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The National Police Chiefs’ Council (NPCC), in partnership with UK Research and Innovation (UKRI), has announced details of the nine Policing Academic Centres of Excellence (P-ACEs) that will launch in October 2025.
Backed by funding of £4.5m, the P-ACEs are intended to improve connections between academic researchers and policing, making it easier for law enforcement to draw upon the latest research evidence, science, and technological advances. This includes showcasing key insights, findings and outputs from their work, responding to request for evidence from policing, and working in partnership with policing to co-develop new research and knowledge exchange activities.
The following universities have been selected to be P-ACEs:
- Edinburgh Napier University, with Glasgow Caledonian University, University of St Andrews and University of Edinburgh
- Lancaster University
- Manchester Metropolitan University, with University of Manchester
- Nottingham Trent University
- University College London
- University of Bath
- University of Birmingham, with Aston University and University of Leicester
- University of Leeds, with University of York
- University of Portsmouth
The initiative also aims to improve industry engagement through improving the connections between industry, academia and policing, to create shared understanding and better partnerships. This includes assessing technologies developed outside of policing domains that could offer benefits in a policing context but may require further testing for these benefits to be realised fully. Opportunities for industry are likely to align with policing’s Areas of Research Interest (ARIs), which include taking advantage of emerging technologies, analytics, AI, biometrics, drones etc.
It is vital that policing engages more effectively with the research and innovation system and builds stronger industry partnerships if it is to counter emerging threats, such as those enabled and augmented by AI. Although the amount of funding allocated to P-ACEs is small compared to the scale of the challenge it is an important step in the right direction.
Posted by: Dale Peters at 10:14
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