Imperial College London (legally Imperial College of Science, Technology and Medicine) is a

public In public relations and communication science, publics are groups of individual people, and the public (a.k.a. the general public) is the totality of such groupings. This is a different concept to the sociological concept of the ''Öffentlichk ...

research university A research university or a research-intensive university is a university that is committed to research as a central part of its mission. They are the most important sites at which knowledge production occurs, along with "intergenerational kn ...

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

, United Kingdom. Its history began with Prince Albert, consort of

Queen Victoria Victoria (Alexandrina Victoria; 24 May 1819 – 22 January 1901) was Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland from 20 June 1837 until her death in 1901. Her reign of 63 years and 216 days was longer than that of any previo ...

, who developed his vision for a cultural area that included the Royal Albert Hall,

Victoria & Albert Museum The Victoria and Albert Museum (often abbreviated as the V&A) in London is the world's largest museum of applied arts, decorative arts and design, housing a permanent collection of over 2.27 million objects. It was founded in 1852 and nam ...

Natural History Museum A natural history museum or museum of natural history is a scientific institution with natural history collections that include current and historical records of animals, plants, fungi, ecosystems, geology, paleontology, climatology, and more. ...

and

royal college A royal college in some Commonwealth countries is technically a college which has received royal patronage and permission to use the prefix ''royal''. Permission is usually granted through a royal charter. The charter normally confers a constitut ...

s. In 1907, Imperial College was established by a

royal charter A royal charter is a formal grant issued by a monarch under royal prerogative as letters patent. Historically, they have been used to promulgate public laws, the most famous example being the English Magna Carta (great charter) of 1215, but s ...

, which unified the

Royal College of Science The Royal College of Science was a higher education institution located in South Kensington; it was a constituent college of Imperial College London from 1907 until it was wholly absorbed by Imperial in 2002. Still to this day, graduates from th ...

Royal School of Mines The Royal School of Mines comprises the departments of Earth Science and Engineering, and Materials at Imperial College London. The Centre for Advanced Structural Ceramics and parts of the London Centre for Nanotechnology and Department of Bioe ...

, and

City and Guilds of London Institute The City and Guilds of London Institute is an educational organisation in the United Kingdom. Founded on 11 November 1878 by the City of London and 16 livery companies – to develop a national system of technical education, the institute has ...

. In 1988, the

Imperial College School of Medicine Imperial College School of Medicine (ICSM) is the undergraduate medical school of Imperial College London in England, and one of the United Hospitals. It is part of the college's Faculty of Medicine and was formed by the merger of several hist ...

was formed by merging with St Mary's Hospital Medical School. In 2004, Queen Elizabeth II opened the

Imperial College Business School Imperial College Business School is the graduate business school of Imperial College London in the UK. In 2004, the business school was opened by Queen Elizabeth II. History In 1851, the Great Exhibition was the first World's Fair, organized by ...

. Imperial focuses exclusively on science, technology, medicine, and business. The main campus is located in

South Kensington South Kensington, nicknamed Little Paris, is a district just west of Central London in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea. Historically it settled on part of the scattered Middlesex village of Brompton. Its name was supplanted with ...

, and there is an innovation campus in White City. Facilities also include teaching hospitals throughout London, and with

Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust is an NHS trust based in London, England. It is one of the largest NHS trusts in England and together with Imperial College London forms an academic health science centre. The trust was formed in October 200 ...

together form an academic health science centre. Imperial joined the

University of London The University of London (UoL; abbreviated as Lond or more rarely Londin in post-nominals) is a federal public research university located in London, England, United Kingdom. The university was established by royal charter in 1836 as a degree ...

in 1908, becoming an independent university in 2007. Imperial has a highly international community, with 59% of students from outside the UK and 140 countries represented on campus.

History

19th century

The earliest college that led to the formation of Imperial was the

Royal College of Chemistry The Royal College of Chemistry: the laboratories. Lithograph The Royal College of Chemistry (RCC) was a college originally based on Oxford Street in central London, England. It operated between 1845 and 1872. The original building was designed ...

, founded in 1845, with the support of Prince Albert and

parliament In modern politics, and history, a parliament is a legislative body of government. Generally, a modern parliament has three functions: representing the electorate, making laws, and overseeing the government via hearings and inquiries. Th ...

. This was merged in 1853 into what became known as the

. The medical school has roots in many different schools across London, the oldest of which being Charing Cross Hospital Medical School which can be traced back to 1823, followed by teaching starting at

Westminster Hospital Westminster Hospital was a hospital in London, England, founded in 1719. In 1834 a medical school attached to the hospital was formally founded. In 1939 a newly built hospital and medical school opened in Horseferry Road, Westminster. In 1994 the ...

in 1834, and St Mary's Hospital in 1851. In 1851, the Great Exhibition was organised as an exhibition of

culture Culture () is an umbrella term which encompasses the social behavior, institutions, and norms found in human societies, as well as the knowledge, beliefs, arts, laws, customs, capabilities, and habits of the individuals in these groups ...

and

industry Industry may refer to: Economics * Industry (economics), a generally categorized branch of economic activity * Industry (manufacturing), a specific branch of economic activity, typically in factories with machinery * The wider industrial sector ...

Henry Cole Sir Henry Cole FRSA (15 July 1808 – 18 April 1882) was a British civil servant and inventor who facilitated many innovations in commerce and education in the 19th century in the United Kingdom. Cole is credited with devising the concept of ...

and by Prince Albert, husband of the reigning monarch of the United Kingdom,

. An enormously popular and financial success, proceeds from the Great Exhibition were designated to develop an area for cultural and scientific advancement in

. Within the next six years the

Victoria and Albert Museum The Victoria and Albert Museum (often abbreviated as the V&A) in London is the world's largest museum of applied arts, decorative arts and design, housing a permanent collection of over 2.27 million objects. It was founded in 1852 and nam ...

and

Science Museum A science museum is a museum devoted primarily to science. Older science museums tended to concentrate on static displays of objects related to natural history, paleontology, geology, industry and industrial machinery, etc. Modern trends in ...

had opened, joined by new facilities in 1871 for the Royal College of Chemistry, and in 1881 the opening of the Royal School of Mines and

In 1881, the Normal School of Science was established in South Kensington under the leadership of

Thomas Huxley Thomas Henry Huxley (4 May 1825 – 29 June 1895) was an English biologist and anthropologist specialising in comparative anatomy. He has become known as "Darwin's Bulldog" for his advocacy of Charles Darwin's theory of evolution. The stor ...

, taking over responsibility for the teaching of the natural sciences and agriculture from the Royal School of Mines. The school was renamed the

royal consent In the UK and certain other Commonwealth countries, King's Consent (Queen's Consent when the monarch is female) is a parliamentary convention under which crown consent is sought whenever a proposed parliamentary bill will affect the crown's own ...

in 1890. The Central Institution of the

, was opened as a

technical education In the United States, a technical school is a type of two-year college that covers specialized fields such as business, finance, hospitality, tourism, construction, engineering, visual arts, information technology and community work. Asso ...

school on

Exhibition Road Exhibition Road is a street in South Kensington, London which is home to several major museums and academic establishments, including the Victoria and Albert Museum, the Science Museum and the Natural History Museum. Overview The road gets i ...

by the

Prince of Wales Prince of Wales ( cy, Tywysog Cymru, ; la, Princeps Cambriae/Walliae) is a title traditionally given to the heir apparent to the English and later British throne. Prior to the conquest by Edward I in the 13th century, it was used by the rulers ...

in early 1885. Royal-College-of-Science,-Imperial-College-Road

20th century

At the start of the 20th century, there was a concern that

Britain Britain most often refers to: * The United Kingdom, a sovereign state in Europe comprising the island of Great Britain, the north-eastern part of the island of Ireland and many smaller islands * Great Britain, the largest island in the United King ...

was falling behind

Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...

in scientific and technical education. A departmental committee was set up at the Board of Education in 1904, to look into the future of the Royal College of Science. A report released in 1906 called for the establishment of an institution unifying the Royal College of Science and the Royal School of Mines, as well as – if an agreement could be reached with the City and Guilds of London Institute – their Central Technical College. On 8 July 1907,

Edward VII Edward VII (Albert Edward; 9 November 1841 – 6 May 1910) was King of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland and Emperor of India, from 22 January 1901 until his death in 1910. The second child and eldest son of Queen Victoria and ...

granted a

Royal Charter A royal charter is a formal grant issued by a monarch under royal prerogative as letters patent. Historically, they have been used to promulgate public laws, the most famous example being the English Magna Carta (great charter) of 1215, but s ...

establishing the Imperial College of Science and Technology. This incorporated the Royal School of Mines and the Royal College of Science. It also made provisions for the City and Guilds College to join once conditions regarding its governance were met, as well as for Imperial to become a college of the

. The college joined the University of London on 22 July 1908, with the City and Guilds College joining in 1910. The main campus of Imperial College was constructed beside the buildings of the

Imperial Institute The Commonwealth Education Trust is a registered charity established in 2007 as the successor trust to the Commonwealth Institute. The trust focuses on primary and secondary education and the training of teachers and invests on educational pro ...

