EPSRC Strategic Advisory Teams vacancies

• Closing date: 7 November 2025 4:00pm UK time
• Number of positions: Multiple
• Length of term: Two years
• Time commitment: Up to 10 days a year
• Remuneration: Travel and subsistence will be paid, along with an attendance fee per meeting

  Applicable for both in-person and virtual meetings

• Outcomes communicated: March 2026

The Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) welcomes applicants for vacancies on our Strategic Advisory Teams (SATs) for the following themes:

• resilience and security
• clean energy
• engineering
• healthcare
• information communication technologies
• research infrastructure
• sustainable manufacturing
• mathematical sciences
• physical sciences

We are seeking applications from individuals with experience of industry, academia, users of research, and in the third sector and government organisations.

Who we’re looking for

We welcome applications from those who are:

• in full-time or part-time work across all career stages
• on sabbatical or a career break
• based in academia (including research technical professionals and research software engineers), industry, the third sector or government organisation

You will not be required to act as representative of your own organisation, research area or sector, but rather as someone who is able to contribute on a non-affiliated basis, and will be expected to adhere to the seven principles of public life.

Person specification

The specific requirements sought for SAT members are as follows.

Expertise relevant to the vacancies applied for, including:

• advancing knowledge
• delivering impact
• stakeholder engagement
• community leadership
• meeting the needs of business, society or both

Ability to take a strategic overview of issues relevant to the themes applied for.

Issues may relate to one or more of:

• research
• skills and training
• international context
• impact
• innovation
• research infrastructure
• interdisciplinary work
• preparedness to develop, test and constructively challenge EPSRC and UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) policies, in a flexible, adaptable, multistakeholder environment
• willingness to represent the views of the research, innovation and business community, and facilitate two-way communication between the community, EPSRC, and UKRI
• willingness to dedicate sufficient time to the role and backing or support from your organisation

For more information, refer to the terms of reference for strategic advisory teams.

Vacancies

Vacancies are specified as open to:

• academic, those employed by a higher education institution, meaning a university
• industry or users of research, for example, those employed by business (large corporation through to small and medium-sized enterprises), research and technology organisation, NHS body and independent consultant

This is to ensure a balance of representation across our advisory bodies. Multiple SAT vacancies may be filled by one applicant if the appropriate individual is found. You are welcome to apply to a maximum of two of the available SAT vacancies or one SAT vacancy and one vacancy on the EPSRC Science, Engineering and Technology Board (SETB).

Full list of available vacancies can be found in the ‘Further information’ section.

What you’ll be doing

Members of EPSRC advisory bodies are paid a daily fee and reimbursed for appropriate travel and subsistence for attendance at meetings. We may host meetings physically, virtually or facilitate a mixed attendance meeting (physical and virtual attendance).

Initial appointments will usually be for two years, with extensions at the discretion of the EPSRC. Appointments will start from 1 April 2026.

Role of SAT members

The advisory teams are devised as a flexible resource, enabling heads of theme to obtain the strategic advice they need in a timely manner, drawing on a range of perspectives from across our key stakeholder groups. They vary in membership size depending on the needs of the theme.

See Strategic Advisory Teams for further information.

See EPSRC research portfolio and priorities for theme-specific visions.

Each theme’s advisory team meets at least three times per year and may also be asked to take part in further EPSRC business (or other parts of UKRI as appropriate), including but not limited to workshops, advisory groups for specific activities and peer review panels.

Members of all advisory teams are expected to bring a broad strategic view to bear and to act as ‘generous generalists’, advising across the breadth of EPSRC’s portfolio and the portfolios of other Councils where appropriate.

How to apply

Submission of applications for the vacancies opens on 8 September 2025 and closes on 7 November 2025 at 4:00pm UK time. Late applications will not be accepted.

Applications should be made through the Engagement hub form.

You can apply to a maximum of two vacancies.

Applications are sought from individuals who feel they can meet the requirements set out in the ‘Who we’re looking for’ section. You must apply individually as nominations from colleagues or organisations will not be possible.

Universities, businesses, learned societies and other key stakeholder groups should continue to encourage and support suitable colleagues to apply.

Assessment of your suitability for the vacancy is made solely on the information provided in the application form. No other information will be used so you should take care to address all criteria.

