Innovation Accelerator

A ground-breaking two-sided Extended Reality (XR) Culture and Heritage platform that will empower online visitors to explore vast cultural assets in engaging new ways; enable novice and expert curators to create new content; and explore models of use to support sustainable economic and cultural growth. The project will harness the University of Glasgow's global reputation for research in digital cultural heritage and XR, together with key cultural heritage and immersive technology partners, to develop an innovative solution to constraints that can limit physical exhibitions to less than 10% of the objects held in collections, and limit audience reach by cost, distance, and accessibility. 

University of Glasgow spin-out Chemify Ltd is developing the automated technology of chemputation: universal chemical synthesis controlled by computers. Chemify plans to expand to more than 100 people as it begins research and development to build a prototype of a scalable pilot plant capable of becoming a chemical 'giga factory' for the on demand discovery and manufacture of trillions of chemicals on demand for use in pharmaceuticals, high-value chemical manufacturing, new materials, farming, and green energy solutions. 

Bowel screening is used to find bowel cancer and pre-cancerous lesions called polyps in patients without symptoms. The aim of screening is both to catch bowel cancers early and to prevent cancers by removing pre-cancerous polyps. This project is part of the INCISE collaboration, which aims to develop a tool which will more accurately predict a patient’s risk of developing a future polyp, and therefore the need for a colonoscopy, using the latest advances in artificial intelligence, sequencing, and pathology. This new tool will reduce the number of people needing repeated colonoscopy, reducing unpleasant experiences and complications, improving access to colonoscopy by reducing surveillance lists, and reducing costs to the NHS, while maintaining a safe follow up regime for patients. 

Huge growth is predicted for the photonics and quantum markets in coming decades. This project aims to build an engineering capability, led by the University of Glasgow’s James Watt Nanofabrication Centre (JWNC), that will aid the growth of the Scottish photonics and quantum cluster. It will appoint design, test and manufacturing engineers to build on the embedded expertise and skill of the JWNC and senior University of Glasgow researchers, and enable industry to deliver innovative products that open up new markets. 

Exploring the viability of new technologies in uncooled infra-red detectors, novel edge processed high-definition imagers and the latest laser sensing techniques. These early-stage technologies hold the potential of being developed, matured and integrated into a new generation of world-class remote sensing equipment. Future products derived from these technologies could become significant disruptors, allowing world class systems to be produced to meet emerging capability requirements identified for military, medical diagnostic, energy monitoring, net-zero, security and surveillance applications. They are estimated to be worth an anticipated £40m in the UK market and £120m from exports over a decade. 

The FinTech Scotland initiative, in partnership with industry partners, Strathclyde and Glasgow universities, includes the creation of a new collaborative centre of excellence, focused on innovation in financial regulation. The work will explore new technologies to accelerate regulatory efficiencies, revolutionise risk management and shape future financial regulatory developments.