, the new building for the Royal College of Science having opened across from it in 1906, and the foundation stone for the Royal School of Mines building being laid by

King Edward VII Edward VII (Albert Edward; 9 November 1841 – 6 May 1910) was King of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland and Emperor of India, from 22 January 1901 until his death in 1910. The second child and eldest son of Queen Victoria a ...

in July 1909. As students at Imperial had to study separately for London degrees, in January 1919, students and alumni voted for a petition to make Imperial a university with its own degree awarding powers, independent of the University of London. In response, the University of London changed its regulations in 1925 so that the courses taught only at Imperial would be examined by the university, enabling students to gain a BSc. Imperial College Royal School of Mines

In October 1945,

George VI George VI (Albert Frederick Arthur George; 14 December 1895 – 6 February 1952) was King of the United Kingdom and the Dominions of the British Commonwealth from 11 December 1936 until his death in 1952. He was also the last Emperor of I ...

and Queen Elizabeth visited Imperial to commemorate the centenary of the Royal College of Chemistry, which was the oldest of the institutions that united to form Imperial College. "Commemoration Day", named after this visit, is held every October as the university's main graduation ceremony. The college also acquired a biology field station at Silwood Park near

Ascot, Berkshire Ascot () is a town in the Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead in Berkshire, England. It is south of Windsor, east of Bracknell and west of London. It is most notable as the location of Ascot Racecourse, home of the Royal Ascot meeting, ...

in 1947 Following the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposi ...

, there was again concern that Britain was falling behind in science – this time to the United States. The Percy Report of 1945 and Barlow Committee in 1946 called for a "British

MIT The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private land-grant research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Established in 1861, MIT has played a key role in the development of modern technology and science, and is one of the m ...

"-equivalent, backed by influential scientists as politicians of the time, including

Lord Cherwell Frederick Alexander Lindemann, 1st Viscount Cherwell, ( ; 5 April 18863 July 1957) was a British physicist who was prime scientific adviser to Winston Churchill in World War II. Lindemann was a brilliant intellectual, who cut through bureauc ...

, Sir

Lawrence Bragg Sir William Lawrence Bragg, (31 March 1890 – 1 July 1971) was an Australian-born British physicist and X-ray crystallographer, discoverer (1912) of Bragg's law of X-ray diffraction, which is basic for the determination of crystal struct ...

and Sir Edward Appleton. The University Grants Committee strongly opposed however, and so a compromise was reached in 1953, where Imperial would remain within the university, but double in size over the next ten years. The expansion led to a number of new buildings being erected. These included the Hill building in 1957 and the Physics building in 1960, and the completion of the East Quadrangle, built in four stages between 1959 and 1965. The building work also meant the demolition of the City and Guilds College building in 1962–63, and the Imperial Institute's building by 1967. Opposition from the

Royal Fine Arts Commission The Commission for Architecture and the Built Environment (CABE) was an executive non-departmental public body of the UK government, established in 1999. It was funded by both the Department for Culture, Media and Sport and the Department for C ...

and others meant that

Queen's Tower Queen's Tower can refer to: * Queen's Tower, Brisbane, residential skyscraper in Brisbane, Australia * Queen's Tower (London), a building of Imperial College London * Queen's Tower (Serpieri), a former royal estate near Athens * Queen's Tower (Shef ...

was retained, with work carried out between 1966 and 1968 to make it free standing. New laboratories for biochemistry, established with the support of a £350,000 grant from the

Wolfson Foundation The Wolfson Foundation is a charity that awards grants to support excellence in the fields of science and medicine, health, education and the arts and humanities. Overview The endowment of the Wolfson Foundation is currently some £800 million, ...

, were opened by the

Queen Queen or QUEEN may refer to: Monarchy * Queen regnant, a female monarch of a Kingdom ** List of queens regnant * Queen consort, the wife of a reigning king * Queen dowager, the widow of a king * Queen mother, a queen dowager who is the mother ...

in 1965. In 1988, Imperial merged with St Mary's Hospital Medical School under the Imperial College Act 1988. Amendments to the

changed the formal name of the institution to ''The Imperial College of Science, Technology and Medicine'' and made St Mary's a constituent college. This was followed by mergers with the

National Heart and Lung Institute The Faculty of Medicine is the academic centre for medical and clinical research and teaching at Imperial College London. It contains the Imperial College School of Medicine, which is the college's undergraduate medical school. History Medica ...

in 1995 and the Charing Cross and Westminster Medical School, Royal Postgraduate Medical School and the Institute of Obstetrics and Gynaecology in 1997, with the

Imperial College Act 1997 The Imperial College Act 1997 is a local Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. It is a minor piece of legislation that enabled Imperial College London to take over the Charing Cross and Westminster Medical School, the National Heart and L ...

formally establishing the Imperial College School of Medicine.

21st century

In 2003, Imperial was granted degree-awarding powers in its own right by the Privy Council. In 2004, the

and a new main college entrance on Exhibition Road were opened. The

UK Energy Research Centre The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotland, Wales and North ...

was also established in 2004 and opened its headquarters at Imperial. On 9 December 2005, Imperial announced that it would commence negotiations to secede from the University of London. Imperial became fully independent of the University of London in July 2007. In April 2011, Imperial and King's College London joined the UK Centre for Medical Research and Innovation as partners with a commitment of £40 million each to the project. The centre was later renamed the Francis Crick Institute and opened on 9 November 2016. It is the largest single biomedical laboratory in Europe. The college began moving into the new White City campus in 2016, with the launching of the Innovation Hub. This was followed by the opening of the Molecular Sciences Research Hub for the Department of Chemistry, officially opened by

Mayor of London The mayor of London is the chief executive of the Greater London Authority. The role was created in 2000 after the Greater London devolution referendum in 1998, and was the first directly elected mayor in the United Kingdom. The current m ...

Sadiq Khan Sadiq Aman Khan (; born 8 October 1970) is a British politician serving as Mayor of London since 2016. He was previously Member of Parliament (MP) for Tooting from 2005 until 2016. A member of the Labour Party, Khan is on the party's sof ...

in 2019.

Campuses

Goldsmiths Extension and Main Entrance from across Exhibition Road

South Kensington

Imperial's main campus is based in

. Notable buildings include the Business School opened by Queen Elizabeth II, which serves as the college's main entrance, the

, which sits at the heart of the campus, the

, and the

. As part of

Albertopolis Albertopolis is the nickname given to the area centred on Exhibition Road in London, named after Prince Albert, consort of Queen Victoria. It contains many educational and cultural sites. It is in South Kensington, split between the Royal Boro ...

, a cultural centre based on the vision of Prince Albert, the campus is adjacent many of London's most popular attractions, including Kensington Palace and the Royal Albert Hall, museums including the

, and

, and institutions including the

Royal College of Art The Royal College of Art (RCA) is a public research university in London, United Kingdom, with campuses in South Kensington, Battersea and White City. It is the only entirely postgraduate art and design university in the United Kingdom. It o ...

, the

Royal College of Music The Royal College of Music is a conservatoire established by royal charter in 1882, located in South Kensington, London, UK. It offers training from the undergraduate to the doctoral level in all aspects of Western Music including performanc ...

, and the National Art Library. Many students take advantage of the ample green spaces that are an easy walking distance to Kensington Gardens and Hyde Park. A Walk in the Park - geograph

White City

Imperial has a new second major campus in White City providing a platform for

innovation Innovation is the practical implementation of ideas that result in the introduction of new goods or services or improvement in offering goods or services. ISO TC 279 in the standard ISO 56000:2020 defines innovation as "a new or changed entit ...

and

entrepreneurship Entrepreneurship is the creation or extraction of economic value. With this definition, entrepreneurship is viewed as change, generally entailing risk beyond what is normally encountered in starting a business, which may include other values t ...

