Cranfield University is the Academic Provider to the Defence Academy of the United Kingdom and this partnering relationship allows students access to leading academics, to military expertise and to state-of-the art facilities at Shrivenham. Those that study Chemical, Biological, Radiological, Nuclear (CBRN) defence with us are usually already practitioners. We are commissioned to run two courses a year on the underpinning science of CBRN, delivered to the MOD. We also deliver bespoke courses to government agencies and the private sector which include material ranging from threat through sensing and protection to hardening and impact. We provide CBRN elements on a wide range of other courses.
Established CBRN practitioners often seek education that lies beyond existing knowledge; we offer supervision of research studies leading to Masters by Research, MPhil and PhD awards. We are currently supporting CBRN practitioners study in the fields of health and emergency planning, military defence, and domestic security and preparedness. These studies may be part time, classified, and often align strongly with the candidates employed role. In order to be effective providers and facilitators of education, we remain scientifically current by conducting our own research and we remain context aware by maintaining good relationships across the public and private sectors. We strive to be able to set CBRN technologies and effects in context of conventional threats and technologies, to set science in context of threat and hazard/resource management, and we are alert to the synergies and discrepancies between conventional warfare, domestic terrorism, and accidents.
We have various unique facilities to support our own research and service clients with testing. These include radiation sources and live chemical agent facilities often used for testing clothing and respirators. Our technical knowledge, research and facilities have supported the development of detection, hardening and protection technologies. Our awareness of the CBRN environment has seen us commissioned to contribute to threat forecasting, vulnerability surveys and impact assessments. We look forward to continuing to support those working in CBRN with education, research and testing for another fifty years.
