It will provide industry and academia with the conditions to assess materials and perform testing from 2 Kelvin (-271.15 °C) to 20 Kelvin (-253.15 °C).
A lab at these temperatures helps upscale technologies and propel innovation in sectors including quantum computing and high temperature superconductor (HTS) technologies.
Advancing knowledge
A wide range of companies have already expressed interest in accessing the facility from sectors as varied as:
- quantum technology
- healthcare
- green aviation
- fusion energy
This lab allows cryogenic materials characterisation for MRI systems for health scanning, and may help researchers understand the performance of novel materials to support liquid hydrogen powered flight.
The conditions could also prove key for understanding mechanical properties for applications in superconducting magnets.
Quantum specialists
This large-scale facility will be situated at UK Research and Innovation’s (UKRI) Daresbury Laboratory to deliver an approximately six-fold increase in cryo-capacity, most notably for scale-up by quantum computing companies like global leaders PsiQuantum.
NCF will also act as a centre of excellence to drive skills development in cryogenic design, technologies and system operation, identified as areas of key UK skills shortage.
A UK Quantum Skills Taskforce report highlights that new jobs created globally in the quantum computing sector will reach 250,000 by 2030, and 840,000 by 2035.
Infrastructure Fund
This latest investment is part of a £156.6 million boost which will be shared across four vital infrastructure projects driving economic and scientific growth in the UK.
Supported by UKRI, the Infrastructure Fund will invest in a wide range of critical infrastructures though a portfolio of projects which currently totals £2.04 billion.
The Infrastructure Fund will also invest in:
- next-generation multiscale bioimaging infrastructure
- a tidal energy innovation, testing and production facility
- a distributed plant and crop research infrastructure
Subject to business case approvals, these investments are expected to deliver outcomes for the nation that advance knowledge and improve lives while fuelling the economy.
Imaging Across Scales (IMAS-UK)
The IMAS-UK project promises unprecedented insights into the function of complex biological systems, enabling researchers to map in-situ spatial drivers of ageing, disease, drug-resistance and toxicity.
The £55 million project will combine next-generation imaging technologies spanning the molecular to organism scale with artificial intelligence-powered data integration.
It will create a national, distributed infrastructure that will connect centres of imaging excellence across England, Scotland and Wales.
IMAS-UK delivering frontier technologies
IMAS-UK will be jointly led by the Medical Research Council and Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC).
Its advanced capabilities will drive understanding of the mechanistic basis of health and disease and accelerate discovery in frontier technologies like engineering biology.
The project will contribute to the delivery of key government strategies such as the Life Sciences Sector Plan and the 10 Year Health Plan for England.
Blue Horizon
The UK’s tidal energy capabilities will gain a major boost through Blue Horizon, an Innovate UK–led project to be delivered by the Orkney based European Marine Energy Centre (EMEC).
Supported by the £15 million Infrastructure Fund investment, and subject to securing £7.5 million co-funding from other sources, the project will significantly expand EMEC’s tidal energy test and demonstration facilities.
This investment will unlock vital infrastructure needed to accelerate the commercialisation of tidal power in the UK.
Blue Horizon project benefits and impacts
By enhancing capacity for real world testing, Blue Horizon will help answer key questions about how the UK can best harness its globally significant tidal resource to:
- drive industrial growth
- strengthen energy security
- follow the cost reduction trajectory successfully pioneered by offshore wind
The upgraded facilities will also support innovation in the technologies and systems required for large scale tidal deployment worldwide.
Within the next decade, EMEC anticipates that the project will deliver measurable national benefits of:
- over 1,500 GWh of clean tidal energy generation
- around £300 million in leveraged private investment
- more than 300 skilled jobs across the UK’s growing marine energy supply chain
PhenomUK
PhenomUK will accelerate the development of new plant and crop varieties securing the UK’s long term food supply by ensuring they are resilient to:
- changing climate
- biodiversity loss
- invasive non-native species
This investment establishes a national research and innovation infrastructure covering crop growth from seed to field, and enhances our capacity to assess new varieties’ performance in realistic and scalable environments.
PhenomUK is a £35.4 million, six-year project funded through the UKRI Infrastructure Fund and led by BBSRC.
It builds on the successful UK Plant and Crop Phenotyping Infrastructure preliminary activity and PhenomUK Technology Touching Life network.
Addressing global issues
Invasive non-native species cost the British economy approximately £1.9 billion per year in direct impacts, with extreme weather costing UK farmers over £1 billion in arable crop income annually.
Crop improvement programmes require detailed understanding of plant development and behaviour in varied and rapidly changing growth environments.
Research enabled by PhenomUK will drive advances in national food production and reduce pesticide use.
The project aligns with the government’s ambition to position the UK as a global leader in the plant and crop breeding market.
This will accelerate the application of precision breeding using engineering biology to create deployable agricultural solutions.
World class research
Infrastructure Portfolio Director Adam Staines said:
These investments demonstrate the breadth and ambition of both new and existing infrastructure opportunities that UKRI will enable and deliver.
Spanning clean energy, medical imaging, food security and quantum technologies, these projects will play a critical role in ensuring the UK maintains its position as a global leader across these priority areas.
Strategic infrastructure investment is fundamental to supporting world class research and innovation, and to unlocking long term economic and societal benefit.
I’m particularly excited that, through these investments, we will strengthen collaboration with industry partners and ensure that R&D investment delivers maximum economic and societal impact for the UK.
Accelerating innovation
UKRI CEO Professor Sir Ian Chapman said:
UKRI’s mission is to advance knowledge, improve lives and drive growth. Delivering on the mission depends on investing in underpinning tools, including world leading infrastructure, facilities and skills.
Today’s announcement demonstrates how UKRI is turning public funding into real-world outcomes and enabling world-class research, accelerating innovation and delivering the greatest possible benefit for the UK public.
We are delighted to be announcing these outstanding projects across our portfolio including in clean energy, medical imaging, food security and and quantum technologies.
There are many remarkable projects but we can’t finance them all, so we’ve made some tough choices. These investments are aligned with government and societal priorities and are key to enabling economic growth through public R&D funding.
About the UKRI Infrastructure Fund programme
The UKRI Infrastructure Fund supports the facilities, equipment and resources that are essential for researchers and innovators to do ground-breaking work.
This strategic fund helps to create a long-term pipeline of research and innovation infrastructure investment priorities for the next 10 to 20 years.
It supports a range of projects from new infrastructures to major upgrades, delivering a step change in infrastructure capability and capacity.
The Infrastructure Fund spans the complete disciplinary spectrum and funds infrastructures located across all of the UK’s regions and nations, and those which form part of major international collaborations.
