As London's leading multi-faculty university, UCL has a global and cross-disciplinary vision for research and innovation, strengthened by our broad range of industrial links, world-leading clinical partners, active policy engagement and central London location. The future research leaders of both academia and industry, research students are at the heart of this vision, and a key part of UCL's research community. Within UCL's Faculties of Engineering Sciences, Mathematical & Physical Sciences and the Bartlett Faculty of the Built Environment alone there are around 1,900 research students. Our thriving doctoral community in engineering and the physical sciences is strengthened by the 17 EPSRC-funded Centres for Doctoral Training hosted or co-hosted by UCL.
Our DTP: supports the best research students; nurtures early career academics; develops the pipeline of future research talent via undergraduate Vacation Bursaries; and, primes nascent interdisciplinary areas. We provide world-class student supervision, support, training and enterprise opportunities and expose students to a range of career options and industry collaboration opportunities. Our DTP provision is broad and vibrant, covering mathematics, physics, astronomy, chemistry, materials science, complex strands of mechanical, electronic and environmental engineering, computer science, and analysis and design of the built environment. Our interdisciplinary focus enables studentships to be co-hosted across departments or faculties, building strong collaborative relationships. Our research has demonstrable social and economic benefit in the UK and globally.
We invest our DTP strategically to:
a) Offer outstanding candidates comprehensive training and research opportunities via 60-80 4-year, fully-funded studentships per annum;
b) Collaborate with industry by allocating at least 10% of awards as DTP CASE Conversion studentships;
c) Enable high-potential graduates to develop their own independence via 2-year Doctoral Prize Fellowships (c. 9 per year);
d) Support up to 40 talented and promising undergraduate students to undertake summer research projects, through the Vacation Bursaries scheme;
e) Retain excellent international students, under the International Doctoral Scholar flexibility quota; and,
f) Support critical mass in areas of strategic importance, for instance, via top-sliced allocation of studentships especially to bolster cross-faculty, interdisciplinary research.
All doctoral students belong to the Doctoral School, which provides high quality training and resources. The Doctoral Skills Programme runs a comprehensive range of transferable skills training, including research ethics, ED&I, responsible innovation, public engagement, outreach, and impact. There are further opportunities to attend masters modules, CPD training and external courses.
UCL's DTP portfolio is broadly shaped around the UCL Grand Challenges, the UK Industrial Strategy, and priorities of UKRI and EPSRC, while also looking forward to areas that may be national priorities of the future. Faculties and departments also allocate awards in line with their local strategic priorities and areas of growth. The process is both bottom-up and top-down, ensuring comprehensive coverage and agility to deliver high-quality research. The UCL Doctoral Training Strategy Committee has overall responsibility for UCL's doctoral training. The DTP is overseen by the EPSRC Doctoral Training Governance Board with the Doctoral Training Manager having day-to-day oversight.
DTP awards are advertised with various deadlines across the academic year. Studentships are advertised on departmental pages as well as centrally: https://www.ucl.ac.uk/prospective-students/graduate/research-degrees/funded-research-opportunities-doctoral-training-and-studentships/studentships
For details of how to apply see: https://www.ucl.ac.uk/prospective-students/graduate/applying-graduate-study
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