The Universities of Glasgow and Edinburgh are set to lead a multidisciplinary new doctoral-level training centre to create the UK’s next generation of nuclear scientists and engineers.
The Skills Centre for Advancing Nuclear Systems, or SCANS, is one of seven recipients of new Doctoral Focal Awards (DFAs), formerly called Centres for Doctoral Training, from the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero.
Edinburgh is also helping deliver the RADIANT applied nuclear physics and technology DFA, led by the University of York.
The £65.6m Doctoral Focal Awards are match-funded by industry and delivered by UK Research and Innovation (UKRI). They follow the Nuclear Skills Plan’s recommendation to quadruple the number of nuclear fission doctoral students to address the sector’s shortage of high-level nuclear skills and refresh an ageing workforce.
The aim is to equip doctoral students with a broad range of advanced technical skills essential for the UK’s current and future civil and defence nuclear programmes, supporting the UK’s economic growth, energy and national security, and net zero objectives.
SCANS will operate across two integrated and interconnected hubs, in Glasgow and Edinburgh, drawing on the combined expertise in chemistry and radiochemistry, physics, engineering, mathematics, environmental and data science.
Academics from Edinburgh and Glasgow, the SUERC: Centre for the Isotope Sciences and Heriot-Watt University will train four cohorts of doctoral researchers, delivering challenge-led research projects co-created with industry, from the development of advanced fuels and reactors to decommissioning, waste management, and environmental stewardship.
Students will have access to leading research facilities, including The National Robotarium, SUERC’s radioisotope laboratories, Heriot-Watt’s Lyell Centre, the University of Edinburgh’s Pyrochemical Research Laboratory – a National Nuclear User Facility, and CSEC, its multidisciplinary Centre for Science at Extreme Conditions and the University of Glasgow’s wet‑chemistry, nuclear materials and specialist physics laboratories.
And they will also benefit from the backing of industry and national organisations, who are contributing funding, training, placements and specialist expertise.
Professor Andy Mount of the University of Edinburgh’s School of Chemistry, lead for the Edinburgh SCANS hub, said
This extraordinary collaboration leverages our combined, multi-disciplinary research, facilities and training expertise - in areas ranging from materials and process development to sensing and robotics – to equip future leaders with the bespoke skills needed to build a thriving and sustainable UK nuclear sector.”
Dr Joy Farnaby, of the University of Glasgow’s School of Chemistry, Glasgow SCANS hub lead, said:
I’m delighted to be working with my colleagues at institutions to launch SCANS, which represents a unique opportunity to support future innovations in the UK’s nuclear sector across the full nuclear lifecycle.
By recruiting and training researchers as cohorts, giving them access to exceptional facilities, and working closely with industry to help them create the workforce they need, we will foster a new generation of experts who will advance the sector for decades to come.”
Andrew Aveyard, energy sector lead at Edinburgh Innovations, which is supporting the Edinburgh hub, said:
Aligned with our University Research and Innovation Strategy mission to tackle the climate and environmental crisis, we have built in systems thinking and the principles of sustainability (reduce, reuse, recycle, innovate) into SCANS.
It’s crucial that we work closely with industry in programmes like this to meet cluster challenges such as completing the energy mix and building UK supply chains.”
Professor Charlotte Deane, Executive Chair at UKRI’s Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council, said:
The UK's nuclear sector is central to our national security, clean energy ambitions and economic future. Meeting those challenges demands a new generation of researchers and innovators with the technical expertise to make a real difference.
UKRI doctoral focal awards are a proven way to develop that talent. They bring together academic excellence, industry partnerships and cohort-based learning to give doctoral students the skills and experience to make an immediate impact in the nuclear workforce.
These new nuclear focal awards, developed in partnership with government, will continue building the research base that the UK's national security and clean energy future depends on.”
