Organisation University of Leeds
Country United Kingdom 
Sector Academic/University 
PI Contribution UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research is the first university consortium co-established by UK and China specializing in engineering education and research. The partnership was set up following a prestigious award by BEIS and administrated by the British Council, which is aimed at building higher education links and helping to improve the quality of engineering research and teaching in China. The consortium is the first of its kind to partner leading UK universities with the top nine engineering research institutions in China. It will be led by Queen's University Belfast, and includes the University of Birmingham, Cardiff University, University College London, The University of Nottingham and The University of Warwick. The secretariat is at Queen's University Belfast. The Chinese universities include Southeast University, Beijing Institute of Technology, Chongqing University, Dalian University of Technology, Harbin Institute of Technology, Northwestern Polytechnical University, South China University of Technology, Tianjin University, and Tongji University. The secretariat is located in Southeast University. During a delegation to Shanghai by Jo Johnson MP in September, the Department of Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy agreed to fund the significant £200,000 award through the British Council with second year follow-on funding of another £200,000.The funding will enable the successful universities to work closely with the top nine engineering institutions in China, which will allow the UK universities to create a critical mass on a cluster of key engineering areas, such as energy and advanced manufacturing, and will help maintain the UK's global standing in light of increasing international competition. It will also allow China to make the transition from a big manufacturer to a manufacturing industry superpower. QUB is the secretariat institution, hosting management team for the consortium, and support all activities on engineering research and collaboration with E9 partner institutions in China, and in addition Queen's University invests £80,000 to support research student and staff mobility to these partner universities in China.
Collaborator Contribution All UK and Chinese partner universities contribute significantly to staff and research student mobility among partner universities in the UK and China University Consortium, organise and host research seminars, and carry out joint research projects. One of the activities is to establish the future Engineers' Leadership and Innovation Academy, which was developed through the UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research (UK-China UCEER) and aims to build UK-China teams to support both countries manufacturing ambitions. The academy received the first batch of 26 PhD students from across the Consortium, and over two weeks period these students met in Beijing to develop new technical and creative skills that will help them to solve global challenges. The Academy is hosted by the Beijing Institute of Technology (BIT) and delivered by staff from Queen's University Belfast and BIT. Working together in transnational teams the students have applied their innovation and leadership skills to topics such as disaster management using unmanned aerial vehicles. This is the first step in building enhanced transnational PhD educational opportunities between the UK and China in engineering.
Impact UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research was established in May 2017, the first of its kind between UK and China. The consortium brings together 18 leading universities from UK and China to tackle the global challenges in sustainable energy and intelligent manufacturing, as one of the two education statements signed at the UK-China high-level people-to-people dialogue held in London in December 2017. The future Engineers' Leadership and Innovation Academy has been established with the first batch of 26 PhD students from across the Consortium met in Beijing in Nov 2017, and over two weeks period these students met in Beijing to develop new technical and creative skills that will help them to solve global challenges. The Academy was hosted by the Beijing Institute of Technology (BIT) and delivered by staff from Queen's University Belfast and BIT. Working together in transnational teams the students have applied their innovation and leadership skills to topics such as disaster management using unmanned aerial vehicles. This is the first step in building enhanced transnational PhD educational opportunities between the UK and China in engineering. The second batch of students attended the Academy in Nov 2018, which began with the President's Forum of the UK-China Consortium on Engineering Education and Research, which brought together Vice-Chancellors and representatives of all the partner universities, and the British Council. The Forum shared ideas on international research and innovation between UK and Chinese universities, as well as collaboration between universities and industry. After the Forum, the students undertook a mini-MBA, delivered by the William J Clinton Leadership Institute from Queen's University Belfast. The course covered finance essentials, marketing strategies, to leading teams, cumulating with a presentation on consultancy task - where groups competed throughout the week. On the following week, they had seminars on design and innovation, as well as a crash course in machine learning and neural networks, run by academics from Southeast University and researchers from Huawei. Throughout this exchange, the group went on several site visits, from industrial parks, research centres, and Huawei's headquarters in Nanjing. Over the weekends, students visited various cultural and historic sites of significance (from the city walls, the Nanjing Museum, Confucius Temple, and the Presidential Palace, as well as country walks). The Academy was a thoroughly insightful experience for both the UK and Chinese students - from viewpoints on engineering education and research, to sharing and learning about each other's culture. Further, a UK-China Knowledge Exploitation Forum was launched in September 2018 in Chongqing, which brought together leading figures from the government, academia and industry to discuss the impact of policy, the role of incubators and catapults, and work out how the consortium can develop mechanisms to facilitate UK-China knowledge transfer collaborations.
Start Year 2017
 