. The hub houses research facilities, postgraduate accommodation, as well as a commercialisation space. The campus is home to the Scale Space and

incubator An incubator is anything that performs or facilitates various forms of incubation, and may refer to: Biology and medicine * Incubator (culture), a device used to grow and maintain microbiological cultures or cell cultures * Incubator (egg), a de ...

, Invention Rooms, a college

hackerspace A hackerspace (also referred to as a hacklab, hackspace, or makerspace) is a community-operated, often "not for profit" ( 501(c)(3) in the United States), workspace where people with common interests, such as computers, machining, technology, ...

and community outreach centre. The White City campus also includes another biomedical centre funded by Sir Michael Uren.

Silwood Park

Silwood Park is a postgraduate campus of Imperial in the village of Sunninghill near Ascot in Berkshire. The Silwood Park campus is a centre for research and teaching in ecology, evolution, and conservation. It is set in 100 hectares of parkland used for ecological field experiments.

Hospitals

Imperial has teaching hospitals across London which are used by the

School of Medicine A medical school is a tertiary educational institution, or part of such an institution, that teaches medicine, and awards a professional degree for physicians. Such medical degrees include the Bachelor of Medicine, Bachelor of Surgery (MBBS, M ...

for undergraduate clinical teaching and medical research. All are based around college-affiliated hospitals, and also provide catering and sport facilities. College libraries are located on each campus, including the Fleming library at St Mary's.

Organisation and administration

Faculties and departments

Imperial is organised by four faculties: the Faculty of Engineering, the Faculty of Medicine, the Faculty of Natural Sciences, and Imperial College Business School. Faculty of Engineering * Aeronautical Engineering * Bioengineering *

Chemical Engineering Chemical engineering is an engineering field which deals with the study of operation and design of chemical plants as well as methods of improving production. Chemical engineers develop economical commercial processes to convert raw materials int ...

* Civil & Environmental Engineering *

Computing Computing is any goal-oriented activity requiring, benefiting from, or creating computing machinery. It includes the study and experimentation of algorithmic processes, and development of both hardware and software. Computing has scientific, ...

Dyson School of Design Engineering The Dyson School of Design Engineering is the academic centre for design engineering at Imperial College London. The school has just over 50 academic staff and 400 students, with over 220 undergraduates. The school is located in the Dyson buildin ...

* Earth Science & Engineering * Electrical & Electronic Engineering *

Materials Material is a substance or mixture of substances that constitutes an object. Materials can be pure or impure, living or non-living matter. Materials can be classified on the basis of their physical and chemical properties, or on their geolog ...

Mechanical Engineering Mechanical engineering is the study of physical machines that may involve force and movement. It is an engineering branch that combines engineering physics and mathematics principles with materials science, to design, analyze, manufacture, an ...

Faculty of Medicine * Brain Sciences * Immunology & Inflammation * Infectious Disease * Metabolism, Digestion & Reproduction * Surgery and Cancer * Institute of Clinical Sciences * National Heart and Lung Institute * School of Public Health Faculty of Natural Sciences * Chemistry * Mathematics *

Physics Physics is the natural science that studies matter, its fundamental constituents, its motion and behavior through space and time, and the related entities of energy and force. "Physical science is that department of knowledge which r ...

* Life Sciences *

Centre for Environmental Policy The Centre for Environmental Policy (CEP) is a department at Imperial College London in the Faculty of Natural Sciences. Its aim is to influence a wide range of environmental issues through research on the environmental, energy and health aspects ...

* Analytics & Operations * Economics & Public Policy * Finance * Management & Entrepreneurship * Marketing

Global institutes

Imperial hosts global centres to promote inter-disciplinary work: * Energy Futures Laboratory * Gandhi Centre for Inclusive Innovation *

Grantham Institute for Climate Change Grantham () is a market and industrial town in the South Kesteven district of Lincolnshire, England, situated on the banks of the River Witham and bounded to the west by the A1 road. It lies some 23 miles (37 km) south of the Lincoln and ...

* Institute for Security Science & Technology * Centre for Health Economics & Policy Innovation * Brevan Howard Centre for Financial Analysis & Technology * Global Entrepreneurship & Development Index * Data Science Institute * Institute for Molecular Science and Engineering *

Institute of Global Health Innovation The Institute of Global Health Innovation is one of Imperial College London’s global challenge Institutes. Established in 2010, its mission is to improve global health and care through evidence-based innovation. The Institute’s work aims to sup ...

* Francis Crick Institute

Academic centres

Imperial College also houses two academic centres, formerly the Department of Humanities, offering teaching to undergraduate and postgraduate students in modern languages, arts and humanities subjects, social sciences and other subjects which fall outside of the standard remit of science, technology and medicine. The aim of these centres is to provide training in study skills, such as the acquisition of English language proficiency, but also to encourage innovatory and interdisciplinary approaches to science, technology and medicine, which might make use of study of the arts, humanities, languages and social sciences. The academic centres are the: * Centre for Academic English * Centre for Languages, Culture and Communication The Centre for Languages, Culture and Communication also operates as Imperial College London's adult education centre, offering evening class courses in the arts, humanities, languages and sciences.

Governance

The council is the governing body of Imperial. The council consists of the Chairman, the President, the Provost, the President of Imperial College Union, 4 senior staff members, and between 9 and 13 lay advisory members (who are not employees of Imperial). The

President President most commonly refers to: *President (corporate title) * President (education), a leader of a college or university * President (government title) President may also refer to: Automobiles * Nissan President, a 1966–2010 Japanese ...

is the highest academic official and

chief executive A chief executive officer (CEO), also known as a central executive officer (CEO), chief administrator officer (CAO) or just chief executive (CE), is one of a number of corporate executives charged with the management of an organization especially ...

of Imperial College London. The position has been held by

Alice Gast Alice Petry Gast (born May 25, 1958) is an American researcher, was the 16th president of Imperial College London, and sits on the board of directors of Chevron. Gast was named one of the top 100 "Modern Era" engineers in the US under the categ ...

, since September 2014. It was announced that Hugh Brady would take up the next Presidency in August 2022. The current Provost is

Ian Walmsley Ian Alexander Walmsley FRS is Provost of Imperial College London where he is also Chair of Experimental Physics. He was previously pro-vice-chancellor for research and Hooke Professor of Experimental Physics at the University of Oxford, and a ...

, and the current Chair is Sir Philip Dilley.

Finances and endowment

Royal Albert Hall Crop, London - Nov 2012

In 2017/18, Imperial had a consolidated income of £1,033.0 million. The college's endowment is sub-divided into three distinct portfolios: * Unitised Scheme – a unit trust vehicle for the college, Faculties and Departments to invest endowments and unfettered income to produce returns for the long term * Non-Core Property – a portfolio containing around 120 operational and developmental properties which the college has determined are not core to the academic mission * Strategic Asset Investments – containing the college's shareholding in Imperial Innovations and other restricted equity holdings.

Affiliations and partnerships

Imperial is a member of the Association of Commonwealth Universities, European University Association, Global Alliance of Technological Universities,

League of European Research Universities The League of European Research Universities (LERU) is a consortium of European research universities. History and overview The League of European Research Universities (LERU) is an association of research-intensive universities. Founded in 2002 ...

and the

Russell Group The Russell Group is a self-selected association of twenty-four public research universities in the United Kingdom. The group is headquartered in Cambridge and was established in 1994 to represent its members' interests, principally to governmen ...

. It is a founding member of the Imperial College

academic health sciences centre An academic medical centre (AMC), variously also known as academic health science centre, academic health science system, or academic health science partnership, is an educational and healthcare institute formed by the grouping of a health profes ...

, the Francis Crick Institute and MedCity. Imperial is a long-term partner of the

Massachusetts Institute of Technology The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private land-grant research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Established in 1861, MIT has played a key role in the development of modern technology and science, and is one of the ...

, with the first formal large-scale collaboration agreement dating back to 1944 as part of the

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...

scientific effort. The two institutions still share a strong bond with exchange programs for their students and academic staff. In the field of Mathematics, Imperial College London has a joint venture with King's College London and

University College London , mottoeng = Let all come who by merit deserve the most reward , established = , type = Public research university , endowment = £143 million (2020) , budget = ...

running the London School of Geometry and Number Theory, which offers doctoral training in mathematic aspects of number theory, geometry and topology.

