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The Wessex Institute of Technology (usually referred to as just Wessex Institute or WIT) is an educational institute offering higher degrees validated by the University of Wales, located at Ashurst Lodge in the New Forest National Park, in the south of England.

The overall aim of Wessex Institute is to develop a series of knowledge transfer mechanisms, particularly directed towards the exchange of information between academics and professional users within industry.

This is achieved through a range of activities organised by staff of the Institute and its associate companies. A large network of contacts and links have been established with many organisations throughout the world.

Core activities

• Graduate Programmes at Doctoral and Master level, many in collaboration with other academic institutions throughout the world.
• Specialist Research within the areas of Damage Mechanics, Environmental Fluid Mechanics, Industrial Research and Information Communications Technology.
• International Conference Programme which is constantly expanding in both size and scope.
• Publishing Arm: The Institute has a publishing arm which produces numerous scientific books, monographs and edited works as well as the proceedings from the Institute’s conference programme.

Graduate programmes

Several International Master Programmes are available covering areas such as Information and Communications Engineering, Environmental Modelling and Computer Aided Engineering.

The graduate programmes of the Wessex Institute are supported by a variety of research and industrial organisations throughout the world. In addition, support is provided on some programmes by the UK Government and through the Wessex Institute Foundation.

A substantial number of PhDs have been awarded by the institute, and many who have carried out research at WIT have positions of responsibility in academic institutions and industry. Some have gone on to become professors at some of the best UK Universities; including Imperial College, Nottingham and Brunel, whilst others are now professors in Universities within their country of origin.

Wessex Institute retains strong links with its Alumni, who actively collaborate with its activities.

Major research divisions

• The Damage Mechanics Division is involved in the development of complex computational methods, including boundary element techniques for stress analysis problems.

• The Environmental Fluid Mechanics Division is dedicated to the modelling of environmental and fluid dynamics phenomena including applications of high performance computing to the solution of problems in science and engineering.

• The Industrial Research Division concentrates on solving problems of importance to industry and demonstrates the significance that Wessex Institute attaches to producing practical research. The division also carries out an intensive programme to train professional engineers in the latest techniques for advanced engineering design.

• The Information and Communications Engineering Division is concerned with a variety of areas of research related to the latest developments including Management Information Systems, Data Mining and Web-based technologies. The division has links with many countries and collaborates in the organisation of joint research and training programmes at postgraduate level.

Recent research achievements and activities

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• The current research programmes at the Institute continue to be supported by the EU, NATO, industry and other prestigious organizations.
• The International Master Programme on Information Systems. Data Mining and Knowledge Discovery, which is supported by the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office attracted students from the Ukraine. A number of students who have completed their Master degree are now registered on full-time PhD programmes at this Institute.
• The International Master Programme in Environmental Electromagnetic Compatibility organised by the Wessex Institute and administered by the British Council supported a number of Croatian students. Some are currently registered on the PhD programme at WIT.
• The Prigogine Medal, in memory of the late Ilya Prigogine, Nobel Prize in Chemistry, has been awarded annually since 2004 in collaboration with the University of Siena.

International conference programme

Wessex Institute organises an extensive annual meetings programme, including short courses, seminars and conferences. Short courses usually take place at Ashurst Lodge, whilst about 25 international seminars and conferences are held in many different locations around the world in association with other organisations and universities. Originally focused on physical sciences and engineering, the range of topics covered by the meetings has expanded to cover a wide variety of fields ranging from ecology to finance. Proceedings are published in book format and online through the Transactions of the Wessex Institute of Technology with over 20,000 papers available.

WIT is known internationally for its extensive spamming campaigns in connection with its conferences. These conferences are widely regarded as being nothing more than revenue generating operations without any scientific credibility.

Publishing activities

WIT Press publishes conference proceedings and a number of specialized research monographs and edited works. Works are available in hard copy and online, much of which is available through the WIT eLibrary. WIT Press has a policy of making its material available in Open-Access format. International journal titles include Ecodynamics , Sustainable Development and Planning and Design and Nature.

References

This article includes material duplicated from the official website of Wessex Institute of Technology, released under GNU Free Documentation License.

1. University of Wales Validation Services entry for WIT, retrieved 01-May-2008
2. "Prigogine Awards". Retrieved 2008-09-02.

• WIT - Institute Brochure
• WIT Research Report 2006

External links

• WIT Website - Wessex.ac.uk
• WIT Press Publishing - Witpress.com

50°52′44″N 1°31′33″W / 50.8789°N 1.5259°W / 50.8789; -1.5259

• Higher education colleges in England