Description UK Consortium for the collaboration with Chinese Excellence League (E9) Group of Universities 
Organisation University of Liverpool
Country United Kingdom 
Sector Academic/University 
PI Contribution UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research is the first university consortium co-established by UK and China specializing in engineering education and research. The partnership was set up following a prestigious award by BEIS and administrated by the British Council, which is aimed at building higher education links and helping to improve the quality of engineering research and teaching in China. The consortium is the first of its kind to partner leading UK universities with the top nine engineering research institutions in China. It will be led by Queen's University Belfast, and includes the University of Birmingham, Cardiff University, University College London, The University of Nottingham and The University of Warwick. The secretariat is at Queen's University Belfast. The Chinese universities include Southeast University, Beijing Institute of Technology, Chongqing University, Dalian University of Technology, Harbin Institute of Technology, Northwestern Polytechnical University, South China University of Technology, Tianjin University, and Tongji University. The secretariat is located in Southeast University. During a delegation to Shanghai by Jo Johnson MP in September, the Department of Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy agreed to fund the significant £200,000 award through the British Council with second year follow-on funding of another £200,000.The funding will enable the successful universities to work closely with the top nine engineering institutions in China, which will allow the UK universities to create a critical mass on a cluster of key engineering areas, such as energy and advanced manufacturing, and will help maintain the UK's global standing in light of increasing international competition. It will also allow China to make the transition from a big manufacturer to a manufacturing industry superpower. QUB is the secretariat institution, hosting management team for the consortium, and support all activities on engineering research and collaboration with E9 partner institutions in China, and in addition Queen's University invests £80,000 to support research student and staff mobility to these partner universities in China.
Collaborator Contribution All UK and Chinese partner universities contribute significantly to staff and research student mobility among partner universities in the UK and China University Consortium, organise and host research seminars, and carry out joint research projects. One of the activities is to establish the future Engineers' Leadership and Innovation Academy, which was developed through the UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research (UK-China UCEER) and aims to build UK-China teams to support both countries manufacturing ambitions. The academy received the first batch of 26 PhD students from across the Consortium, and over two weeks period these students met in Beijing to develop new technical and creative skills that will help them to solve global challenges. The Academy is hosted by the Beijing Institute of Technology (BIT) and delivered by staff from Queen's University Belfast and BIT. Working together in transnational teams the students have applied their innovation and leadership skills to topics such as disaster management using unmanned aerial vehicles. This is the first step in building enhanced transnational PhD educational opportunities between the UK and China in engineering.
Impact UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research was established in May 2017, the first of its kind between UK and China. The consortium brings together 18 leading universities from UK and China to tackle the global challenges in sustainable energy and intelligent manufacturing, as one of the two education statements signed at the UK-China high-level people-to-people dialogue held in London in December 2017. The future Engineers' Leadership and Innovation Academy has been established with the first batch of 26 PhD students from across the Consortium met in Beijing in Nov 2017, and over two weeks period these students met in Beijing to develop new technical and creative skills that will help them to solve global challenges. The Academy was hosted by the Beijing Institute of Technology (BIT) and delivered by staff from Queen's University Belfast and BIT. Working together in transnational teams the students have applied their innovation and leadership skills to topics such as disaster management using unmanned aerial vehicles. This is the first step in building enhanced transnational PhD educational opportunities between the UK and China in engineering. The second batch of students attended the Academy in Nov 2018, which began with the President's Forum of the UK-China Consortium on Engineering Education and Research, which brought together Vice-Chancellors and representatives of all the partner universities, and the British Council. The Forum shared ideas on international research and innovation between UK and Chinese universities, as well as collaboration between universities and industry. After the Forum, the students undertook a mini-MBA, delivered by the William J Clinton Leadership Institute from Queen's University Belfast. The course covered finance essentials, marketing strategies, to leading teams, cumulating with a presentation on consultancy task - where groups competed throughout the week. On the following week, they had seminars on design and innovation, as well as a crash course in machine learning and neural networks, run by academics from Southeast University and researchers from Huawei. Throughout this exchange, the group went on several site visits, from industrial parks, research centres, and Huawei's headquarters in Nanjing. Over the weekends, students visited various cultural and historic sites of significance (from the city walls, the Nanjing Museum, Confucius Temple, and the Presidential Palace, as well as country walks). The Academy was a thoroughly insightful experience for both the UK and Chinese students - from viewpoints on engineering education and research, to sharing and learning about each other's culture. Further, a UK-China Knowledge Exploitation Forum was launched in September 2018 in Chongqing, which brought together leading figures from the government, academia and industry to discuss the impact of policy, the role of incubators and catapults, and work out how the consortium can develop mechanisms to facilitate UK-China knowledge transfer collaborations.
Start Year 2017
 
