Climate change is projected to have a significant impact upon buildings, infrastructure and utilities. The EPSRC funded programme of research called Building Knowledge for a Changing Climate (BKCC) has over the last three years advanced knowledge of the impacts of climate change on urban drainage, engineered slopes, the electricity supply industry, the aviation industry, historic buildings and infrastructure and the urban environment more generally. It has also developed specialised climate and socio-economic scenarios for impacts assessment studies. Substantial research challenges remain in areas not addressed in the BKCC programme and in more systematic examination of the design and implementation of options for adaptation to climate change. An enthusiastic group of end users from industry and government has been assembled as part of the BKCC programme and have played an active role in the design, monitoring and dissemination of the research results.The Sustaining Knowledge for a Changing Climate will build upon the progress that has been made in BKCC and sustain the community of researchers and end users that has been assembled during BKCC. It will synthesise the results from all of the BKCC projects and present them in a high quality report that will be distributed widely to industry and at a high profile conference aimed at end users. It will continue research in areas of broad interest to industry particularly on problems that only received limited attention during BKCC. Specifically it will, through scoping and pilot studies, work shops and publications progress thinking on (i) use of probabilistic climate scenarios in planning and managing the built environment and infrastructure; (ii) adaptation options that can be beneficial in a range of sectors; (iii) impacts and adaptation in existing and new building stock and (iv) integrating adaptation and solutions to mitigate greenhouse gas emissions. Finally, SKCC will, through stakeholder and researcher workshops develop a coherent user-led plan for future research into the impacts of climate change on the built environment and infrastructure and development of adaptation solutions. This will prepare for major new research proposals in the field of climate impacts and adaptation.

Current developments in data science have been employed across the commercial world but they also offer a wealth of possibilities for improving visitor experience in cultural institutions, with potential benefits on a significant scale. Indeed, in 2016-17, 52% of British people visited a museum and 74% visited a heritage site. This represents an encouraging level of engagement, however there remains significant potential for increasing participation. For example, figures from the US suggest that attendance at art museums, galleries and heritage sites showed a clear decline between 2002 and 2012. This is mirrored in recent UK figures; for example, visits to government sponsored museums and galleries declined by 0.8% in the single year from 2015/16 to 2016/17. To increase visitor numbers, and improve the experience for existing audiences, we need to develop a better understanding of visitors' responses and requirements. In line with this aim, this project will create a network to investigate the possibilities for using advanced data science to realise the full potential of museums' existing visitor data (e.g. visitor numbers, social media comments) in order to understand and improve visitor engagement. Our multidisciplinary network comprises academics from History, Psychology, Computer Science and Electronic Engineering, in combination with a diverse team of British and American museums, heritage organisations and technology companies: - Colonial Williamsburg (Virginia, US) is the world's largest living history museum, with over forty sites and two art museums. - Historic Royal Palaces runs six of the UK's most iconic palaces, including the Tower of London and Hampton Court. - The Franklin Institute in Philadelphia (Pennsylvania, US) is one of America's oldest and most respected science museums. - Sussex Past runs a variety of heritage sites and museums including Fishbourne Roman Palace, Lewes Castle and Anne of Cleves House. - The JORVIK Group comprises five heritage attractions in the city of York, including the world-famous JORVIK Viking Centre. - Royal Holloway's Picture Gallery boasts a world-class collection of Victorian art. - Mechdyne is a leading innovator in visualisation, 3D, VR and machine learning in commercial contexts. - Smartify is an SME with an app that allows museum visitors to receive detailed information using AR and museums to receive the data analytics generated. The varied nature of these partnering cultural institutions will provide our network with a uniquely diverse range of perspectives that will be shared through a range of networking events and meetings. Our final meeting will identify concrete plans for future funded research projects and network development. The planned activities will also generate documentary records of the discussions. These will be disseminated across our partners and the AHRC with a view to informing the shape of future priorities in a constantly shifting technological landscape.