Academic profile

Rankings

Global

In the 2023

Times Higher Education World University Ranking The ''Times Higher Education World University Rankings'' (often referred to as the THE Rankings) is an annual publication of university rankings by the ''Times Higher Education'' (THE) magazine. The publisher had collaborated with Quacquarelli ...

, Imperial is ranked 10th in the world, as well as 3rd in Europe, behind

Cambridge Cambridge ( ) is a College town, university city and the county town in Cambridgeshire, England. It is located on the River Cam approximately north of London. As of the 2021 United Kingdom census, the population of Cambridge was 145,700. Cam ...

and

Oxford Oxford () is a city in England. It is the county town and only city of Oxfordshire. In 2020, its population was estimated at 151,584. It is north-west of London, south-east of Birmingham and north-east of Bristol. The city is home to the ...

. In the 2023 Quacquarelli Symonds World University Ranking, Imperial is ranked 6th in the world, as well as 3rd in Europe. In the 2022 Academic Ranking of World Universities, Imperial is ranked 23rd in the world, as well as 6th in Europe.

Innovation

In the 2023 QS MBA Rankings for the MBA specialization of

, Imperial is ranked 3rd in the world, as well as 1st in Europe behind Stanford and Harvard. In the 2019 Reuters World's Most Innovative Universities, Imperial is ranked 1st in

in the UK, and 2nd in Europe, after

KU Leuven KU Leuven (or Katholieke Universiteit Leuven) is a Catholic research university in the city of Leuven, Belgium. It conducts teaching, research, and services in computer science, engineering, natural sciences, theology, humanities, medicine, ...

Career prospects

According to the 2019 Guardian University Guide and the 2019 Complete University Guide, Imperial students are ranked 1st in employment prospects among UK universities. As of 2018, ''The Guardian'' notes that Imperial graduates pick up the highest salaries in the UK in the first year after graduation, earning around a fifth more than students leaving

and

. A 2018

Department for Education The Department for Education (DfE) is a department of His Majesty's Government responsible for child protection, child services, education (compulsory, further and higher education), apprenticeships and wider skills in England. A Department ...

report found that Imperial boosted female graduates earnings 31.3% above the average female graduate, and male graduates similarly saw a 25.3% increase in earnings above the average male graduate. In 2018, the Sunday Times Good University Guide found that Computer Science at Imperial was the highest paying degree in the UK.

Research

Imperial Institute Tower c1960 - geograph

Imperial was ranked 1st overall in rankings produced by ''Times Higher Education'' based upon the

Research Excellence Framework The Research Excellence Framework (REF) is a research impact evaluation of British higher education institutions. It is the successor to the Research Assessment Exercise and it was first used in 2014 to assess the period 2008–2013. REF is under ...

results 2021. Imperial submitted a total of 1,257 staff across 11 units of assessment to the 2021

(REF) assessment. This found that 96.6% of Imperial's research is “world-leading” (66.3% achieved the highest possible 4* score) or “internationally excellent” (30.3% achieved 3*), giving an overall GPA of 3.63 – the highest in the UK. 93% of Imperial's computer science research was found to be world-leading, achieving the highest possible 4* score. Imperial is also widely known to have been a critical contributor of the discovery of penicillin, and the invention of fiber optics. The college promotes research commercialisation, partly through its dedicated

technology transfer Technology transfer (TT), also called transfer of technology (TOT), is the process of transferring (disseminating) technology from the person or organization that owns or holds it to another person or organization, in an attempt to transform invent ...

company, Imperial Innovations, which has given rise to a large number of spin-out companies based on academic research. Imperial College has a long-term partnership with the

, that dates back from

. The

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...

is the college's top collaborating foreign country, with more than 15,000 articles co-authored by Imperial and U.S.-based authors over the last 10 years. In January 2018, the mathematics department of Imperial and the

French National Center for Scientific Research The French National Centre for Scientific Research (french: link=no, Centre national de la recherche scientifique, CNRS) is the French state research organisation and is the largest fundamental science agency in Europe. In 2016, it employed 31,637 ...

launched UMI

Abraham de Moivre Abraham de Moivre FRS (; 26 May 166727 November 1754) was a French mathematician known for de Moivre's formula, a formula that links complex numbers and trigonometry, and for his work on the normal distribution and probability theory. He moved ...

at Imperial, a joint research laboratory of mathematics focused on unsolved problems and bridging

British British may refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories, and Crown Dependencies. ** Britishness, the British identity and common culture * British English, ...

and French scientific communities. The Fields medallists

Cédric Villani Cédric Patrice Thierry Villani (; born 5 October 1973) is a French politician and mathematician working primarily on partial differential equations, Riemannian geometry and mathematical physics. He was awarded the Fields Medal in 2010, and he w ...

and

Martin Hairer Sir Martin Hairer (born 14 November 1975) is an Austrian-British mathematician working in the field of stochastic analysis, in particular stochastic partial differential equations. He is Professor of Mathematics at EPFL (École Polytechnique F ...

hosted the launch presentation. In October 2018, Imperial College launched the Imperial Cancer Research UK Center, a research collaboration that aims to find innovative ways to improve the precision of cancer treatments, inaugurated by former

Vice President of the United States The vice president of the United States (VPOTUS) is the second-highest officer in the executive branch of the U.S. federal government, after the president of the United States, and ranks first in the presidential line of succession. The vice ...

Joe Biden as part of his Biden Cancer Initiative. Imperial was one of the ten leading contributors to the NASA InSight Mars lander which landed on planet

Mars Mars is the fourth planet from the Sun and the second-smallest planet in the Solar System, only being larger than Mercury. In the English language, Mars is named for the Roman god of war. Mars is a terrestrial planet with a thin at ...

in November 2018, with the college logo appearing on the craft. InSight's Seismic Experiment for Interior Structure, developed at Imperial, measured the first likely

marsquake A marsquake is a quake which, much like an earthquake, would be a shaking of the surface or interior of the planet Mars as a result of the sudden release of energy in the planet's interior, such as the result of plate tectonics, which most quakes ...

reading in April 2019. In 2019, it was revealed that the

Blackett Laboratory The Blackett Laboratory is part of the Imperial College Faculty of Natural Sciences and has housed the Department of Physics at Imperial College London since its completion in 1961. Named after experimental physicist Patrick Blackett who establi ...

would be constructing an instrument for the European Space Agency

Solar Orbiter The Solar Orbiter (SolO) is a Sun-observing satellite developed by the European Space Agency (ESA). SolO, designed to obtain detailed measurements of the inner heliosphere and the nascent solar wind, will also perform close observations of th ...

in a mission to study the

Sun The Sun is the star at the center of the Solar System. It is a nearly perfect ball of hot plasma, heated to incandescence by nuclear fusion reactions in its core. The Sun radiates this energy mainly as light, ultraviolet, and infrared radi ...

, which launched in February 2020. The laboratory is also designing part of the US

Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment The Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment (DUNE) is a neutrino experiment under construction, with a near detector at Fermilab and a far detector at the Sanford Underground Research Facility that will observe neutrinos produced at Fermilab. An int ...

. In early 2020, immunology research at the Faculty of Medicine focused on

SARS-CoV-2 Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS‑CoV‑2) is a strain of coronavirus that causes COVID-19 (coronavirus disease 2019), the respiratory illness responsible for the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. The virus previously had a ...

under the leadership of Robin Shattock as part of the college's COVID-19 Response Team, including the search of a cheap vaccine which started human trials on 15 June 2020. Neil Ferguson's 16 March report entitled "Impact of non-pharmaceutical interventions (NPIs) to reduce COVID- 19 mortality and healthcare demand" was described in a 17 March ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...

'' article, as the coronavirus "report that jarred the U.S. and the U.K. to action". Since 18 May 2020, Imperial College's Dr. Samir Bhatt has been advising the

state of New York New York, officially the State of New York, is a state in the Northeastern United States. It is often called New York State to distinguish it from its largest city, New York City. With a total area of , New York is the 27th-largest U.S. state ...

for its reopening plan. The governor of New York,

Andrew Cuomo Andrew Mark Cuomo ( ; ; born December 6, 1957) is an American lawyer and politician who served as the 56th governor of New York from 2011 to 2021. A member of the Democratic Party, he was elected to the same position that his father, Mario Cu ...

