The School of Computer Science and Electronic Engineering (CSEE) at the University of Essex has an outstanding reputation for teaching and high-quality research in artificial intelligence, biomedical engineering, brain-computer interfaces, computer games, evolutionary computation, human language technology, robotics, networks and optoelectronics.

Particularly relevant to this application is our research in artificial intelligence and in life and medical sciences applications, which was judged as world-leading in the recent Research Excellence Framework, the system for assessing the quality of research in UK higher education institutions. Indeed, Essex is ranked 23rd in the world (6th in Europe) for Artificial Intelligence based on citations in the last 10 years by Microsoft Academic Research and is ranked among the best 101-150 universities world-wide for computer science (joint 8th in the UK) in the latest Academic Ranking of World Universities.

An important center spanning both areas is the Essex Brain-Computer Interface (BCI) Laboratory. The BCI lab was co-founded in 2004 by Prof. Poli and Dr. Citi among others, and is one of the largest and better equipped in Europe. For over a decade, it has produced highly visible internationally leading research (150 peer reviewed publications, frequent presence in the media, including ITV, the New Scientist, the Financial Times magazine and many more), with international collaborators at MIT, NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory, the European Space Agency, and many others.

The school is a partner of the inter-faculty Ageing and Assisted Living Network. Our members have led high-profile externally funded projects in the area of Assisted Living Technologies. Since 2007 our research has featured prominently in the UK’s Department of Health’s annual report on research and development work relating to assistive technology, e.g. see the 2012 report, which is presented to parliament.