Department of Computer Science, University of Manchester

The Department of Computer Science stands in the Kilburn Building on Oxford Road in Manchester. It is the oldest computer-science department in the United Kingdom and one of the largest, with more than 1,500 students and sixty full-time academic staff. The building itself was named after Tom Kilburn, who led the department from its start in 1964 until 1980. The department grew from the Computer Group set up in 1946 by Freddie Williams. In 2004 the Victoria University of Manchester and UMIST merged to form the University of Manchester, creating the School of Computer Science. Ten people have served as heads since 1964, including Robert Stevens, Norman Paton and Steve Furber. The department is worth visiting because it has produced landmark achievements in computing. The world’s first electronic stored-program digital computer, the Manchester Baby, was built here. The Atlas Computer introduced virtual memory using paging. The AMULET microprocessor series was developed in the department. Research groups such as Advanced Processor Technologies and Bio-Health Informatics attract funding from bodies like the European Union and the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council. The department also hosts the National Centre for Text Mining. Inside the Kilburn Building visitors find nine research groups working across fields from machine learning to nano-engineering. The Nano Engineering and Storage Technologies group works in cleanrooms where graphene research won a Nobel Prize. The Information Management Group has created tools like the Taverna workbench and Protégé. The Advanced Interfaces Group researches virtual environments and computer vision. The Imaging Science group studies image processing and healthcare applications. Outside, Oxford Road links the department to the wider university campus and the city centre.