Brawn needed to partner brains

United Kingdom scientists have drawn up lists of new technologies they predict will be needed to push back the frontiers of knowledge in the next few decades, writes Steve Farrar.

In an initiative led by the Particle Physics and Astronomy Research Council and backed by the Office of Science and Technology, industrial collaborators are being sought to work with academics on new techniques to pursue future research.

Both parties should benefit greatly from the project in the long term, according to Robert Hawley, chairman of PPARC.

In a keynote speech to an open PPARC community meeting on Tuesday, Dr Hawley said that while many of the proposals were unlikely to lead to immediate applications, their development would ultimately produce some great technological leaps forward.

"British industry needs to make more of our work and advanced technology to develop new devices," he said. "However, to build the equipment we require for future research there are only a few companies in the UK who can compete and this is a major problem."

The research councils that use technology have produced or are about to produce first drafts of lists of technologies they predict they will need. Common areas include new detector technologies and information processing methods.

The development of the world wide web by experts at the European particle physics laboratory at Cern, in Switzerland, is seen as a good example of a practical spin-off and new data handling techniques being developed to rapidly handle the enormous quantities of information generated by the forthcoming Large Hadron Collider may well prove of enormous use elsewhere.