Warwick has signed a new PhD agreement with Shanghai Jiao Tong University (SJTU) to further strengthen our research collaboration and support the development of our future research leaders.

Researchers will benefit from a new agreement signed by Warwick and SJTU that will see the recruitment of up to eight PhD students per year, co-supervised by the partner institutions.

Warwick and SJTU have a longstanding partnership which is built on a history of individual collaboration between our researchers. In 2016 this was formalised by an institutional partnership agreement and has been further expanded with a mobility programme that includes both physical and virtual, short-term and full-year student exchange.

For the past five years Warwick and SJTU have offered a Joint Seed Fund to support research collaboration projects across a wide variety of disciplines, including biomass conversion and English language teacher training in rural China.

When asked why global partners such as SJTU are so important, Professor Michael Scott, Pro-Vice-Chancellor (International) said:

International collaboration is vital to tackle the global challenges facing our world today. Warwick is committed to building partnerships across the globe that provide innovative educational learning experiences for our students and enable us to harness combined expertise and resources to develop solutions that transcend borders.

This new collaborative framework with SJTU will take our research collaboration to the next level as we work together to strive for sustainable answers to global issues that affect millions of people around the world.

To support further research collaboration, the two universities have now developed an institutional framework for joint PhDs. Beginning in 2024, the first cohort of PhD students will involve supervisors with an SJTU-Warwick Joint Seed Fund award to enable current projects to be further developed. Future rounds of this programme will be open to new applications and anyone interested in collaborating with SJTU is invited to contact ISR to discuss your research proposal.

Professor Sai Gu, Deputy Pro-Vice-Chancellor (E and SE Asia) said:

We greatly value our partnership with Shanghai Jiao Tong University which has grown to include collaborative teaching, research and student exchange. We are united in our common goal to tackle global challenges and have leveraged our Joint Seed Fund to foster research innovation. I am excited by today’s agreement as we further strengthen our research collaboration through the new joint PhD program and invest in our research leaders of the future.

If you have any questions about the SJTU-Warwick Joint PhD Programme please get in touch with Hui Wang, International Partnerships Officer (E and SE Asia), International Strategy and Relations, hui.wang.6@warwick.ac.uk.