Networks
Bristol has a rich variety of collaborative networks and initiatives in health data science. This page shows examples of some of them. Search for colleagues contributing to various networks by using a drop-down list at the top. If you wish to be added to this hub, please contact ebi-healthdatascience@bristol.ac.uk.
ALSPAC
Based at the University of Bristol, the Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children (ALSPAC), also known as Children of the 90s, is a world-leading birth cohort study providing the international research community with a rich resource for the study of the environmental and genetic factors that affect a person’s health and development.
ARUK
Alzheimer’s Research UK is the UK’s leading dementia research charity, dedicated to causes, diagnosis, prevention, treatment and cure.
Applied Nonlinear Mathematics
The Applied Nonlinear Mathematics group at the University of Bristol primarily works at the interface between mathematics and real-world applications. The idea that real-world challenges and mathematical theory can form a virtuous circle is a fundamental part of the philosophy of the group.
BNSSG CCG
The Bristol, North Somerset and South Gloucestershire Clinical Commissioning Group brings together experienced healthcare professionals to decide what services are needed in the local area and ensure that they are provided for our population.
Biostatics, Epidemiology, Mathematics and Ecology group
The cross-cutting Biostatistics, Epidemiology, Mathematics and Ecology group is led by Professor William Browne. The group covers a wide selection of research interests, all with a quantitative theme and ranging from statistical methodology and software development work, through statistical modelling, to more applied epidemiology work both in the UK and overseas. The group also works on mathematical image analysis techniques and modelling of disease.
Biostatistic, evidence synthesis and informatics
The Biostatistics, evidence synthesis and informatics theme enables researchers across the Bristol BRC to use cutting-edge approaches to organise and analyse large sets of data and sources of evidence, working across the five clinical research themes: cardiovascular disease; mental health; nutrition, diet and lifestyle; perinatal and reproductive health and surgical innovation.
Bristol BRC Informatics
The informatics and data science group provides a clinical informatics platform that underpins the delivery of all BRC research. It enables the effective management of, access to and integration of research data and routinely collected data to provide reliable outcome ascertainment and broader personal and health characterisation. The program will coalesce around our leading programs in record linkage, and development and application of tools for data sharing, integration, analysis and secure co-analysis.
Bristol BRC Surgical Innovation Theme
The theme’s aim is to transform the introduction and evaluation of novel and evolving invasive procedures including surgery and the use of devices. We aim to accelerate the implementation of safe and effective surgical techniques and devices as well as the rejection of those that are ineffective.
Bristol Centre for Surgical Research
The Bristol Centre for Surgical Research is a multidisciplinary collaboration aiming to transform patient care, focusing on improving early phase studies to understand and promote safe and efficient surgical innovation. They also work to optimise trials to increase evidence-based surgical practice. The centre tackles key questions relevant to patients, clinicians and the NHS and is working to inspire and train a new generation of surgeons to undertake high quality research.
Bristol Health Partners
Bristol Health Partners is an Academic Health Science Centre designated by NHS England and NHS Improvement and the National Institute for health Research. BHP’s mission is to generate significant health gain and improvements in service delivery in the Bristol, North Somerset and South Gloucestershire region by integrating, promoting and developing the region’s strengths in health services, research, innovation and education.
Bristol NIHR Biomedical Research Centre
The National Institute for Health Research Bristol Biomedical Research Centre (NIHR Bristol BRC) is a partnership between University Hospitals Bristol and Weston NHS Foundation Trust and the University of Bristol and is one of 20 BRCs across England funded by the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR). NIHR funds, enables and delivers world-leading health and social care research that improves people’s health and wellbeing and promotes economic growth.
British Sociological Association
The British Sociological Association (BSA) is the national subject association for sociologists in the UK and its primary objective is to promote sociology. The BSA is the largest sociological network in the UK and is the public face of sociology in Britain.
CABOT
The Cabot Institute for the Environment at the University of Bristol is a diverse community of 600 experts, united by a common cause: protecting our environment and identifying ways of living better with our changing planet.