Description UK Consortium for the collaboration with Chinese Excellence League (E9) Group of Universities 
Organisation University of Nottingham
Department Faculty of Engineering
Country United Kingdom 
Sector Academic/University 
PI Contribution UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research is the first university consortium co-established by UK and China specializing in engineering education and research. The partnership was set up following a prestigious award by BEIS and administrated by the British Council, which is aimed at building higher education links and helping to improve the quality of engineering research and teaching in China. The consortium is the first of its kind to partner leading UK universities with the top nine engineering research institutions in China. It will be led by Queen's University Belfast, and includes the University of Birmingham, Cardiff University, University College London, The University of Nottingham and The University of Warwick. The secretariat is at Queen's University Belfast. The Chinese universities include Southeast University, Beijing Institute of Technology, Chongqing University, Dalian University of Technology, Harbin Institute of Technology, Northwestern Polytechnical University, South China University of Technology, Tianjin University, and Tongji University. The secretariat is located in Southeast University. During a delegation to Shanghai by Jo Johnson MP in September, the Department of Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy agreed to fund the significant £200,000 award through the British Council with second year follow-on funding of another £200,000.The funding will enable the successful universities to work closely with the top nine engineering institutions in China, which will allow the UK universities to create a critical mass on a cluster of key engineering areas, such as energy and advanced manufacturing, and will help maintain the UK's global standing in light of increasing international competition. It will also allow China to make the transition from a big manufacturer to a manufacturing industry superpower. QUB is the secretariat institution, hosting management team for the consortium, and support all activities on engineering research and collaboration with E9 partner institutions in China, and in addition Queen's University invests £80,000 to support research student and staff mobility to these partner universities in China.
Collaborator Contribution All UK and Chinese partner universities contribute significantly to staff and research student mobility among partner universities in the UK and China University Consortium, organise and host research seminars, and carry out joint research projects. One of the activities is to establish the future Engineers' Leadership and Innovation Academy, which was developed through the UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research (UK-China UCEER) and aims to build UK-China teams to support both countries manufacturing ambitions. The academy received the first batch of 26 PhD students from across the Consortium, and over two weeks period these students met in Beijing to develop new technical and creative skills that will help them to solve global challenges. The Academy is hosted by the Beijing Institute of Technology (BIT) and delivered by staff from Queen's University Belfast and BIT. Working together in transnational teams the students have applied their innovation and leadership skills to topics such as disaster management using unmanned aerial vehicles. This is the first step in building enhanced transnational PhD educational opportunities between the UK and China in engineering.
Impact UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research was established in May 2017, the first of its kind between UK and China. The consortium brings together 18 leading universities from UK and China to tackle the global challenges in sustainable energy and intelligent manufacturing, as one of the two education statements signed at the UK-China high-level people-to-people dialogue held in London in December 2017. The future Engineers' Leadership and Innovation Academy has been established with the first batch of 26 PhD students from across the Consortium met in Beijing in Nov 2017, and over two weeks period these students met in Beijing to develop new technical and creative skills that will help them to solve global challenges. The Academy was hosted by the Beijing Institute of Technology (BIT) and delivered by staff from Queen's University Belfast and BIT. Working together in transnational teams the students have applied their innovation and leadership skills to topics such as disaster management using unmanned aerial vehicles. This is the first step in building enhanced transnational PhD educational opportunities between the UK and China in engineering. The second batch of students attended the Academy in Nov 2018, which began with the President's Forum of the UK-China Consortium on Engineering Education and Research, which brought together Vice-Chancellors and representatives of all the partner universities, and the British Council. The Forum shared ideas on international research and innovation between UK and Chinese universities, as well as collaboration between universities and industry. After the Forum, the students undertook a mini-MBA, delivered by the William J Clinton Leadership Institute from Queen's University Belfast. The course covered finance essentials, marketing strategies, to leading teams, cumulating with a presentation on consultancy task - where groups competed throughout the week. On the following week, they had seminars on design and innovation, as well as a crash course in machine learning and neural networks, run by academics from Southeast University and researchers from Huawei. Throughout this exchange, the group went on several site visits, from industrial parks, research centres, and Huawei's headquarters in Nanjing. Over the weekends, students visited various cultural and historic sites of significance (from the city walls, the Nanjing Museum, Confucius Temple, and the Presidential Palace, as well as country walks). The Academy was a thoroughly insightful experience for both the UK and Chinese students - from viewpoints on engineering education and research, to sharing and learning about each other's culture. Further, a UK-China Knowledge Exploitation Forum was launched in September 2018 in Chongqing, which brought together leading figures from the government, academia and industry to discuss the impact of policy, the role of incubators and catapults, and work out how the consortium can develop mechanisms to facilitate UK-China knowledge transfer collaborations.
Start Year 2017
 
