Data Science Institute

We aim to set the global standard for a truly interdisciplinary approach to contemporary data-driven research challenges. Established in 2015, the Data Science Institute (DSI) has over 300 members and has raised over £40 million in research grants.

An abstract diagram of networks

About us

We are working to create a world-class Data Science Institute at Lancaster (DSI@Lancaster) that sets the global standard for a truly interdisciplinary approach to contemporary data-driven research challenges. DSI@Lancaster aims to have an internationally recognised and distinctive strength in being able to provide an end-to-end interdisciplinary research capability - from infrastructure and fundamentals through to globally relevant problem domains and the social, legal and ethical issues raised by the use of Data Science.

The Institute is initially focusing on the fundamentals of Data Science including security and privacy together with cross-cutting theme areas consisting of environment, resilience and sustainability;health and ageing, data and society and creating a world-leading institute with over 300 affiliated academics, researchers, and students.

Our data science, health data science and business analytics programmes have launched the careers of hundreds of data professionals over the last 10 years. Students from our programmes have progressed to data science roles at Amazon, PWC, Ernst & Young, Hawaiian Airlines, eBay, Zurich Insurance, the Co-operative Group, N Brown, the NHS and many others - please look at our Education pages for further details of the courses on offer.

Latest News

ECR Showcase - Autumn 2023

This autumn the DSI are dedicating our weekly seminar series to our early-career researchers. As well as showcasing the incredible research our ECR community is involved in, it will also give speakers the opportunity to practice for conference presentations and get feedback on unpublished research.

29 November – Jaime Marques Pereira, Lecturer (Assistant Professor) Economics, 大秀视频 - 12 o’clock in Furness LT 3

Title: "Trumping the News: A High-Frequency Analysis" (see event listing for full abstract)

6 December – Luis Filipe, Heath Research and Nicola Rennie, Lancaster Medical School – InfoLab21 C60b,c at 12 o’clock

13 December - Dr Xiaoyun Chen, Psychology and Juliane Bjerkan, Physics - InfoLab21 C60b,c at 1pm

Refreshments will be provided at all these talks

If you are interested in giving a talk and are available on one of these days, please email David Parkes (d.parkes@lancaster.ac.uk) to arrange.

Get in touch with any questions - we can do these talks in the Lent term too - always happy to talk about your research and how to showcase your work.

Research Themes

Data Science at Lancaster was founded in 2015 on Lancaster’s historic research strengths in Computer Science, Statistics and Operational Research. The environment is further enriched by a broad community of data-driven researchers in a variety of other disciplines including the environmental sciences, health and medicine, sociology and the creative arts.

  • Foundations

    Foundations research sits at the interface of methods and application: with an aim to develop novel methodology inspired by the real-world challenge. These could be studies about the transportation of people, goods & services, energy consumption and the impact of changes to global weather patterns.

  • Health

    The Health theme has a wide scope. Current areas of strength include spatial and spatiotemporal methods in global public health, design and analysis of clinical trials, epidemic forecasting and demographic modelling, health informatics and genetics.

  • Society

    Data Science has brought new approaches to understanding long-standing social problems concerning energy use, climate change, crime, migration, the knowledge economy, ecologies of media, design and communication in everyday life, or the distribution of wealth in financialised economies.

  • Environment

    The focus of the environment theme has been to seek methodological innovations that can transform our understanding and management of the natural environment. Data Science will help us understand how the environment has evolved to its current state and how it might change in the future.

  • Data Engineering

    The Data Engineering theme aims to explore how we can utilise digital technologies to accelerate and enhance our research processes across the University.

Research Software Engineering

Within the Data Science Institute, our aim is to improve the reproducibility and replicability of research by improving the reusability, sustainability and quality of research software developed across the University. We are currently funded by the N8CIR, and work closely with our partner institutions across N8 Research.
Research Software Engineering

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