, said at the time that "the Imperial College model, as we've been following this for weeks, was the best, most accurate model." The hospitals from the

, which have been caring for COVID-19 infected patients, partnered with

Microsoft Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational technology corporation producing computer software, consumer electronics, personal computers, and related services headquartered at the Microsoft Redmond campus located in Redmond, Washin ...

to use their

HoloLens Microsoft HoloLens is an augmented reality (AR)/ mixed reality (MR) headset developed and manufactured by Microsoft. HoloLens runs the Windows Mixed Reality platform under the Windows 10 operating system. Some of the positional tracking tech ...

when treating those patients, reducing the amount of time spent by staff in high-risk areas by up to 83%, as well as saving up to 700 items of PPE per ward, per week.

Admissions

In the academic year 2021/22, Imperial had an admissions rate of 11.1% for undergraduate admissions and 13.0% for postgraduate admissions: the ratio of applicants to admissions was 9:1 for undergraduates and 7.7:1 for postgraduates. The undergraduate courses with the highest ratios of applicants to admissions were

computing Computing is any goal-oriented activity requiring, benefiting from, or creating computing machinery. It includes the study and experimentation of algorithmic processes, and development of both hardware and software. Computing has scientific, ...

(15.8:1), mathematics (12.1:1) and

mechanical engineering Mechanical engineering is the study of physical machines that may involve force and movement. It is an engineering branch that combines engineering physics and mathematics principles with materials science, to design, analyze, manufacture, an ...

(8.9:1). For postgraduate, they were earth science and engineering (18.8:1), computing (15.8:1) and mechanical engineering (15.1:1). Imperial is among the most diverse international universities in the United Kingdom, with 50% of students from the UK, 16% of students from the EU, and 34% of students from outside the UK or EU. The student body is 39% female and 61% male. 36.5% of Imperial's undergraduates are privately educated, the fourth highest proportion amongst mainstream British universities.

Libraries

The college's Central Library is located next to

Queen's Lawn The Queen's Lawn is a green lawned area situated at the centre of Imperial College London's South Kensington campus, next to the Queen's Tower and immediately to the north of Imperial College Road. It provides an open space of 1,600 sq metres, ...

and contains the main corpus of the college's collection. It previously also housed the

's library until 2014. The Fleming library is located at St Mary's in

Paddington Paddington is an area within the City of Westminster, in Central London. First a medieval parish then a metropolitan borough, it was integrated with Westminster and Greater London in 1965. Three important landmarks of the district are Padd ...

, originally the library of St Mary's Hospital Medical School, with other hospital campuses also having college libraries.

Medicine

The Imperial Faculty of Medicine was formed through mergers between Imperial and the St Mary's, Charing Cross and Westminster, and Royal Postgraduate medical schools and has six

teaching hospital A teaching hospital is a hospital or medical centre that provides medical education and training to future and current health professionals. Teaching hospitals are almost always affiliated with one or more universities and are often co-located ...

s. It accepts more than 300 undergraduate medical students per year and has around 321 taught and 700 research full-time equivalent postgraduate students. Imperial College London Diabetes Centre

was formed on 1 October 2007 by the merger of Hammersmith Hospitals NHS Trust (

Charing Cross Hospital Charing Cross Hospital is an acute general teaching hospital located in Hammersmith, London, United Kingdom. The present hospital was opened in 1973, although it was originally established in 1818, approximately five miles east, in central L ...

Hammersmith Hospital Hammersmith Hospital, formerly the Military Orthopaedic Hospital, and later the Special Surgical Hospital, is a major teaching hospital in White City, West London. It is part of Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust in the London Borough of ...

and

Queen Charlotte's and Chelsea Hospital Queen Charlotte's and Chelsea Hospital is one of the oldest maternity hospitals in Europe, founded in 1739 in London. Until October 2000, it occupied a site at 339–351 Goldhawk Road, Hammersmith, but is now located between East Acton and Wh ...

) and St Mary's NHS Trust ( St. Mary's Hospital and Western Eye Hospital) with Imperial College London Faculty of Medicine. It is an academic health science centre and manages five hospitals:

, St Mary's Hospital, and Western Eye Hospital. The Trust is currently one of the largest in the UK and in 2012/13 had a turnover of £971.3 million, employed approximately 9,770 people and treated almost 1.2 million patients. Other (non-academic health science centres) hospitals affiliated with Imperial College include

Chelsea and Westminster Hospital Chelsea and Westminster Hospital is a 430-bed teaching hospital located in Chelsea, London. Although the hospital has been at its present site since only 1993, the hospital has a rich history in that it serves as the new site for the Westminst ...

Royal Brompton Hospital Royal Brompton Hospital is the largest specialist heart and lung medical centre in the United Kingdom. It is managed by Guy's and St Thomas' NHS Foundation Trust. History Consumption in the 19th Century In the 19th century, consumption was a c ...

West Middlesex University Hospital West Middlesex University Hospital (WMUH) is an acute NHS hospital in Isleworth, West London, operated by Chelsea and Westminster Hospital NHS Foundation Trust. It is a teaching hospital of Imperial College School of Medicine and a designated aca ...

Hillingdon Hospital Hillingdon Hospital is an NHS hospital in Pield Heath Road, Hillingdon, Greater London. It is one of two hospitals run by the Hillingdon Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, the other being Mount Vernon Hospital. History The hospitals has its origi ...

Mount Vernon Hospital Mount Vernon Hospital is located in Northwood, an area of north-west Greater London. It is one of two hospitals run by The Hillingdon Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust. History The hospital was founded as The North London Hospital for Co ...

Harefield Hospital Harefield Hospital is a health institution in Harefield, London Borough of Hillingdon, England. It is managed by the Guy's and St Thomas' NHS Foundation Trust. History The first hospital on the site was the No. 1 Australian Auxiliary Hospital ...

Ealing Hospital Ealing Hospital is a district general NHS hospital, part of London North West University Healthcare NHS Trust, located in the Southall district of the London Borough of Ealing, West London, England. It lies on the south side of the Uxbridge ...

Central Middlesex Hospital Central Middlesex Hospital is in the centre of the Park Royal business estate, on the border of two London boroughs, Brent and Ealing. It is managed by the London North West University Healthcare NHS Trust. History The hospital was establish ...

Northwick Park Hospital Northwick Park Hospital (NWPH) is a major National Health Service hospital situated near the town of Harrow, North West London, managed by the London North West University Healthcare NHS Trust. It is located off Watford Road in the London Borou ...

, St Mark's Hospital, St Charles' Hospital and St Peter's Hospital.

Controversies

Accusations of bullying

In 2003, it was reported that one third of female academics "believe that discrimination or bullying by managers has held back their careers". Imperial has since won the

Athena SWAN Athena SWAN (Scientific Women's Academic Network) is a quality charter mark framework and accreditation scheme established and managed by the UK Equality Challenge Unit (now part of Advance HE) in 2005 that recognises and celebrates good pract ...

Award, which recognises employment practices that are supportive of the careers of women in science, technology, engineering and maths. In 2007, concerns were raised about the methods that were being used to fire people in the Faculty of Medicine. In 2014, Stefan Grimm, of the Department of Medicine, was found dead after being threatened with dismissal for failure to raise enough grant money. His last email before his death accused his employers of bullying by demanding that he should get grants worth at least £200,000 per year. The college announced an internal inquiry into Stefan Grimm's death, and found that the performance metrics for his position were unreasonable, with new metrics for performance being needed. The issue of bullying within the staff at Imperial resurfaced in November 2020 when Alex Sobel, the Labour MP for Leeds North West asked the Secretary of State for Education in a written question on 24 November what steps the Office for Students had taken in response to a report by Jane McNeill QC dated 25 August which found that bullying had taken place at Imperial under the President (

) and the Chief Financial Officer. Michelle Donelan, the Conservative MP for Chippenham, responded for the Department for Education that "The Office for Students (OfS) is considering the information it has received in relation to this matter, in line with their normal processes. As is standard practice, the OfS cannot comment on individual cases". The college was accused of a cover-up by the Universities and Colleges Union in December 2020 when it refused to publish McNeill's report, even in redacted form. The Chair of Council said that the report was kept confidential to preserve the anonymity of people who gave evidence, that its recommendations had been accepted by the senior leadership team, and that these recommendations were being implemented in full. A disciplinary panel decided that Gast's dismissal as president was not warranted and spokesperson for the college said that she had "offered wholehearted apologies to those affected". On 14 February 2021, it was announced that the OfS would formally investigate allegations of bullying.