Description UK Consortium for the collaboration with Chinese Excellence League (E9) Group of Universities 
Organisation University of Warwick
Department School of Engineering
Country United Kingdom 
Sector Academic/University 
PI Contribution UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research is the first university consortium co-established by UK and China specializing in engineering education and research. The partnership was set up following a prestigious award by BEIS and administrated by the British Council, which is aimed at building higher education links and helping to improve the quality of engineering research and teaching in China. The consortium is the first of its kind to partner leading UK universities with the top nine engineering research institutions in China. It will be led by Queen's University Belfast, and includes the University of Birmingham, Cardiff University, University College London, The University of Nottingham and The University of Warwick. The secretariat is at Queen's University Belfast. The Chinese universities include Southeast University, Beijing Institute of Technology, Chongqing University, Dalian University of Technology, Harbin Institute of Technology, Northwestern Polytechnical University, South China University of Technology, Tianjin University, and Tongji University. The secretariat is located in Southeast University. During a delegation to Shanghai by Jo Johnson MP in September, the Department of Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy agreed to fund the significant £200,000 award through the British Council with second year follow-on funding of another £200,000.The funding will enable the successful universities to work closely with the top nine engineering institutions in China, which will allow the UK universities to create a critical mass on a cluster of key engineering areas, such as energy and advanced manufacturing, and will help maintain the UK's global standing in light of increasing international competition. It will also allow China to make the transition from a big manufacturer to a manufacturing industry superpower. QUB is the secretariat institution, hosting management team for the consortium, and support all activities on engineering research and collaboration with E9 partner institutions in China, and in addition Queen's University invests £80,000 to support research student and staff mobility to these partner universities in China.
Collaborator Contribution All UK and Chinese partner universities contribute significantly to staff and research student mobility among partner universities in the UK and China University Consortium, organise and host research seminars, and carry out joint research projects. One of the activities is to establish the future Engineers' Leadership and Innovation Academy, which was developed through the UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research (UK-China UCEER) and aims to build UK-China teams to support both countries manufacturing ambitions. The academy received the first batch of 26 PhD students from across the Consortium, and over two weeks period these students met in Beijing to develop new technical and creative skills that will help them to solve global challenges. The Academy is hosted by the Beijing Institute of Technology (BIT) and delivered by staff from Queen's University Belfast and BIT. Working together in transnational teams the students have applied their innovation and leadership skills to topics such as disaster management using unmanned aerial vehicles. This is the first step in building enhanced transnational PhD educational opportunities between the UK and China in engineering.
Impact UK-China University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research was established in May 2017, the first of its kind between UK and China. The consortium brings together 18 leading universities from UK and China to tackle the global challenges in sustainable energy and intelligent manufacturing, as one of the two education statements signed at the UK-China high-level people-to-people dialogue held in London in December 2017. The future Engineers' Leadership and Innovation Academy has been established with the first batch of 26 PhD students from across the Consortium met in Beijing in Nov 2017, and over two weeks period these students met in Beijing to develop new technical and creative skills that will help them to solve global challenges. The Academy was hosted by the Beijing Institute of Technology (BIT) and delivered by staff from Queen's University Belfast and BIT. Working together in transnational teams the students have applied their innovation and leadership skills to topics such as disaster management using unmanned aerial vehicles. This is the first step in building enhanced transnational PhD educational opportunities between the UK and China in engineering. The second batch of students attended the Academy in Nov 2018, which began with the President's Forum of the UK-China Consortium on Engineering Education and Research, which brought together Vice-Chancellors and representatives of all the partner universities, and the British Council. The Forum shared ideas on international research and innovation between UK and Chinese universities, as well as collaboration between universities and industry. After the Forum, the students undertook a mini-MBA, delivered by the William J Clinton Leadership Institute from Queen's University Belfast. The course covered finance essentials, marketing strategies, to leading teams, cumulating with a presentation on consultancy task - where groups competed throughout the week. On the following week, they had seminars on design and innovation, as well as a crash course in machine learning and neural networks, run by academics from Southeast University and researchers from Huawei. Throughout this exchange, the group went on several site visits, from industrial parks, research centres, and Huawei's headquarters in Nanjing. Over the weekends, students visited various cultural and historic sites of significance (from the city walls, the Nanjing Museum, Confucius Temple, and the Presidential Palace, as well as country walks). The Academy was a thoroughly insightful experience for both the UK and Chinese students - from viewpoints on engineering education and research, to sharing and learning about each other's culture. Further, a UK-China Knowledge Exploitation Forum was launched in September 2018 in Chongqing, which brought together leading figures from the government, academia and industry to discuss the impact of policy, the role of incubators and catapults, and work out how the consortium can develop mechanisms to facilitate UK-China knowledge transfer collaborations.
Start Year 2017
 
