The DigiTech Centre

The DigiTech Centre at Adastral Park is an innovative partnership between the University of Suffolk and BT, funded by a £9.6m investment by New Anglia Local Enterprise Partnership. The DigiTech Centre is a Centre of Excellence in digital skills for teaching and learning, research and knowledge exchange.

The DigiTech Centre is the principal hub for computing teaching to degree apprentices, mainstream undergraduate students and postgraduate master's students. Students benefit from state-of-the-art facilities, including an AI Compute Server, a Juniper Networking "Sandpit", a Cyber Range, and a Digital Forensics Laboratory. In addition to studying for their degrees and gaining a wealth of practical computing skills and expertise, our students also have the opportunity to undertake industrial certifications. All computing degree programmes incorporate opportunities for businesses to work with students on projects.

The DigiTech Centre is also home to two university research institutes - the Digital Futures Institute and the Suffolk Sustainability Institute.

The Digital Futures Institute is undertaking research across three broad themes of:

1. Improving cyber security and resilience;
2. Experience and interaction design with a focus on gamification and mixed realities;
3. Achieving better outcomes to real-world problems through applying AI, data science and technology.

The Suffolk Sustainability Institute is undertaking research across three broad themes of:

1. Green infrastructure to alleviate climate and environmental problems;
2. Energy and resource management addressing sustainable construction, material efficiency and sustainable and renewable energy;
3. Sustainable healthy communities.

Both research institutes are keen to work with businesses on collaborative research, consultancy and knowledge exchange activities.

One of the teaching areas we have on site includes a Smart Living and Sustainability lab on an landscaped area adjacent to the Digitech Centre. This is a two-storey smart home built from fully sustainable means, with solar panels, rainwater collection, highly efficient heating and cooling, and biodiverse planting. It is also fully sensor-enabled, with smart controls to be as efficient as possible. It's a real insight into what homes of the future will look like. We hope this will be an ever evolving base for sensor enabled home/smart living technologies and advancements in the future!

To find out more about the DigiTech Centre, please visit the University of Suffolk website, or email digitech@uos.co.uk.