Chancellor George Osborne has allotted £5.9 billion ($9.2 billion), £1.1 billion per year, over the next parliamentary term to research infrastructure. Half of the £3 billion for supporting labs will be awarded based on competition. “Grand challenges” will receive £2.9 billion. Of that amount, £800 million will go toward projects including chemistry and nanotechnology research, and big-data analysis at specified institutes, and research on shale gas, and carbon capture and storage. An additional £900 million will fund research to be proposed and subject to review. Mr. Osborne in the past said that he wanted the UK to excel in areas such as advanced materials, energy and synthetic biology. “Catapult centres” for “cutting edge equipment and expertise,” such as robotics products, will receive £61 million, and the National Formulation Centre, which will open in 2016, will receive £28 million. R&D tax credits will also increase for businesses.

Source: Chemistry World