Tips for your application:

• think about how you address each of the selection criteria; don’t just copy and paste from your website or refer us to your published work. While there is no minimum word count, you must provide adequate evidence to justify your suitability
• treat all questions as important
• don’t just provide a list of previous positions. We want to know what skills you have used and gained in your current and previous positions or roles.
• consider using the STAR (situation, task, approach and result) approach when formulating your answers. Describe the situation, what your task was, how you approached it and what the result was
• if you are applying for two positions, ensure your application covers your suitability for both
• have a look at the current SAT members to see the range of people we have recruited in the past

In accordance with our strict General Data Protection Regulations (GDPR) guidelines, the personal information provided as part of your application will specifically be used for the purpose of administering this process. Also, aggregated anonymised data will be used for the purposes of monitoring our advisory and decision-making bodies.

Analysis of the information will be viewed by UKRI staff and external members that are specifically involved in the recruitment process only. Personal information will not be used for any other purpose without your specific consent.

For further information on how your information will be used, how we maintain the security of your information, and your rights to access information we hold on you, refer to UKRI’s privacy notice or contact the UKRI Information Rights Team at dataprotection@ukri.org

Ask about the vacancies or the recruitment process

Email: epsrcsatnominations@epsrc.ukri.org

How we’ll assess your application

Selection process

Step one

Applications will be assessed internally in January 2026 against the criteria outlined under the person specification, dependent on the role you apply for.

A shortlist of candidates will be made, determined by how well the candidate meets the essential criteria in the person specification.

Assessment is based on the evidence provided in the application for this step.

Step two

Vacancies will be filled from the shortlists with consideration to the following:

• provision of an appropriate balance of expertise across all SAT appointments
• ensuring a biological sex balance in line with our ambition of achieving at least 30% participation of the underrepresented sex across SATs and an ethnicity balance in line with our ambition of achieving at least 20% minority ethnic representation across all advisory bodies
• diversity of organisational affiliation and across the UK’s regions and nations

This step of the recruitment process will consider the balance across the emerging membership. It may, where candidates are as qualified as each other, take positive action to prioritise candidates based on sex and minority ethnic underrepresentation.

Individual diversity data on sex and ethnicity requested during the application will be used solely in this step. All other diversity data collected will be used for monitoring purposes only.

The UK Supreme Court has recently ruled that the word ‘sex’ means biological sex for the purposes of the Equality Act 2010, providing clarity on the interpretation of the Act. As the Supreme Court set out, all protections against discrimination and harassment in employment remain in place for trans colleagues under the protected characteristic of gender reassignment. The ruling is relevant across the UK and we await the statutory guidance from the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC), which they will develop after a public consultation. At EPSRC we value the full diversity of people who work for and with UKRI, and we are committed to creating an inclusive culture where all colleagues are respected and valued. Everyone in the community remains very welcome to work with us and apply for these advisory opportunities, your views are encouraged and welcome.

Targets are set considering the demographics of the engineering and physical sciences research and innovation academic population, as well as the size of the advisory group and relevant population that can be drawn from.

Step three

In February 2026, a sub-committee of Council, the Appointments Assurance Committee, will be asked to ratify that the appropriate processes have been followed by the executive prior to appointment of SAT members.

Step four

Once ratification has taken place, communications will be sent to both unsuccessful and successful applicants. This is expected to be between the end of February and start of March 2026.

Further information

Vacancies

Resilience and security:

• digital or physical or behavioural forensics science for crime (academic, industry or user)
• digital identity (academic, industry or user)
• crime prevention and detection (academic, industry or user)
• two vacancies in national security (academic, industry or user)
• two vacancies in defence (academic, industry or user)

Clean energy:

• two vacancies as industrialist in the Clean Energy portfolio (industry or user only)
• offshore renewables (academic, industry or user)
• carbon or greenhouse gas removal including carbon capture, use and storage, and negative emission technologies (academic, industry or user)
• bioenergy or land use for energy applications (academic, industry or user)
• early career researcher in any area that complements existing SAT members (academic, industry or user)

Engineering:

• fluid dynamics (academic, industry or user)
• medical engineering or bioengineering (academic, industry or user)
• materials engineering (academic, industry or user)
• built environment or construction (industry or user only)
• robotics (academic, industry or user)
• aerospace, aeronautical or space engineering (academic, industry or user)
• power electronics or electrical engineering (academic, industry or user)

Healthcare:

