Thinkubators
Finding the unasked questions for impactful research

What is a Thinkubator?

Industrial and societal challenges require interdisciplinary knowledge and engagement. Problem-formulation or 'sandpit' workshops with mathematical sciences have proven efficacy.

Our Thinkubator “input the challenge, output the question” approach formulates a technically precise series of questions within the framework of a full knowledge exchange, where a traditional “question and answer” approach may overlook valuable research avenues.

Each Thinkubator is designed bespoke for each challenge partner. However, they follow our core structure, which has been shown to give the best results.

1. Initial discussions

One to two pre-event meetings to align on the problem, address questions, and determine attendees for the event.

2. Thinkubator

Full day workshop with external partners, academics, Innovation Research Associates (InRAs), and PhD students, aligned to the schedule above.

3. Future avenues

A summary road-map is produced by a focused group of attendees, outlining potential avenues e.g. co-funded PhD projects, InRA/IFS driven research, Industrial funding, or consultancy.

Core schedule

⇒ PROBLEM EXPLORATION
Blend small group and full group facilitated discussions, to explore the range of potential research avenues, and identify key avenues for problem formulation.


⇒ SCIENTIFIC FORMULATION
Specialised work groups refine an avenue into a research question, determine the core mathematical questions, whilst identifying techniques and challenges.


⇒ DIRECTION SCOPING
All avenues are presented as formulated questions, and next steps are discussed, including identifying suitable work packages for future collaboration.

Engagement areas

Industrial applied mathematics: to solve problems held by diverse partners with physical modelling needs arising from real-world systems.

Distributed socio-technical systems: challenges faced by partners in e.g. transportation systems, urban science, financial regulation, energy grids, and social sciences.

Applied data science: including impactful and ethical applications of data science and AI to social and technological problems such as those in the Data Science for Social Good initiative.

If a Thinkubator could help you or your company, please don't hesitate to get in touch with us to discuss how we can help!