Émigré scientists ‘key to UK-Poland research links’

High-flying scientists from Poland working at UK universities could be crucial to improving research cooperation between the two countries, says a study that suggests the fast-growing east European economy is likely to be a key market for innovative British companies post-Brexit.

With Polish-British research links hit by the UK’s three-year absence from Horizon Europe, the report from the Polonium Foundation, in partnership with the UK Science and Innovation Network, says Poland’s scientific diaspora should play a leading role in re-establishing research ties.

Just over half of Polish researchers working abroad are based in the UK, the paper notes, with the universities of Oxford and Cambridge employing at least 18 Polish principal investigators in STEM fields alone. Polish scientists working in the UK have won nearly as many advanced European Research Council grants in STEM subjects (seven) as Poland has received in total (nine), it adds. The UK has won some 528 advanced grants since 2007 despite its removal for Horizon since 2021.

These émigré scientists could prove a useful conduit to increase research cooperation between the two countries, said Agata Nyga, team lead for research and policy at the Polonium Foundation, a not-for-profit advocacy group for Polish science. “There is certainly a diaspora of Polish scientists who have won prestigious grants and fellowships while in the UK and settled down. We’re not saying ‘You must go back to Poland’, but [rather] asking people to think how we take advantage of these connections to enhance talent in both countries,” said Dr Nyga, head of research and development for a Cambridge-based biotechnology company.

The growing biotech start-up scene in Poland, where major players such as AstraZeneca and GSK have operational bases, also offers opportunities for innovation-led companies keen to reach European markets after Brexit, said Dr Nyga, who noted that Imperial College London and Coventry University had already established research bases in the country.

“After Brexit, there is a growing imperative to have a physical footprint in Europe, and there is a question about where this should be,” said Dr Nyga, adding that Poland’s highly developed IT infrastructure and innovation ecosystem and lower-cost economy could be attractive to potential UK partners.

“We are in a much better situation than a decade ago after a lot of economic growth, including a boom in the technological sectors following a lot of investment,” added Dr Nyga.

“Any sector related to IT has been growing rapidly, and we’re now seeing the life sciences sector take academic research and translate into products for the business world.”

For Polish institutions, collaborations with UK universities and investors made sense because the “UK is big market, but it also opens the door to the US”, said Dr Nyga, who noted that several Polish-founded start-ups had found success at UK accelerators.

With the flow of Polish students to UK universities drying up after Brexit, these collaborations would be important if British universities wanted to find outstanding Polish graduate researchers, who in previous years had gone on to lead their own laboratories, said Dr Nyga, a former investigator at the Medical Research Council’s Laboratory of Molecular Biology in Cambridge.

“There has been a huge drop in students from Europe, and this will soon translate into fewer postgraduates, and you will not have those students setting up spin-outs that we’ve seen,” she said. “Whether it’s British firms thinking about expanding into new markets or universities working together to create better research or find the next generation of academics, there are definitely ways that we can create better partnerships.”

jack.grove@timeshighereducation.com