CAPC
The Centre for Academic Primary Care (CAPC) at the University of Bristol is a leading centre for primary care research and teaching in the UK, and one of nine centres that form the NIHR School for Primary Care Research. Part of Bristol Medical School, CAPC is an internationally recognised centre of excellence for population health sciences research and teaching.
CIPOLD
CIPOLD is the Confidential Inquiry into premature deaths of people with learning disabilities and is funded by the Department of Health. CIPOLD aims to improve the health and well-being of people with learning disabilities by carrying out an inquiry into their death.
CLAHRC
Between January 2014 and October 2019, the NIHR Applied Research Collaboration (ARC) West was called the NIHR Collaboration for Leadership in Applied Health Research and Care (CLAHRC) West. Like ARC West, CLAHRC West did applied research projects with collaborators. Applied research aims to address the immediate issues facing the health and social care system.
COMARE
COMARE advises on the health effects of natural and man-made radiation, both ionising and non-ionising.
CRUK
Cancer Research UK is a cancer research and awareness charity in the United Kingdom and Isle of Man.
ConDuCT
The MRC ConDuCT Hub for Trials Methodology Research. ConDuCT stands for Collaboration and innovation in Difficult and Complex randomised controlled Trials and was part of the MRC’s Network of Hubs for Trials Methodology Research. The Hub was open between 2009 and 2019. It aimed to develop a world class centre of excellence for high-quality, cutting-edge methodological research of relevance to pragmatic RCTs in general, but with a particular focus on the needs of RCTs in surgery.
DECIPHer
DECIPHer (Centre for Development, Evaluation, Complexity and Implementation in Public Health Improvement) brings together leading experts from a range of disciplines to tackle public health issues.
DECODE
The NIHR School for Primary Care Research funded DECODE (unexpecteD consEquenCes Of Digital hEalth) study examined the unexpected and unintended consequences of technology for patients, GP’s and other practice staff for three popular uses of technology in primary care practices: Smartphone apps that support patients to monitor and self-manage long-term conditions with their GP; online triage/consultation; patients’ online access to their medical records.
Digital Health Engineering
The Digital Health Engineering group applies computer science and electronic technologies to health and well-being challenges. Working with clinicians and the public, they research and design wearable sensors, low power communication networks, computer vision systems and machine learning methods that can reason about these diverse sources of data.
Digital Health Research Strand
The Elizabeth Blackwell Institute’s Digital Health Strand supported broader University of Bristol Digital Health strategy by increasing visibility of the considerable volume of digital health research within the University of Bristol to potential collaborators externally and to the public through bringing together teams around challenges and research topics, developing and building partnerships with external organisations and engaging undergraduate students in its activities.
Dynamic Genetics Lab
The Dynamic Genetics Lab, led by Dr Claire Haworth and Dr Oliver Davis, and part of the MRC Integrative Epidemiology Unit at the University of Bristol, explores how genetic and environmental influences change through time, through space, and in response to intervention.
Dynamics and Control
The Dynamics and Control Group at the University of Bristol addresses research problems relating to modelling, simulation and control of civil, mechanical and aerospace engineering systems. The research group focuses on the development of advanced analytical techniques in combination with numerical simulations and a strong element of experimental testing.
Engineering Systems and Design
The Engineering Systems and Design group is concerned with researching and creating tools, methods, models and strategies to improve the engineering and operation of our future infrastructure and industrial systems. Fundamental to their research approach is the need to understand how the process of modelling relates to the process of practical intervention, with a particular focus on the methodological challenges of modelling and designing complex technical and socio-technical systems.
HDS
Health Data Science Research Strand focuses on building Bristol capacity to carry out interdisciplinary research that makes the best use of existing, routinely collected data to improve health, care and services.
HPC Executive Board
The HPC Executive provides oversight for the day-to-day management of the advanced computing facilities of the University of Bristol.
HPRU
Based in Population Health Sciences at Bristol Medical School, the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Health Protection Research Unit in Behavioural Science and Evaluation is one of 14 HPRUs across England, part of a £58.7 million investment by the NIHR to protect the health of the nation. It is a partnership between the University of Bristol and Public Health England (PHE), in collaboration with the Medical Research Council (MRC) Biostatistics Unit at University of Cambridge and the University of the West of England.