• healthcare professional with expertise in healthcare technologies (industry or user only)
• industry professional including biotechnologies and pharmaceutical (industry or user only)
• expertise in engineering and physical sciences research relevant to population health and prevention of ill health (academic, industry or user)
• expertise in engineering and physical sciences research with relevance to early diagnosis (academic, industry or user)

Information communication technologies:

• pure computer science expert (academic, industry or user)
• pure data science expert (academic, industry or user)
• pure human-computer interaction expert, multidisciplinary, design and engineering aligned (academic, industry or user)
• semiconductor experts with up to two positions available covering a mix of design, heterogeneous integration, integrated photonics and compound semiconductors (academic, industry or user)
• future communications expert covering hardware and software or full stack (academic, industry or user)
• We welcome a mix of applicants from industry and academia particularly with cross-cutting expertise in: Creative Industry; National Security and Defence aligned research; multidisciplinary skills especially at the interface of ICT and Social Science; general commercialisation and push to market expertise or experience

Research infrastructure:

• experience of managing an internationally recognised scientific facility including Research Technical Professionals (RTP) (academic, industry or user)
• digital or capital early career researcher (academic, industry or user)
• industry (industry or user only)
• digital RTP including research software engineers (academic, industry or user)
• capital RTP (academic, industry or user)
• physical sciences facility user or representative of user group (academic, industry or user)
• open vacancy (academic, industry or user)

Sustainable manufacturing:

• digital manufacturing (academic, industry or user)
• supply chains (academic, industry or user)
• process-based manufacturing (academic, industry or user)
• healthcare manufacturing (academic, industry or user)
• transport and maritime (academic, industry or user)
• land transport (academic, industry or user)

Mathematical sciences:

• applied mathematics (academic, industry or user)
• industrial user of mathematics (industry or user only)
• operational research (academic, industry or user)
• statistics or applied probability (academic, industry or user)

Physical sciences:

• industrial: chemicals or life sciences (industry or user only)
• industrial: emerging sectors or spin-out (industry or user only)
• industrial: physics-based industries (industry or user only)
• discovery-led research: artificial intelligence or machine learning in the physical sciences (academic, industry or user)
• discovery-led research: physical scientist with experience of government policy development/engagement (academic, industry or user)
• discovery-led research: theoretical or quantum physics (academic, industry or user)
• infrastructure: facilities management or RTP (academic, industry or user)

Equality, diversity and inclusion (EDI)

Diverse representation within our advisory bodies is important to ensure we include a range of opinions, experiences and viewpoints in our advice streams.

Appointments to the advisory teams are made primarily on merit and we are keen to obtain greater diversity across the membership. We particularly encourage applications from women, from people who identify as minority ethnic, people with a disability, and other groups who are currently under-represented. We welcome applications from people based in all regions and nations of the UK.

At EPSRC we value the full diversity of people who work for and with UKRI, and we are committed to creating an inclusive culture where all colleagues are respected and valued. Everyone in the community remains very welcome to work with us and apply for these advisory opportunities, your views are encouraged and welcome.

As part of our commitment within our EDI action plan, from those applications that meet the essential criteria, we will ensure a diversity of membership from across organisations including academia, industry and other stakeholders, incorporating:

• a balance of expertise and institutional representation
• biological sex balance in line with our ambition of achieving at least 30% participation of women across SATs
• an ethnicity balance in line with our ambition of achieving at least 20% minority ethnic participation across SATs

The recruitment process will consider the balance across SATs and may, where candidates are as qualified as each other, prioritise candidates based on sex or minority ethnic underrepresentation. EPSRC will also seek to achieve an appropriate distribution across career stages.

As part of the application process, we will require candidates to submit their diversity data to help us assess and subsequently monitor the diversity of membership. This data will be collected, stored, and used in line with our strict GDPR guidelines. The use of an individual’s diversity data in the selection process will be clearly outlined.

All diversity data that is used for monitoring purposes will be appropriately anonymised and aggregated according to Office for National Statistics rounding and suppression methodology.

Where participation in a SAT meeting or associated activity would involve additional care requirements, we have developed guidelines to highlight the support available to researchers with caring responsibilities.

We are committed to ensuring all meetings and events are as inclusive and accessible as possible.

We will:

• select venues that are accessible and where possible accommodate any specific requirement in our planning and organisation of an initiative to support wider participation
• ensure attendees have an opportunity to raise any specific requirements or adjustments in advance
• handle personal sensitive information in compliance with UK GDPR

Last updated: 8 September 2025