Student life

Student body

For the academic year, Imperial had a total full-time student body of , consisting of undergraduate students and postgraduates. 50.7% of the student body is from outside of the UK. 32% of all full-time students came from outside the

European Union The European Union (EU) is a supranational political and economic union of member states that are located primarily in Europe. The union has a total area of and an estimated total population of about 447million. The EU has often been de ...

in 2013–14, and around 13% of the International students had Chinese nationality in 2007–08. Imperial's male to female ratio for undergraduate students is uneven at approximately 64:36 overall and 5:1 or higher in some engineering courses. However, medicine has an approximate 1:1 ratio with biology degrees tending to be higher.

Imperial College Union

Imperial College Union Imperial College Union is the students' union of Imperial College London. It is host to many and varied societies, and has student bars situated around Albertopolis. The Union is based in the north wing of the Beit Quadrangle on Prince Consor ...

is the students' union and is run by five full-time sabbatical officers elected from the student body for a tenure of one year, and a number of permanent members of staff. It is split into constituent unions aligned with the faculties of the college, carrying on the association with the original constituent colleges of Imperial, the

Royal College of Science Union The Royal College of Science Union (RCSU) is a student union and science outreach organisation at Imperial College London which represents over 3,000 students in the university's Faculty of Natural Sciences. It manages the student societies for t ...

City and Guilds College Union The City and Guilds College Union represents students who are undertaking courses from the departments of Aeronautical, Chemical, Civil, Design, Electrical, and Mechanical Engineering, together with Bioengineering and Computing at the college. Ot ...

, Royal School of Mines Students' Union and

Imperial College School of Medicine Students' Union Imperial College School of Medicine Students' Union (ICSMSU) is the students' union of the Imperial College School of Medicine. It is charged with representing and advocating for the educational, pastoral, social and extracurricular needs of al ...

. The Union is given a large subvention by the university, much of which is spent on maintaining over 300 clubs, projects and societies. Examples of notable student groups and projects are Project Nepal which sends Imperial College students to work on educational development programmes in rural Nepal and the El Salvador Project, a construction based project in Central America. The Union also hosts sports-related clubs such as

Imperial College Boat Club Imperial College Boat Club is the rowing club for Imperial College and has its boat house on the River Thames on the Putney embankment, London, United Kingdom. It was founded in 1919. The alumni also run a boat club which is known as the Queen' ...

and Imperial College Gliding Club. The Union operates on two sites, with most events at the Union Building on Beit Quad at South Kensington, with mostly medical school events at the Reynold's bar, Charing Cross.

Facilities

Sports facilities at Imperial's London campuses include four gyms, including the main Ethos gym at the South Kensington Campus, two swimming pools and two sports halls. Imperial has additional sports facilities at the Heston and Harlington sports grounds. On the South Kensington campus, there are a total of six music practice rooms which consist of upright pianos for usage by people of any grade, and grand pianos which are exclusively for people who have achieved Grade 8 or above. There are two student bars on the South Kensington campus, one at the

and one at Eastside. There are a number of pubs and bars on campus and also surrounding the campus, which become a popular social activity for Imperial's students. The

Pewter Pewter () is a malleable metal alloy consisting of tin (85–99%), antimony (approximately 5–10%), copper (2%), bismuth, and sometimes silver. Copper and antimony (and in antiquity lead) act as hardeners, but lead may be used in lower grades ...

tankard collection at Imperial College Union is the largest in Europe, with the majority of clubs and societies having tankards associated with their clubs. Imperial College Farmers Market, Prince's Gardens

Imperial College Farmers Market, Prince's Gardens

Student media

Imperial College Radio

Imperial College Radio (ICRadio) was founded in November 1975 with the intention of broadcasting to the student

halls of residence A dormitory (originated from the Latin word ''dormitorium'', often abbreviated to dorm) is a building primarily providing sleeping and residential quarters for large numbers of people such as boarding school, high school, college or university s ...

from a studio under Southside, actually commencing broadcasts in late 1976. It now broadcasts from the West Basement of Beit Quad over the internet.

Imperial College TV

Imperial College TV (ICTV) is Imperial College Union's TV station, founded in 1969 and operated from a small TV studio in the Electrical Engineering block. The department had bought an early

AMPEX Ampex is an American electronics company founded in 1944 by Alexander M. Poniatoff as a spin-off of Dalmo-Victor. The name AMPEX is a portmanteau, created by its founder, which stands for Alexander M. Poniatoff Excellence.AbramsoThe History ...

Type A 1-inch videotape recorder and this was used to produce an occasional short news programme which was then played to students by simply moving the VTR and a monitor into a common room. A cable link to the Southside halls of residence was laid in a tunnel under Exhibition Road in 1972. Besides the news, early productions included a film of the Queen opening what was then called College Block.

Felix Newspaper

Felix Felix may refer to: * Felix (name), people and fictional characters with the name Places * Arabia Felix is the ancient Latin name of Yemen * Felix, Spain, a municipality of the province Almería, in the autonomous community of Andalusia, ...

'' is weekly student newspaper, first released on 9 December 1949. In addition to news, Felix also carries comic strips, features, opinions, puzzles and reviews, plus reports of trips and Imperial College sporting events. RGETeam

Student societies

Imperial College Boat Club

The

is the rowing club of Imperial and was founded on 12 December 1919. The college's boat house is located in

Putney Putney () is a district of southwest London, England, in the London Borough of Wandsworth, southwest of Charing Cross. The area is identified in the London Plan as one of 35 major centres in Greater London. History Putney is an ancient paris ...

on the

Thames The River Thames ( ), known alternatively in parts as the River Isis, is a river that flows through southern England including London. At , it is the longest river entirely in England and the second-longest in the United Kingdom, after the R ...

, and was recently refurbished, reopening in 2014. The club has a number of notable accolades, such as three alumni of the college in the gold medal-winning GB 8+ at the

2000 Summer Olympic Games The 2000 Summer Olympics, officially the Games of the XXVII Olympiad and also known as Sydney 2000 (Dharug: ''Gadigal 2000''), the Millennium Olympic Games or the Games of the New Millennium, was an international multi-sport event held from 1 ...

Sports

Imperial College has over 60 sports clubs, of which many participate in the

British Universities and Colleges Sport British Universities & Colleges Sport (BUCS) is the governing body for higher education sport in the United Kingdom. BUCS was formed in June 2008 following a merger of British Universities Sports Association (BUSA) and University College Sport ...

Association leagues such as

American Football American football (referred to simply as football in the United States and Canada), also known as gridiron, is a team sport played by two teams of eleven players on a rectangular field with goalposts at each end. The offense, the team wi ...

Rugby Rugby may refer to: Sport * Rugby football in many forms: ** Rugby league: 13 players per side *** Masters Rugby League *** Mod league *** Rugby league nines *** Rugby league sevens *** Touch (sport) *** Wheelchair rugby league ** Rugby union: 1 ...

, Badminton,

Lacrosse Lacrosse is a team sport played with a lacrosse stick and a lacrosse ball. It is the oldest organized sport in North America, with its origins with the indigenous people of North America as early as the 12th century. The game was extensiv ...

, Football, Ice Hockey, and many others.

Exploration Club

South Side looking up, Beit Hall, Beit Quadrangle

Eastside and Southside Halls, Prince's Gardens in snow

Imperial's Exploration Board was established in 1957 to assist students with a desire for exploration. Trips have included Afghanistan, Alaska, Cameroon, Ethiopia, Fiji, the Himalayas, Iran, Morocco, Norway, Tanzania, Thailand, Ukraine, and the Yukon.

Dramatic Society

The Imperial College Dramatic Society (DramSoc) is one of two major theatrical arts societies, with the other being the Musical Theatre Society, and it was founded in 1912. The society puts on three major plays each year, in addition to several smaller fringe productions. It is additionally one of the London-based dramatic societies to participate in the London Student Drama Festival, and regularly attends the

Edinburgh Fringe The Edinburgh Festival Fringe (also referred to as The Fringe, Edinburgh Fringe, or Edinburgh Fringe Festival) is the world's largest arts and media festival, which in 2019 spanned 25 days and featured more than 59,600 performances of 3,841 dif ...

