Program Overview

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Our MPhil Data Science is an advanced research degree within our Department of Mathematical Sciences and we have staff members available to act as supervisors across a number of areas within data science. Possible areas of research include: artificial intelligence, classification/supervised learning, clustering/unsupervised learning, data science education, deep learning, industry 4.0, information retrieval, mathematical foundations of data science, multidimensional scaling, optimisation, and statistical learning. If you’re interested in doing a data science research degree at Essex get in touch with our Department to discuss potential research areas. Our staff are strongly committed to excellence in research and excellence in education. Our Department of Mathematical Sciences (DMS) and our School and Computer Science and Electronic Engineering (CSEE) have introduced undergraduates and postgraduate courses in data science since 2014. The University of Essex is a leading institution worldwide on Data Science Education. DMS has strong track record on Knowledge Transfer Partnerships (KTP) with data-driven industries, for example: Profusion, Mondaq, MSXI and Ocado. DMS has two research groups: Data Science and Mathematics. Our Department of Mathematical Sciences is genuinely innovative and student-focused. Our research groups are working on a broad range of collaborative areas tackling real-world issues. Here are a few examples:

• Our data scientists carefully consider how not to lie, and how not to get lied to with data. Interpreting data correctly is especially important because much of our data science research is applied directly or indirectly to social policies, including health, care and education.
• We do practical research with financial data (for example, assessing the risk of collapse of the UK’s banking system) as well as theoretical research in financial instruments such as insurance policies or asset portfolios.
• We also research how physical processes develop in time and space. Applications of this range from modelling epilepsy to modelling electronic cables.
• Our optimisation experts work out how to do the same job with less resource, or how to do more with the same resource.
• Our pure maths group are currently working on two new funded projects entitled “The Calabi problem for smooth Fano threefolds” and “Stability of Brunn-Minkowski inequalities and Minkowski type problems for nonlinear capacity”.
• We also do research into mathematical education and use exciting technologies such as electroencephalography or eye tracking to measure exactly what a learner is feeling. Our research aims to encourage the implementation of ‘the four Cs’ of modern education, which are critical thinking, communication, collaboration, and creativity.

We also offer a PhD in this subject, and part time study is also available. Why we're great.

• Our degree is jointly delivered by our Department of Mathematical Sciences and our School of Computer Science and Electronic Engineering.
• Our data science courses benefit from the Institute of Analytics and Data Science (IADS), the Institute of Social and Economic Research (ISER) and the UK Data Archive, all based at the University of Essex.
• Our department is ranked 31st for research power in the Research Excellence Framework 2021.

Our expert staff

Our Department of Mathematical Sciences has an international reputation in all areas of mathematical sciences including; statistical learning, artificial intelligence, classification/supervised learning, clustering/unsupervised learning, data science education, actuarial science, mathematical statistics, operational research, applied mathematics, pure mathematics, and mathematics education. We encourage MPhil students to meet with their supervisor regularly. While undertaking your research within our Department, joint supervision across other Essex departments and schools is possible. A PhD should lead to publications in academic journals. Our PhD students have had papers accepted and published in journals such as: Advances in Data Analysis and Classification ; BMC Bioinformatics ; Ecology ; Journal of Physics A: Mathematical and Theoretical ; Mathematical Modelling of Natural Phenomena ; and The North American Journal of Economics and Finance .

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Specialist facilities

The Department of Mathematical Sciences is based in the University’s state-of-the-art STEM Centre. Research students have a dedicated work space and PCs, with access to software such as MATLAB, Gap, SageMath, Python and R. All University of Essex research students have access to our innovative and unique scheme, Proficio. Postgraduate research students are automatically enrolled on Proficio, which provides a variety of training courses, and a fund of up to £2,500 per student for conference attendance and relevant external training courses.

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Your future

Many of our former PhD students have gone on to work as academics in prominent institutions across the world, such as the University of Bristol, University of Cambridge, University of Nottingham and many other international universities. Some have also remained at the University of Essex, working as postdoctoral research fellows, research impact officers, or lecturers. Other graduates have joined organisations like the Met Office, the Ministry of Defence, and companies based in the City of London. There is a high demand for data science experts in all sectors of the economy, so our graduates are sought after in the UK and abroad.