UCLan shortlisted for two prestigious awards

Times Higher Education recognises research and enterprising excellence

The University of Central Lancashire (UCLan) has once again been shortlisted in the prestigious Times Higher Education Awards.

It has been nominated for Research Project of the Year and Entrepreneurial University of the Year in the seventh year of the Awards, which celebrates the achievements of Higher Education institutions throughout the UK.

For the second year in a row Dr Charlie Frowd from UCLan and Professor Peter Hancock from the University of Stirling have been shortlisted in the Research Project of the Year category, this time for their novel caricature animation technique that enhances the effectiveness of facial composites.

Dr Frowd, who has recently demonstrated the technology live on the Crimewatch Roadshow television programme, commented: “Facial composites are used by police forces to enable witnesses and victims of crimes to create a likeness of the face of a perpetrator.  These images appear on Crimewatch and in the media generally, as part of a public appeal for information, but trying to recognise a composite can be very difficult, limiting the effectiveness of police investigations.”

With funding from the government’s Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC), the researchers have developed a new animated-image format for police to publish composites in the media, on television and on the internet to improve identification rates.

The animated format is based on facial caricature. Watching a composite image being caricatured, by progressively exaggerating its facial features, and then anti-caricatured, by making the features appear more average, substantially improves a person’s ability to correctly name the face.

The award recognises innovative research that has a far reaching impact in its field. The nomination comes after Dr Charlie Frowd and Professor Peter Hancock were shortlisted in the same category last year for their alternative facial composite system EvoFIT, which can be used in conjunction with the animated facial caricature.

Dr Frowd added: “Our facial composite system has made a great impact in its field and has led to real results for the police in quite a few high profile cases.  We are thrilled to be recognised for this through the nomination.”

It is also the second year in a row that UCLan has also been nominated in the Entrepreneurial University of the Year category, which acknowledges the enterprising spirit that is embedded within the institution.

Commenting on UCLan’s nomination for Entrepreneurial University of the Year, Director of Knowledge Transfer, Bede Mullen, said: “UCLan has transformed its culture and operates as an entrepreneurial University on all levels with the spirit of enterprise embedded within its staff, curriculum and systems.

We have established strategic partnerships with world class organisations such as Sony Computer Games Europe, Newsquest Ltd and BAE Systems.  Our entrepreneurial culture is spread right across the University and can be seen in the increasing number of start-up student businesses and enterprising graduates we have."

UCLan is up against five other universities in each category it has been nominated in and the winners will be announced at the awards dinner at the Grosvenor House Hotel, London on Thursday 24 November 2011.