. DramSoc is responsible for the day-to-day maintenance of the Union's theatrical space, the Union Concert Hall.

The Techtonics

The Techtonics are an all-male a cappella group from Imperial College London, and are a part of the Imperial College A Cappella Society. The group was formed in 2008, and has since risen to prominence in the world a cappella scene. The group is best known for winning the International Championship of Collegiate A Cappella in 2016.

Student housing

Imperial College owns and manages twenty-three halls of residence in

Inner London Inner London is the name for the group of London boroughs which form the interior part of Greater London and are surrounded by Outer London. With its origins in the bills of mortality, it became fixed as an area for statistics in 1847 and was u ...

, Acton, and Ascot. Over three thousand rooms are available, guaranteeing first year undergraduates a place in College residences. The majority of halls offer single or twin accommodation with some rooms having

en suite A bathroom or washroom is a room, typically in a home or other residential building, that contains either a bathtub or a shower (or both). The inclusion of a wash basin is common. In some parts of the world e.g. India, a toilet is typically ...

facilities. Bedrooms are provided with basic furniture and with access to shared kitchens and bathrooms. All rooms come with internet access and access to the Imperial network. Most of them are considered among the newest student halls at London universities. Most students in college or university accommodation are first-year undergraduates, as they are granted a room once they have selected Imperial as their firm offer with

UCAS The Universities and Colleges Admissions Service (UCAS ) is a UK-based organisation whose main role is to operate the application process for British universities. It operates as an independent charity, funded by fees charged to applicants an ...

. The majority of older students and postgraduates find accommodation in the private sector, help for which is provided by the college private housing office. However a handful of students may continue to live in halls in later years if they take the position of a "hall senior", and places are available for a small number of returning students in the Evelyn Garden halls. Some students also live in

International Students House, London International Students House, London (colloquially shortened to ISH) is a set of lodgings for international and British students in London. It permanently occupies one large building in streets that faces Park Crescent which in turn across a squ ...

Notable alumni, faculty and staff

File:Cyril Norman Hinshelwood Nobel.jpg, Sir

Cyril Norman Hinshelwood Sir Cyril Norman Hinshelwood (19 June 1897 – 9 October 1967) was a British physical chemist and expert in chemical kinetics. His work in reaction mechanisms earned the 1956 Nobel Prize in chemistry. Education Born in London, his parents we ...

File:Rajiv Gandhi (1987).jpg, Rajiv Gandhi, 6th Prime Minister of India File:Professor Abdus Salam.gif,

Abdus Salam Mohammad Abdus Salam Salam adopted the forename "Mohammad" in 1974 in response to the anti-Ahmadiyya decrees in Pakistan, similarly he grew his beard. (; ; 29 January 192621 November 1996) was a Punjabi Pakistani theoretical physicist and a ...

File:Alexander Fleming 3.jpg, Sir Alexander Fleming File:Blackett.jpg,

Patrick Blackett, Baron Blackett Patrick Maynard Stuart Blackett, Baron Blackett (18 November 1897 – 13 July 1974) was a British experimental physicist known for his work on cloud chambers, cosmic rays, and paleomagnetism, winning the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1948 ...

File:Sir William Crookes 1906.jpg, Sir

William Crookes Sir William Crookes (; 17 June 1832 – 4 April 1919) was a British chemist and physicist who attended the Royal College of Chemistry, now part of Imperial College London, and worked on spectroscopy. He was a pioneer of vacuum tubes, inventing t ...

File:Thomas Henry Huxley - Project Gutenberg eText 16935.jpg,

File:John Pendry 2014b.jpg, Sir

John Pendry Sir John Brian Pendry, (born 4 July 1943) is an English theoretical physicist known for his research into refractive indices and creation of the first practical " Invisibility Cloak". He is a professor of theoretical solid state physics at Impe ...

File:Portrait of H. G. Wells.jpg, H.G. Wells File:Geoffrey Wilkinson (ca. 1976).jpg,

Geoffrey Wilkinson Sir Geoffrey Wilkinson FRS (14 July 1921 – 26 September 1996) was a Nobel laureate English chemist who pioneered inorganic chemistry and homogeneous transition metal catalysis. Education and early life Wilkinson was born at Springside, Todm ...

File:Dame_Sally_Davies_FMedSci_DBE_FRS.jpg, Dame Sally Davies File:Brian-May_with_red_special.jpg,

Brian May Brian Harold May (born 19 July 1947) is an English guitarist, singer, songwriter, and astrophysicist, who achieved worldwide fame as the lead guitarist of the rock band Queen. May was a co-founder of Queen with lead singer Freddie Mercury and ...

CBE File:Nobel_Prize_24_2013.jpg,

Peter Higgs Peter Ware Higgs (born 29 May 1929) is a British theoretical physicist, Emeritus Professor in the University of Edinburgh,Griggs, Jessica (Summer 2008The Missing Piece ''Edit'' the University of Edinburgh Alumni Magazine, p. 17 and Nobel Prize ...

File:Lord_Winston_2011_(Portrait).jpg, Robert Winston, Baron Winston File:Professor_Martin_Hairer_FRS.jpg, Sir

Nobel laureates: (medicine)

Sir Alexander Fleming Sir Alexander Fleming (6 August 1881 – 11 March 1955) was a Scottish physician and microbiologist, best known for discovering the world's first broadly effective antibiotic substance, which he named penicillin. His discovery in 1928 of what ...

, Sir Ernst Boris Chain, Sir Frederick Gowland Hopkins, Sir Andrew Fielding Huxley, Rodney Robert Porter, (physics)

, Sir George Paget Thomson,

Dennis Gabor Dennis Gabor ( ; hu, Gábor Dénes, ; 5 June 1900 – 9 February 1979) was a Hungarian-British electrical engineer and physicist, most notable for inventing holography, for which he later received the 1971 Nobel Prize in Physics. He obtained ...

, (chemistry) Sir Norman Haworth, Sir Cyril Norman Hinshelwood, Sir Derek Barton,

Sir Geoffrey Wilkinson Sir Geoffrey Wilkinson FRS (14 July 1921 – 26 September 1996) was a Nobel laureate English chemist who pioneered inorganic chemistry and homogeneous transition metal catalysis. Education and early life Wilkinson was born at Springside, Todm ...

, Sir George Porter. Fields medalists: Klaus Friedrich Roth, Sir Simon Donaldson,

. Academic affiliations include: Sir Tom Kibble, co-discoverer of Higgs Boson; Sir Tejinder Virdee, experimental particle physicist; Sir John Pendry, theoretical solid state physicist; Sir Christopher Kelk Ingold, physical organic chemistry pioneer;

Sir William Henry Perkin Sir William Henry Perkin (12 March 1838 – 14 July 1907) was a British chemist and entrepreneur best known for his serendipitous discovery of the first commercial synthetic organic dye, mauveine, made from aniline. Though he failed in tryin ...

, discoverer of the first synthetic organic chemical dye

mauveine Mauveine, also known as aniline purple and Perkin's mauve, was one of the first synthetic dyes. It was discovered serendipitously by William Henry Perkin in 1856 while he was attempting to synthesise the phytochemical quinine for the treatment of ...

; Sir Edward Frankland, originator of the theory of chemical valency;

Sir William Crookes Sir William Crookes (; 17 June 1832 – 4 April 1919) was a British chemist and physicist who attended the Royal College of Chemistry, now part of Imperial College London, and worked on spectroscopy. He was a pioneer of vacuum tubes, inventing t ...

, discoverer of

thallium Thallium is a chemical element with the symbol Tl and atomic number 81. It is a gray post-transition metal that is not found free in nature. When isolated, thallium resembles tin, but discolors when exposed to air. Chemists William Crookes an ...

; Sir Alan Fersht, chemist; David Phillips, chemist; Harold Hopkins, contributed to the theory and design of optical instruments; Alfred North Whitehead, mathematician and philosopher; Sir Steven Cowley, physicist and president of

Corpus Christi College, Oxford Corpus Christi College (formally, Corpus Christi College in the University of Oxford; informally abbreviated as Corpus or CCC) is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom. Founded in 1517, it is the 12t ...

