A prosthetic limb with a “natural-feeling sense of touch” is one of 100 projects to be funded in an £80m government scheme. 

Announced on Tuesday, researchers at 39 institutes from across the UK will receive a share of a new pool of funding to develop “potentially transformative” ideas in fields ranging from health tech to clean energy to quantum computing. 

The funding, to be delivered by UK Research and Innovation (UKRI)’s Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC), is part of Science Minister Lord Vallance’s plan to support “curiosity-driven” research to improve people’s lives and grow the economy. 

Among these projects is the integration of a realistic sense of touch into artificial arms, a biomarker tool to improve blood clot formation and breakdown measurements and a radar-based system to translate British Sign Language without the need for cameras. 

“We are backing 100 ambitious projects up and down the UK which could spark the beginning of a new generation of life-changing developments,” said Vallance. “It is vital we support bright researchers to explore a new generation of discoveries.” 

Vallance has previously said that startups receiving support of as little as £1m were ‘in trouble’ and would ‘spend their lives’ trying to raise money. The science minister later told UKTN that commercial projects need to be backed by the private sector, however, smaller scale targeted support for specific research projects was still valuable.

Institutions being supported in this scheme include the University of Southampton, Swansea University and the University of Edinburgh.

“Discovery science is the bedrock of innovation, feeding the pipeline of progress critical to prosperity, sustainability, security, competitiveness, quality of life and resilience to future challenges. 

“It’s always been a UK strength and EPSRC has always been at the forefront of maintaining and extending this,” said Prof Charlotte Deane, EPSRC’s executive chair. 

“Utilising and enhancing expertise in all parts of the country, these new EPSRC-backed projects will generate a legacy of extraordinary new knowledge, with impacts felt across the UK and the globe.” 

Other funded projects include a King’s College London study into countering quantum attacks on messaging platforms, a project at Loughborough University supporting the development of smart polymer nanoparticles and research at University College London into human-centred machine intelligence to optimise robotic surgical training. 

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