Departmental news

Congratulations to Associate Professor Mingli Chen who has been appointed as Associate Editor of the Journal of Econometrics from 1 January 2024

The Journal of Econometrics serves as an outlet for important, high-quality, new research in both theoretical and applied econometrics. The scope of the Journal includes papers dealing with identification, estimation, testing, decision, and prediction issues encountered in economic research. Classical Bayesian statistics, experimental design, and machine learning methods are decidedly within the range of the Journal's interests.

Mingli Chen is an Associate Professor of Economics in the Department of Economics at the University of Warwick, a Research Associate at CeMMAP, and a Turing Fellow at the Alan Turing Institute (the UK's National Institute for Data Science and Artificial Intelligence). She is working on econometrics, with a special focus on panel data models, social networks, quantile regression, and AI + machine learning both in theoretical inference and applications in economics.

Visit Dr Chen's staff profile for further details about her research and publications.

We are excited to announce the winners of this year's Warwick Future Economist competition jointly organised by the Department of Economics at Warwick and the Warwick Economics Society. They have been selected out of 53 entries for the outstanding quality of their economics essays.

The overall winner of the competition is Edie Farquhar from Cheltenham Ladies College in Cheltenham, whose essay considered the most important factors of the UK's persistent high inflation rate in recent years. Congratulations to Edie who will receive the top cash prize of £250.

We also congratulate the following students in the joint-second place who receive £50 cash prize each:

• Mehar Amiri, The Cooper's Company and Coburn School
• Emerson Leung, Mill Hill County High School

The collaboration between Warwick Economics Society (with nearly 3000 student members from over a hundred different disciplines) and the Department of Economics at Warwick has been going strong for many years, as we combine our aims to widen access and increase diversity within the subject of economics. Matthew Murray, Sagar Mishra and Aanya Manjakunnel from Warwick Economics Society and students on the BSc in Economics degree, commented about the competition:

Matthew Murray, President - " We were delighted to see so much interest in our second annual Essay Competition. At EconSoc, we want to help students succeed and this competition is an amazing opportunity for high school students to strengthen their university applications. We hope to see future winners as part of our society one day! "

Sagar Mishra and Aanya Manjakunnel, Heads of Diversity and Outreach - "It was amazing to see the calibre of students all over the UK and their passion for economics. It was wonderful to hold this competition in partnership with the Warwick Economics Department sand we look forward to expanding this competition in the coming years."

Warwick Future Economist Competition was set up in order to raise the awareness of economics as a subject that is concerned with understanding the major global problems of our time, such as inequality, globalisation, healthcare, climate change and many more. The topics of the essay competition had been selected from the three key areas of economics: macroeconomics, behavioural economics, and environmental economics, and challenged the young students to write how economics can help understand better the cost-of-living crisis, the impact of conflict on the global economy and the climate crisis.

Robin Naylor, Professor and Widening Participation Lead in the Department said:

"As a moderator of the submitted essays, I was delighted to be part of the collaboration over the Future Economists Essay Competition run by our students' Warwick Economics Society and supported by the Department of Economics. the essays I read all demonstrated the enthusiasm and the talent of the young authors in their thinking around the critically important issues facing the world and contributing ideas to resolve them for future generations.

In the Department, we are keen to work with our students and with the Royal Economics Society's Discover Economics project to raise awareness of the wide-ranging and profound insights that can be gained from the study of economics. I thank all students who took part in this competition and hope they gained personally from their contributions"

Congratulations to the winners from all of us in the Department of Economics and the Warwick Economics Society.

Recent research by Dr Ali Struthers reveals 'School Tasking' widening participation project boosts children's legal comprehension, connecting them to cases influencing consumer rights, human rights, and broader justice and equality themes.

The MSc International Trade, Strategy, Operations (ITSO) course, at WMG at the University of Warwick is collaborating with the Institute of Export & International Trade (IOE&IT) to provide students with access to key industrial opportunities and engagements.

The WMG ITSO course is the first accredited Master’s programme in the UK by the IOE&IT. It is a unique interdisciplinary course that integrates the most essential and related pillars of international trade, strategy, and operations management within trade and business management towards supplying compound talents for industries. Following the philosophy of research-informed teaching for practical implementation, the course also seeks industrial access and opportunities for students.