This project brings together social enterprises that use creative practice as a way of promoting sustainable soicial development, together with art, design and community researchers. Working in partnership, we shall design and execute a collaborative research project around a shared set of concerns. Recognising that creative practitioners are often more comfortable communicating through and around their work than they are using abstract language to discuss research design, we shall be using creative practices as a way of opening up our discussions of the domain, exploring the priorities of the different stakeholders, and developing our detailed research plan.

This research will examine how museums can transform the way that they think about and create digital audio interpretation for their collections, to enhance inclusion and access for all audiences. For people who are blind or partially blind (BPB), audio description (AD) is traditionally described as a verbal narrative for information available through vision. In both the UK and US, museums are legally obliged to ensure equitable access to their collections. AD is a key tool for achieving this for BPB audiences but museums need to dramatically improve AD provision. Incredibly, the charity VocalEyes found that only 5% of museums in the UK mentioned AD provision on their websites. Museums could transform accessibility through apps, such as Smartify. Smartify currently gives over 3 million users worldwide online access to more than 2 million works of art at home or through a QR code in the museum building. Of these 2 million works, only a handful are offered with AD, and all come from only two institutions - the Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery (US) and Royal Holloway Picture Gallery (UK). The need goes beyond inclusive digital access for BPB people - this project it is about enhancing the museum experience for everyone. The pandemic has spotlighted both the scope and desire for digital participation and the massive opportunity for museums to grow audiences. Our previous research has shown that AD benefits not only people who are BPB, an inclusive way to audiences globally through high-quality online access. The UK-US research team brings together experts on psychology, aesthetics and design, critical disability studies, cultural diversity, translation studies and includes members who are partially blind and non-blind, neurotypical and with learning differences and of different ethnic and cultural backgrounds. With our digital heritage sector-leading partners - Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery; Royal Holloway Picture Gallery; Smartify and VocalEyes - this research will challenge current AD practice, where sighted curators/describers produce AD for BPB audiences. We will develop and extend AD usage as a tool for all visitors (blind, partially blind and sighted). We will do this by creating and evaluating the W-ICAD (Workshop for Inclusive Co-created Audio Description) model whereby AD creation is led by partially blind co-creators, collaborating with blind and sighted co-creators. The W-ICAD model will give museums a streamlined way to create new AD, extending their digital provision and boosting inclusion. The research will compare how audiences in the UK and US experience AD so that AD creation takes account of varying cultural needs or expectations.

We are regularly told that spending time in nature is good for us. The extent of the link between nature and wellbeing is apparently so strong that the Wildlife Trusts are currently campaigning for 'a Nature and Wellbeing Act for England'. Capaldi et al. argue (2015) that 'evidence suggests that connecting with nature is one path to flourishing in life' and that spending time in nature is therefore a 'potential wellbeing intervention'. Other studies have similarly explored themes such as 'the health benefits of contact with nature in a park context' or the value of 'green exercise' as a wellbeing tool. Many of these studies provide evidence to support a general idea that nature is 'good for us'. Yet, their construction of 'nature' is often broad and definitions of wellbeing typically loose. What exactly is it about 'nature' that improves our 'wellbeing'? What do these two terms actually mean to people? Many of the links between wellbeing and nature relate to walking and activity, but many others are based on an idea that merely 'being in nature' can be good for body and soul. This perceived connection between 'being in nature' and wellbeing has a long social and cultural history, yet is rarely critically examined. In wellbeing literature, the value of nature is often understood in terms of 'green spaces' or attractive landscapes. In hospitals, nature is often introduced through pictures of landscapes or artificial plants. Such frameworks implicitly assume that the value of nature for wellbeing is inextricably linked to the ability to see it, and they often treat 'nature' as homogeneous. What if we remove the visual, and focus on the smells, tastes or sounds of nature? What if we immerse people in unfamiliar or 'wild' natural sensescapes? Does everybody associate the same sensory aspects of nature with wellbeing, or are the relationships more diverse and complex? We will use emerging immersive 360-degree sound and smell technologies to explore some of these questions.