China hub boost for UK diagnostic leader
10 Jun 2019
The world’s largest research centre for diagnostic engineering – the UK’s Centre for Efficiency and Performance Engineering (CEPE) – is to open a new hub in China.
Part of the University of Huddersfield, CEPE employs 15 academic staff, plus 30 doctoral researchers and 30 visiting academics to examine means to improve machine reliability, boost plant performance and reduce emissions.
It has an extensive British network involving several universities and is now seeking to replicate the system in China, explained CEPE founder professor Andrew Ball.
“We also have links with numerous institutions in China,” he stated.
“The network in the UK works well because CEPE is a hub with ‘spokes’, consisting of individuals or groups at other universities in the UK. We realised that we now needed a hub in China.”
Together with the centre’s deputy director professor Fengshou Gu, Ball has led the development of the Chinese hib which will centre on Beijing Institute of Technology in Zhuhai (BITZH).
The institute will be linked to seven Chinese universities. These include institutions in Shanghai, Xi’an,Tsinghua, Chongqing, Nanjing, Tianjin and Zhejiang.
Added Ball: “This is a hugely enabling opportunity and I believe that, because of the much closer collaborative working that the network will bring, it is entirely realistic for member institutions to expect to see a step change in the volume of research outputs and IP disclosures that they make.”