As part of the collaborative partnership, an event was held recently introducing students to a new innovative way of learning and forging direct links between students and the IOE&IT.

At the event, Ms Helen Hastie, Membership Development Manager, from IOE&IT shared, with the students, information about professional memberships and the associated access to industry specialists and activities when studying ITSO. This includes annual events such as the import and export show, international trade awards, and MemberCon – a UK trade networking event. This helped students to improve their knowledge, skills, and opportunities for career development.

Ms Helen Hastie said: “It was a delight to return to welcome the newest cohort of students from WMG into our membership community. International trade offers a unique opportunity for development not only at a country-to-country level, but professionally. This next generation of international trade expertise is being actualised via WMG ITSO course facilitating exciting career opportunities and growing networks. The IOE&IT is delighted to continue supporting this growth.”

ITSO student course representative, Sitong Li commented: “The event is very helpful and we have also been given access to the latest daily news and information on international trade. In addition to learning knowledge, the connection between our course and IOE&IT is a supplement to our study in the actual operations of international trade, and help us to gain more of the practices outside the classroom.”

Find out more about WMG’s International Trade, Strategy and Operations Master’s Programme here: MSc International Trade, Strategy and Operations | University of Warwick

If you have an enquiry about the ITSO course, please email WMG’s Assistant Professor and ITSO Course Director, Dr Di Li:d.li@warwick.ac.uk or wmgmasters@warwick.ac.uk

Mammography for some breast cancer survivors could be reduced, according to research led by Warwick Medical School’s Clinical Trials Unit.

A team at Warwick Medical School’s Clinical Trials Unit have won a prestigious award at the Clinical Research Network Awards, alongside colleagues from the West Midlands Ambulance Service.

The multi-year, multi-million-pound investment is a strategic partnership between TAE Power Solutions and the WMG, High Value Manufacturing Catapult programme to improve the performance and sustainability of energy storage solutions.

With a UK base in the West Midlands, TAE Power Solutions’ mission is to bring their technological advantages developed within Fusion power generation into e-mobility to drive forward carbon reduction and sustainability through increased performance for reduced cost.

TAE Power Solutions use their advanced technology to control energy at a modular-level, enabling dynamic, ultra-precise load balancing across individual battery modules. This increases pack longevity, efficiency, fault-tolerance, and repairability, ultimately reducing lifetime costs and delivering lifetime benefits for consumers and OEMs.

The £4 million partnership aims to use the combined expertise of WMG and TAE to develop the firm’s novel power management systems and energy storage technology to unlock benefits for many new applications across the full spectrum of e-mobility and electric transportation.

The focus over the first two years of an ongoing strategic alliance will be to breakdown the challenges faced by traditional battery control systems, ultimately delivering smaller, lighter, more durable, more efficient, and safer battery packs.

The project will also focus on researching topics related to the “4Rs” - reduce, reuse, recycle & recover, to ensure sustainability of the technology is designed in from the beginning, a key issue in the battery manufacturing industry.

Charles Martin, Strategic Partnership Manager at WMG’s High Value Manufacturing Catapult said: “The team at WMG is very honoured and excited to be starting this new research relationship with TAE Power Solutions. This partnership will leverage WMG’s extensive expertise in batteries, power electronics and e-motor technologies to develop TAE’s novel approach to maximising the performance and life from existing and new battery technologies.

“Using WMG’s state of the facilities and working closely with TAE’s experts, the combined team’s goal is to expand the barriers of existing battery performance whilst enhancing the UK’s engineering and manufacturing capabilities.”

Ben Russell, Chief Commercial Officer of TAE commented: “At TAE we are very excited to be working with WMG on this project, enhancing our core engineering research capability and delivering usable, data driven, world class knowledge into the development of our technology creating the world’s best, integrated power systems.”

AI can analyse X-rays and diagnose medical issues just as, or more, accurately than doctors, a new study led by the University of Warwick has found.

The AI, which has been trained on 2.8 million historic chest X-rays from over 1.5 million patients, scans X-Rays for 37 possible conditions.

It was just as accurate or more accurate than the doctor’s analysis at the time the X-ray was taken for 35 out of 37 conditions (94%).