Title Point Energy 
Description Point energy technology has been developed to offer low-cost component level energy monitoring, providing actionable insights that reduce energy costs and optimise manufacturing processes (http://www.pointenergy.org/). The technology has won several awards, such as 1) Invent2016 Category Winner, Point Energy Technology, Invent 2016, NISP CONNECT, Sept 29, 2016; 2) Finalist, Point Energy Technology, SEAI Sustainable Energy Awards 2016, 2016; 3) Institute of Measurement and Control ICI Prize, for the best paper published in Transactions in 2014, The technology has been tested in several industrial partners from polymer processing to food processing, and attracted substantial interest from industry, public and investors. 
Type Of Technology Systems, Materials & Instrumental Engineering 
Year Produced 2015 
Impact Point energy technology has won several awards, such as 1) Invent2016 Category Winner, Point Energy Technology, Invent 2016, NISP CONNECT, Sept 29, 2016; 2) Finalist, Point Energy Technology, SEAI Sustainable Energy Awards 2016, 2016; 3) Institute of Measurement and Control ICI Prize, for the best paper published in Transactions in 2014, The technology has been tested in Irwin's Bakery which the system has effectively offer cloud-based energy consumption at component level to the company for over a half year, and the company started to implement insightful advice to reduce energy consumption, the system has also been tested in Greiner packaging since 2015, Coca-cola from 2016, etc. The system will also deployed in several other industrial companies through a most recent EPSRC project for optimising energy consumption in industry. 
URL http://www.pointenergy.org/
 