IMPPP
Improving Medicines use in People with Polypharmacy in Primary Care. The aim of this project is to create an effective approach for improving the use of medicines in people with polypharmacy attending general practice.
Intelligent Systems
The Intelligent Systems lab research covers machine learning, data mining, pattern recognition, web technologies, bioinformatics, semantic image analysis and natural intelligent systems. They are interested in the fundamental theory of learning, the design of novel algorithms and real world applications such as animal biometrics, medical bioinformatics, information extraction from data streams on the Web and artificial musicology.
Jean Golding Institute
The Jean Golding Institute is a central hub for data science and data-intensive research at the University of Bristol.
LeDeR
LeDeR is a service improvement programme to improve services for people with a learning disability and autistic people.
MRC Integrative Epidemiology Unit
The MRC Integrative Epidemiology Unit at the University of Bristol (IEU) conducts some of the UK’s most advanced population health science research. It uses genetics, population data and experimental interventions to look for the underlying causes of chronic disease.
NHS
NHS England and NHS Improvement South West is one of the seven regional teams covering the counties of Bath, Wiltshire, West Bristol, Somerset, Gloucestershire, Cornwall and Isles of Scilly, Devon and Dorset.
NHS - University Hospitals Bristol
University Hospitals Bristol and Weston NHS Foundation Trust (UHBW) was formed on 1 April 2020 following the merger of University Hospitals Bristol NHS Foundation Trust and Weston Area Health NHS Trust.
NJR (National Joint Registry for England, Wales, NI and Isle of Man)
The National Joint Registry was set up by the Department of Health and Welsh Government in 2002 to provide an early warning of issues relating to patient safety, improve the quality of outcomes and ensure the quality and cost-effectiveness of joint replacement surgery. The National Joint Registry collects and monitors information on these joint replacement operations to improve clinical standards and benefit patients, clinicians and the orthopaedic sector as a whole.
Nuffield Council Bioethics
The Nuffield Council on Bioethics is an independent body that informs policy and public debate about the ethical questions raised by biological and medical research.
PEARL
PEARL (the Platform to Enable Augmentation of research with Record Linkage). Expertise in the management, governance and interpretation of linked health and administrative data for partners in scientific research, developing aligned, publicly acceptable governance structures for data linkage, and our in house researchers provide specialist epidemiological interpretation and analyses.
ReMemBr (Research into Memory, Brain Sciences and dementia)
The ReMemBr Group (Research into Memory, the Brain and dementia) includes neurologists, psychologist and researchers from both University of Bristol and North Bristol NHS Trust. They diagnose and treat patients with dementia and also offer clinical research opportunities to people with and without dementia. Research focuses on early diagnosis of dementia, understanding how memory is stored in the brain and how this can be enhanced and clinical trials of treatment in dementia.
Robotics
The University of Bristol’s Robotics group works on a wide range of challenges covering both hardware and software aspects of robotics: sensing, perception, reasoning, cooperation, control and actuation. They work in partnership with the University of the West of England through the Bristol Robotics Lab, a joint community based in a dedicated 4,500sqm facility on UWE’s Frenchay Campus.
Royal Statistical Society
The Royal Statistical Society is a professional body for all statisticians and data analysts and one of the world’s leading organisations advocating for the importance of statistics and data.
SPHERE
SPHERE (a Sensor Platform for HealthcarE in a Residential Environment) is an EPSRC-funded IRC (2013-2023) aiming to impact a range of healthcare needs by employing data-fusion and pattern-recognition from a common platform of sensors in the home. Since its inception the project has been working with end users and the public to develop a multi-sensor fusion approach to sensing of health-related behaviours such as sleep, physical activity, eating, domestic chores and social contact.
Trustworthy Systems Laboratory
The Trustworthy Systems Laboratory is active in a broad range of research areas, including energy aware computing, innovative hardware design, test generation and verification & validation. The uniting theme underpinning all these areas is curiosity and drive towards design, verification and analysis techniques for trustworthy systems.
Turing Fellow
Academics from engineering, health sciences, mathematics, veterinary science, geographical sciences, computer science, arts and other disciplines at the University of Bristol join the national institute for data science and artificial intelligence, the Alan Turing Institute.