The AI software can scan X-rays as soon as they are taken for possible conditions and flags any abnormalities. It will then give a percentage chance of each of the abnormalities being present. The AI also understands the seriousness of the different conditions and will flag the more urgent ones to doctors accordingly.

To verify the accuracy of the AI, a sample of over 1,400 X-Rays it had analysed were cross examined by a group of senior radiologists, who compared the diagnoses made by the AI with the historical diagnoses by radiologists at the time.

The AI is a collaboration between Warwick, King’s College London and several NHS sites funded by a Wellcome Trust Innovator Award. The programme also uses a large language model to understand the historical reports written by clinicians – the same underlying technology used by other AI programmes, such as ChatGPT.

Giovanni Montana, Professor of Data Science at WMG at the University of Warwick, and lead author, suggested that the AI tool could either be used as a screening tool for radiologists, or to offer “the ultimate second opinion”, avoiding human bias.

Professor Montana commented: “This programme has been trained on millions of X-rays and is highly accurate. It eliminates the elements of human error, which is unavoidable, and bias. If a patient is referred for an X-ray with a heart problem, doctors will inevitably focus on the heart over the lungs.

“This is totally understandable but runs the risk of undetected problems in other areas. This AI eliminates that human bias – it’s the ultimate second opinion”.

Co-author Professor Vicky Goh of King’s College London, and immediate past Chair of the Academic Committee at the Royal Society of Radiologists commented: “Current AI programmes available to us in the NHS only have a limited scope. Comprehensive AI programmes like this will be the future of medicine, with AI acting as a co-pilot for busy doctors.

“With the acute shortage of radiologists in the UK, programmes like this will facilitate interpretation and reduce delays for diagnosis and treatment”.

There is also the possibility that the AI could look at the X-Rays where no abnormalities are found, which is around half of all of them, and flag this to doctors in a way which could improve efficiency for the NHS. By allowing AI to weed out X-Rays with no abnormalities found, radiologists will have more time to focus on challenging and more critical tests.

A recent poll by the Royal College of Radiologists found that shortages of radiologists were leading to longer wait times, and delays in treatment, at 97% of the UK’s cancer treatment centres.

This AI software – entitled X-Raydar – is designed to help reduce the workload for doctors and cut delays. Remarkably, the research group has open sourced the entire software for non-commercial uses to speed up the pace of research development in this domain.

The software can be seen in use in a video here.

Sophie Powell, a recent BSc Cyber Security graduate, has been named Cyber Student of the Year at the National Cyber Awards 2023. This recognition is a result of her inspirational work to promote gender diversity and equality within cyber security.

The prestigious National Cyber Awards, now in their fifth year, bring together cyber professionals from across public and private sectors to celebrate excellence and innovation in the UK’s cyber security industry.

Sophie has made significant contributions to education and learning in the cyber security space. Notably, she co-founded CyberWomen@Warwick in her second year at university. This initiative was launched in collaboration with the Cyber Security academic team and fellow students.

Since its inception, CyberWomen@Warwick has grown into the CyberWomen Groups Community Interest Company (CIC). The non-profit CIC, directed by Sophie, supports branches of students in different UK universities looking to spotlight the importance of diversity in STEM. It currently has four active branches, CyberWomen@Warwick, CyberWomen@Coventry, CyberWomen@Portsmouth, CyberWomen@UWE, with plans to expand in the future. Executives within each branch work directly with the CIC to set and achieve their own diversity goals and ambitions.

Reflecting on her journey with CyberWomen Groups CIC, Sophie said: “We started this company to ensure every woman in university studying Cyber Security is welcomed into a safe, inclusive environment, where they can flourish both personally and professionally. We look to provide opportunities and resources to encourage a smooth transition into the Cyber industry and create a community that welcomes everybody from different walks of life.”

Alongside Sophie’s success, two current BSc Cyber Security students, Anahitha Vijay and Oscar Williamson, were also recognised at the National Cyber Awards as finalists in the Cyber Student of the Year category.

Dr Sandy Taramonli, Assistant Professor and Course Leader for BSc Cyber Security, said: “I’m incredibly proud of our students for their remarkable achievement. It’s a clear reflection of their hard work, dedication, and the exceptional skills they’ve developed during their time with us. The support from our Cyber Security course team and our commitment to our students’ growth have been key to this success. A hearty congratulations to all, and here’s to more success in the future!”

