The centre will bring hundreds of academics from across the university’s four colleges together to undergo and unlock research on data science and artificial intelligence across various applications.

At the centre’s official launch event, a handful of projects utilising data science and AI to deliver new advances across six programmes of research were showcased.

The cross-disciplinary programmes target data- and AI-driven advances in engineering and the physical sciences; medical, veterinary and life sciences; economic and social sciences; arts and the humanities; and innovation. The sixth programme will support research in data science and AI across the university.

Related projects — including big data collection and analysis to improve quality of life in cities, and efforts to model and mitigate the effects of climate change, among other projects — involving University of Glasgow researchers are currently supported by more than £100 million in funding.

The launch event was attended by the likes of professor Mark Girolami, the chief scientist of the Alan Turing Institute — the UK’s national institute for data science and artificial intelligence — as well as Richard Lochhead MSP, the Scottish Government’s minister for small business, innovation, tourism, and trade.

Speaking on the launch and the centre’s mission-led ethos, professor Ana Basiri, who’s the centre’s director, said: “We were pleased to welcome Mr Lochhead to campus to learn about some of the work we’re doing to help tackle problems like climate change and inequality through data science and AI.”

“The University of Glasgow is a key player in this landscape, and our new Centre will bring together experts from across disciplines to work more strategically to tackle the grand challenges of our time,” said Basiri.

“In the years to come, we’ll be working to advance new research projects which help put data science at the heart of decisionmaking, to teach staff new skills to help them do their jobs more effectively, and to partner with industry to build new products and services using fresh insight gathered from their data streams.”

In April, the University of Glasgow joined the Turing University Network, a group of higher education institutions collaborating to use data science and AI for social good.

Professor Girolami, of the Alan Turing Institute, commented: “The data sciences and artificial intelligence technologies have enormous potential to contribute to solutions that tackle some of the global grand challenges we are currently facing.

“To deliver on this potential will require a coordinated, collective, sustained, and multi-disciplinary approach. The University of Glasgow’s new Centre for Data Science and AI is a beacon of research excellence and innovation in Scotland to facilitate and coordinate the essential collaboration between the University’s world leading experts in AI locally, nationally, and internationally.”

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The innovation minister also commented, saying: “We are working to make Scotland a world leader in the development and use of artificial intelligence in a way which is trustworthy, ethical and inclusive. To do so we must rise to the challenges and opportunities, which will be felt across our economy and society.

“The University of Glasgow has long been renowned for its technical innovation and research, and I am confident that the new Centre for Data Science and AI will build on this reputation.

“I look forward to the Centre fostering collaboration and showcasing effective, impactful, and ethical data science and AI, in keeping with the vision of Scotland’s AI Strategy.”

The Scottish AI Strategy — which was outlined in 2019 by Kate Forbes MSP and then launched in March 2021 — was conceived to help realise Scotland’s vision to be a leader in the development and use of trustworthy, ethical, and inclusive artificial intelligence, with the Scottish AI Alliance being tasked with the delivery of the vision.