On 23rd September, the entire HASC research team came together in Oxford for our annual technical meet-up, HASC Connect. This event is an important opportunity for researchers from across the UK to some together, share their progress, their wins and innovations. With our project growing rapidly, the day provided a vital face-to-face forum for knowledge exchange, collaboration, and networking across our multi-disciplinary community.

This type of meet-up is always about much more than just research updates, they are about creating the space for new conversations, burning questions, and the collaboration that helps shape the future direction of our work.

A Packed Agenda

The day was built around an ambitious programme, covering research from across our four challenges, updates from the Federated Telecoms Hubs (FTH), lightning presentations from our new projects, poster sessions, a keynote, a lab tour and, as if that wasn’t enough, we also had a look towards what the future holds for HASC.

Key themes included measurement and modelling, connectivity, adaptive networks, and security, brought to life by the following contributions:

• C0 – Measurement & Modelling – Indoor Channel Measurements from 6 GHz to 600 GHz
  • Presented by: Simon Cotton & Vanessa Wood (Queens University Belfast)
• C1 – Connectivity – Overcoming Intensity Modulation/Direct Detection Transmission Limits with a Silicon Photonic Optical Processor
  • Presented by: Hao Liu (University of Southampton)
• C2 – Adaptivity – Efficient, Reliable and Resilient Networks
  • Presented by: Xiaolan Liu (University of Bristol)
• C3 – Security – CV-QKD: How to build a real system
  • Presented by: Amanda Weerasinghe (University of Cambridge)

Highlights from the Sessions

One of the standout moments was the keynote from Professor Noa Zilberman, who explored Carbon Aware Communications: Challenges and Opportunities. Her talk encouraged us to think about the environmental impact of our networks, raising important questions about sustainability and the choices we make as a research community.

Across the lightning presentations, we saw a diverse range of exciting work, from silicon photonics and advanced optical networking to quantum key distribution and resilient network design. The poster session provided a lively forum for in-depth discussion, with researchers engaging directly on all the deep-dive technical detail and identifying opportunities to connect work across different challenges.

The FTH directors talked to the team about IP, skills & training, commercialisation and standards. The content was delivered by Sarah Hardy, Samual Giltrap and Nikola Serafimovski, to whom we are very grateful.

The afternoon featured newly funded projects from partners including NPL, Essex, York, Bristol, Sheffield, Strathclyde, King’s, Leeds, and Bangor. These projects are already bringing fresh expertise and ideas, from reconfigurable intelligent surfaces and 6G massive access to O-RAN adaptive load balancing, fibre-mmWave convergence, and metasurface-enabled security.

Key Takeaways

• The community is expanding rapidly, with new partners and projects strengthening our collective capability.
• There is a growing focus on cross-cutting themes such as sustainability, standards, and real-world deployment.
• Poster sessions and lightning talks proved invaluable for deep technical discussion and idea exchange.
• Integration with the JOINER national experimentation platform will be central to progress in the year ahead.
• There is strong momentum to showcase HASC research on the international stage, with Mobile World Congress 2026 already in sharp focus.

Looking Ahead

HASC Connect once again demonstrated the value of bringing people together. Not just to share research updates, but to build the connections that make collaboration so effective. As we move into the next phase of work, the ideas and partnerships formed in Oxford will play a crucial role in shaping our research and its real-world impact.

A big thank you to all who contributed, from presenters and poster authors to everyone who attended and made the journey to Oxford to make the day so valuable. We’re excited to continue this journey with you and look forward to sharing more in the future.

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