See the full list of 2023 finalists and winners of the National Cyber Awards 2023.

The start of this year’s 2023 academic year has been particularly busy for Professor Robin Clark, Dean of WMG. Over the last few months, he has had the privilege of connecting with counterparts at universities worldwide, engaging with international students, and meeting members of the Warwick alumni community.

In October, Professor Robin Clark; and Associate Professor and Director of Overseas Programmes, Mike Newton, travelled to Singapore to attend the Singapore Institute of Management (SIM) graduation.

WMG and SIM have a global education partnership allowing students in Singapore to receive a degree from WMG. A total of 45 students graduated, many of whom completed their course during the Covid 19 pandemic.

Dean of WMG, Professor Robin Clark, said, "At the ceremony, we celebrated the students' latest achievement on their path to leadership. Overcoming various challenges, they earned the University of Warwick qualification through their dedicated efforts. Their graduation is a testament to their academic success and a promising sign of their potential to positively influence our shared future. They're poised to make a meaningful impact by fostering connections, promoting sustainability, and contributing to a more productive world around us."

From Singapore, Professor Clark and Mike Newton, then travelled to Beijing to attend the Beijing City University (BCU) graduation. Similar to SIM, BCU and WMG have a global education partnership allowing students in Beijing to receive a degree from WMG.

Professor Clark said, “At BCU, we had an engaging roundtable discussion on project management, followed by insightful speeches, the presentation of awards, the symbolic turning of tassels, and memorable group photos."

After a brief return to the UK, Professor Clark then travelled to the University of Pentecost and University of Ghana where he gave the keynote at the University of Ghana's First Annual Engineering Conference on Sustainable Innovative Technologies for Development.

Professor Clark added, “It was a privilege to be invited to address the audience. I had the honour to meet the Dean of the University of Ghana, Engineering, and several colleagues for an informative discussion about collaboration.”

Catch up on the University of Ghana's First Annual Engineering Conference and Professor Clark’s keynote here: https://www.youtube.com/live/be7yHiADbwg?si=2LYMrrzcTLA_39Br

In November, Professor Clark, Professor Dan Nunan, Associate Dean (Postgraduate) and Dr. Mosh Mujthaba (Academic Director, Hong Kong) travelled to Hong Kong to attend the Hong Kong Polytechnic University (HK PolyU) graduation ceremony. Like Warwick, HK PolyU is ranked in the top 100 Universities in the world and has a strong partnership with WMG that has been running for 33 years.

This was the first in-person graduation ceremony attended by WMG faculty members since 2019 and with students graduating all having their studies affected by COVID.

Professor Clark said, "More than 2,000 postgraduate students have now graduated from joint programmes as part of the longstanding WMG – PolyU partnership. With record numbers of applications and strong student numbers, we look forward to this partnership continuing to flourish in the future. At the ceremony, it was wonderful to celebrate students’ success, recognising that many graduating had overcome numerous challenges over the COVID period in order to succeed in their studies."

To wrap up the final leg of Professor Clark’s international travels for 2023, he recently accompanied the Vice Chancellor of the University, Professor Stuart Croft, on a trip to India to meet with members of the Warwick alumni community at two receptions in New Delhi and Mumbai.

The focal points of the alumni receptions centred around Warwick's upcoming 60th anniversary in 2025, and the transformative potential of WMG in addressing global challenges.

Professor Clark had the opportunity to connect with potential partners and revive relationships. As part of the visit, he met with Chandrajit Banerjee, Director General of the Confederation of Indian Industry, at CII House in New Delhi to discuss ways to strengthen the relationship between CII and WMG.

Professor Clark also held meetings with senior representatives at Tata Trusts and then Tata Power. He concluded his trip by visiting the CII Naoroji Godrej Centre of Excellence, where he discussed the possibility of developing new education partnerships.

Professor Clark said: “These global experiences underscore my commitment to international engagement and highlight the profound impact of cultivating a worldwide network. Connecting with alumni globally is a cornerstone of the University's dedication to building enduring relationships, contributing to the collective success of a global academic community like no other.”

Follow more updates from Professor Clark here: (19) Professor Robin Clark (@Prof_RobinClark) / X (twitter.com)