Description 2018 International Conference on Intelligent Manufacturing and Internet of Things & International Conference on Sustainable Energy Engineering 
Form Of Engagement Activity Participation in an activity, workshop or similar
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach International
Primary Audience Professional Practitioners
Results and Impact The 2018 International Conference on Intelligent Manufacturing and Internet of Things & International Conference on Sustainable Energy Engineering has launched on September 22, 2018 at Huxi Campus, Chongqing University. IMIOT & ICSEE 2018 is jointly organized by Chongqing University, Queen's University Belfast, University of Leeds and Chongqing Association for Science and Technology, with support of the government of Shapingba District and University Consortium on Engineering Education and Research. Nearly 300 delegates, including academicians, Changjiang Scholars and Outstanding Young Persons from home and abroad have attended the event. Experts and scholars different countries and regions presented in 16 sessions, sparkled a number of discussions and research collaborations. Three conference proceedings have been published in Springer's lecture notes.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2018
URL https://www.springer.com/us/book/9789811323836
 
Description 2018 UK-China (Chongqing) Knowledge Exploitation and Standardization Forum 
Form Of Engagement Activity Participation in an activity, workshop or similar
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach International
Primary Audience Industry/Business
Results and Impact The forum brought together leading figures from the government, academia and industry to discuss novel and cross-boundary approaches of collaborations and facilitation mechanism between UK and China to promote innovation and knowledge exploitation in the fields of intelligent manufacturing and revolutionary smart energy systems. In the meantime, the forum has launched the preparation event of the UK-China knowledge exploitation network, and showcases some of the latest progresses and projects in the two areas. The event was featured with distinguished guest speeches on the impact of policy, role of incubators and catapults, novel mechanisms to facilitate UK-China collaborations on knowledge transfer, sustainable innovation and knowledge transfer, and case studies of UK-China collaborations on knowledge transfer. Posters of existing and potential knowledge transfer projects from academic institutions were presented to attract further funding and investment, and a UK-China Knowledge Exploitation Network Preparation Ceremony was launched.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2018
URL http://ukchinaconsortium.com/chongqing-conferenceworkshop
 
Description Invited Keynote Speaker 
Form Of Engagement Activity A talk or presentation
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach International
Primary Audience Industry/Business
Results and Impact Invited Keynote Speech by Prof Kang Li at International Seminar on EEM [Efficient Energy Management], in conjunction with SWEET 2016, Gwangju, EVIT (Energy Valley Institute of Technology), South Korea, March 16-17, 2016. Title: 'Decarbonizing the whole energy system from top to tail - big data analytics and intelligent control approach'. Over 150 audience from business, industry, general public, and professional practitioners.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2016
 
Description Invited lecture at Imperial College London 
Form Of Engagement Activity A formal working group, expert panel or dialogue
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach National
Primary Audience Schools
Results and Impact Prof. Kang Li was invited to give a lecture titled 'The nexus of sustainable energy and manufacturing' at Imperial College London on 19 June 2018.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2018
URL https://talks.ee.ic.ac.uk/talk/index/1012
 
Description Invited lecture at Northeast University 
Form Of Engagement Activity A formal working group, expert panel or dialogue
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach National
Primary Audience Schools
Results and Impact Prof. Kang li was invited to give a lecture at Northeast University titled 'Control technologies in decarbonizing the whole energy chain from top to tail' on 14 January 2017.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2017
 
Description Invited lecture at Southwest Jiaotong University 
Form Of Engagement Activity A formal working group, expert panel or dialogue
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach National
Primary Audience Schools
Results and Impact Professor Kang Li was invited to give a lecture titled 'Two-stage regression modelling' at Southwest Jiaotong University on 26 September 2018.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2018
 