; and Sir

John Ambrose Fleming Sir John Ambrose Fleming FRS (29 November 1849 – 18 April 1945) was an English electrical engineer and physicist who invented the first thermionic valve or vacuum tube, designed the radio transmitter with which the first transatlantic ra ...

, inventor of the

vacuum tube A vacuum tube, electron tube, valve (British usage), or tube (North America), is a device that controls electric current flow in a high vacuum between electrodes to which an electric potential difference has been applied. The type known as ...

. In biology and medicine;

, advocate of the theory of evolution;

Azeem Majeed Azeem Majeed is Professor and Headof the Department of Primary Care & Public Health at Imperial College, London, as well as a general practitioner in South London and consultant in public health Professor Majeed is a graduate of the University ...

. Clinical Academic and Public Health Specialist;

Wendy Barclay Wendy Sue Fox (née Barclay) is a British virologist. She is currently head of Department of Infectious Disease and Chair in Influenza Virology at Imperial College London. She leads a team of scientists studying the influenza virus and its phy ...

, virologist; Dame Sally Davies, the Chief Medical Officer for England;

David Livingstone David Livingstone (; 19 March 1813 – 1 May 1873) was a Scottish physician, Congregationalist, and pioneer Christian missionary with the London Missionary Society, an explorer in Africa, and one of the most popular British heroes of t ...

, medical missionary and Clare Lloyd, biologist. In engineering; Chi Onwurah, politician; Dame Julia Higgins, polymer scientist; Dame Judith Hackitt, former Chair of the Health and Safety Executive; Dudley Maurice Newitt, scientific director of the

Special Operations Executive The Special Operations Executive (SOE) was a secret British World War II organisation. It was officially formed on 22 July 1940 under Minister of Economic Warfare Hugh Dalton, from the amalgamation of three existing secret organisations. Its pu ...

; and

Julia King, Baroness Brown of Cambridge Julia Elizabeth King, Baroness Brown of Cambridge (born 11 July 1954) is a British engineer and a crossbench member of the House of Lords, where she chairs the Select Committee on Science and Technology. She is the incumbent chair of the Car ...

, engineer and Member of the House of Lords. Non-academic affiliations include:

H. G. Wells Herbert George Wells"Wells, H. G."
Revised 18 May 2015. ''

Nikolas Tombazis, chief car designer at McLaren and Ferrari; Ralph Robins, CEO of

Rolls-Royce Rolls-Royce (always hyphenated) may refer to: * Rolls-Royce Limited, a British manufacturer of cars and later aero engines, founded in 1906, now defunct Automobiles * Rolls-Royce Motor Cars, the current car manufacturing company incorporated in ...

;

, guitarist of rock band

; Chew Choon Seng, CEO of

Singapore Airlines Singapore Airlines ( abbreviation: SIA) is the flag carrier airline of the Republic of Singapore with its hub located at Singapore Changi Airport. The airline is notable for highlighting the Singapore Girl as its central figure in corporat ...

; Sir

Julius Vogel Sir Julius Vogel (24 February 1835 – 12 March 1899) was the eighth premier of New Zealand. His administration is best remembered for the issuing of bonds to fund railway construction and other public works. He was the first Jewish prime mi ...

, former

Prime Minister of New Zealand The prime minister of New Zealand ( mi, Te pirimia o Aotearoa) is the head of government of New Zealand. The prime minister, Jacinda Ardern, leader of the New Zealand Labour Party, took office on 26 October 2017. The prime minister (inform ...

; Rajiv Gandhi, former Prime Minister of India;

Teo Chee Hean Teo Chee Hean ( zh, s=张志贤, poj=Tiuⁿ Chì-hiân, p=Zhāng Zhìxián; born 27 December 1954) is a Singaporean politician and former two-star rear-admiral who has been serving as Senior Minister of Singapore since 2019 and Coordinating Mini ...

Senior Minister of Singapore Senior Minister of Singapore is a position in the Cabinet of Singapore. Holders of this office have served as either the prime minister or the deputy prime minister. Among the executive branch officeholders in the order of precedence, the posi ...

(formerly

Deputy Prime Minister of Singapore The deputy prime minister of Singapore is the deputy head of government of the Republic of Singapore. The incumbent deputy prime ministers are Heng Swee Keat and Lawrence Wong, who took office on 1 May 2019 and 13 June 2022 respectively. His ...

); Edem Tengue, Minister of maritime economy of the republic of Togo;

Huw Thomas Hywel Gruffydd Edward "Huw" Thomas (14 September 1927 – 12 March 2009) was a Welsh broadcaster, barrister and Liberal Party politician. Family and education Huw Thomas was born in Pen-bre, near Llanelli, and was a fluent Welsh speaker.Liberal ...

, Physician to the Queen; Sir Roger Bannister, ran the first

four-minute mile A four-minute mile is the completion of a mile run (1609 m) in four minutes or less. It was first achieved in 1954 by Roger Bannister, at age 25, in 3:59.4. As of April 2021, the "four-minute barrier" has been broken by 1,663 athletes, and is n ...

; David Warren, inventor of the

flight data recorder A flight recorder is an electronic recording device placed in an aircraft for the purpose of facilitating the investigation of aviation accidents and incidents. The device may often be referred to as a "black box", an outdated name which has ...

and

cockpit voice recorder A flight recorder is an electronic recording device placed in an aircraft for the purpose of facilitating the investigation of aviation accidents and incidents. The device may often be referred to as a "black box", an outdated name which has ...

;

Andreas Mogensen Andreas Enevold Mogensen (born 2 November 1976) is a Danish engineer and ESA astronaut who is best known for being the first Dane to fly in space as part of the European Space Agency's iriss program. Mogensen has also been involved in a number of ...

, first Danish astronaut;

Winston Wong Winston Wen-Yang Wong OBE (; born 2 April 1951 in Taipei County (now New Taipei City), Taiwan) is the eldest son of Wang Yung-ching, chair of the Formosa Plastics Group (FPG), by his second wife. Wong is now a widower with a son and a daughter aft ...

, entrepreneur;

Alan Howard Alan Howard may refer to: * Alan Howard (actor) (1937–2015), English actor * Alan Howard (cricketer) (1909–1993), English cricketer * Alan Howard (engineer) (1905–1966), American engineer * Alan Howard (hedge fund manager) (born 1963), hedge f ...

, hedge fund manager and philanthropist;

Cyrus Pallonji Mistry Cyrus Pallonji Mistry (4 July 1968 – 4 September 2022) was an Indian businessman. He was the chairman of the Tata Group, an Indian business conglomerate, from 2012 to 2016. He was the sixth chairman of the group, and only the second (af ...

, former chairman of the

Tata Group The Tata Group () is an Indian multinational conglomerate headquartered in Mumbai. Established in 1868, it is India's largest conglomerate, with products and services in over 150 countries, and operations in 100 countries across six continents ...

; Michael Birch, entrepreneur;

Henry Charles Stephens Henry Charles "Inky" Stephens (2 February 1841 – July 1918) was an English businessman and Conservative PartyLloyd's Weekly Newspaper, Sunday, 3 July 1887 "Election Intelligence" politician. He sat in the House of Commons from 1887 to 1900 as t ...

, politician; Sir Michael Uren, businessman and philanthropist;

Ian Read Ian C. Read (born 1953) is a Scottish-born American business executive and a chartered accountant, serving as executive chairman of pharmaceutical company Pfizer. He was succeeded as CEO by Albert Bourla on 1 January 2019, becoming executive c ...

, CEO of

Pfizer Pfizer Inc. ( ) is an American multinational pharmaceutical and biotechnology corporation headquartered on 42nd Street in Manhattan, New York City. The company was established in 1849 in New York by two German entrepreneurs, Charles Pfizer ...

Pallab Ghosh Pallab Kumar Ghosh (born 1962) is a science correspondent for BBC News. Early life Born in India, he came to the United Kingdom in 1963, attended the Hemel Hempstead School, and studied physics at Imperial College, London between 1980 and 1983 w ...

, BBC correspondent, Hannah Devlin, science journalist; Dyah Roro Esti Widya Putri, member of House of Representatives of the Republic of Indonesia.

Notes

References

External links

* * * {{Coord, 51.498356, -0.176894, type:edu, display=title Buildings and structures in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea Educational institutions established in 1907 Former colleges of the University of London Russell Group 1907 establishments in England South Kensington Universities in London Universities UK