Description Invited presentation 
Form Of Engagement Activity Participation in an activity, workshop or similar
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach National
Primary Audience Professional Practitioners
Results and Impact Attend EPSRC 6 sensor project meeting at University of Surrey on 4 March 2018 and made a presentation on point energy technology, which has sparkled discussions and questions among attendees from both academia and industrialists.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2019
 
Description Keynote speech at 2017 International Conference on Life System Modelling and Simulation (LSMS 2017), and on Intelligent Computing for Sustainable Energy and Environment (ICSEE'17), 
Form Of Engagement Activity Participation in an activity, workshop or similar
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach International
Primary Audience Professional Practitioners
Results and Impact Keynote speech delivered at 2017 International Conference on Life System Modelling and Simulation (LSMS 2017), and on Intelligent Computing for Sustainable Energy and Environment (ICSEE'17), September, Nanjing, 2017, China. Title: 'Control technologies in decarbonizing the whole energy system from top to tail'. The purpose is to promote the importance of new control technologies in decarbonizing the whole energy chain to professional practitioners and industrial partners, as well as postgraduate students. Over 200 people from all around the world attended the keynote speech.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2017
 
Description Keynote speech at 2017 UK-China Symposium on Future Energy, 19th August 2017, Jurys Inn, Park Place, Cardiff, UK 
Form Of Engagement Activity Participation in an activity, workshop or similar
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach International
Primary Audience Professional Practitioners
Results and Impact Keynote speech titled "Control technologies in decarbonizing the whole energy chain from top to tail", presented at 2017 UK-China Symposium on Future Energy, 19th August 2017, Jurys Inn, Park Place, Cardiff, UK
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2017
 
Description Keynote speech in UK-China Researchers Link Workshop on 'Coordinated Development of New Energy Technologies and Multi-Energy Internet' 
Form Of Engagement Activity A formal working group, expert panel or dialogue
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach International
Primary Audience Professional Practitioners
Results and Impact UK-China Researchers Link Workshop on 'Coordinated Development of New Energy Technologies and Multi-Energy Internet', Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai, China, 22-25th, October 2017. Title: 'Control technologies in decarbonizing the whole energy system from top to tail'. Speech made of mainly earlier career researchers in both UK and China, over 30 delegates attended the workshop.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2017
 
Description Presentation of Point Energy Technologies in Regional Competitions 
Form Of Engagement Activity A talk or presentation
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach Regional
Primary Audience Industry/Business
Results and Impact The Point Energy Technology, developed through a couple EPSRC funded project, has been presented in INVENT 2016 in Northern Ireland and Sustainable Energy Award Competition in Ireland. The presentations in these competition have been widely reported in the public, and generated wide awareness of the technologies developed through the EPSRC funded projects. Several companies approached the team for deployment of the new energy saving technologies.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2016
URL http://www.pointenergy.org/
 
Description UK-China workshop on 'Shaping low carbon energy future' 
Form Of Engagement Activity Participation in an activity, workshop or similar
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach International
Primary Audience Professional Practitioners
Results and Impact The UK-China workshop on 'Shaping low carbon energy future', in junction with workshops on 'Intelligent computing and control for networked systems' & 'Smart grids and electric vehicles'', provided a unique and exciting opportunities for researchers and industrialists worldwide, in particular early career researchers from UK and China to work together to generate innovative ideas for shaping low carbon energy future, which will eventually generate impacts and benefit the society, in particular poor populations which still suffer from fuel poverty and poor access to bulk power. This has been achieved via knowledge sharing, brain-storming, knowledge transfer trainings and social networking events. It will also contribute significantly to the capacity building of early career researchers through mentoring scheme and training, and encourage high-impact joint publications and help to foster long-term collaborations of researchers and industrialists through joint application of research grants and formation of a research consortium. Ultimately, it will help achieve the strategic plan of developing all around UK-China collaborations in science and technology in delivering impact, shaping capability and training future leaders. The whole event was attended by over 90 people from UK and China, across different sectors. The workshop covered a wide range of topics, and sparkled a lot of debates, and a UK-China consortium on shaping low carbon energy future has been formed. The workshop was also opened to public.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2016
URL http://ukchinaenergy.com/programme/