UKRI Digital Research Infrastructure Fund has awarded £2.53m to eight new project catalysts to explore next-generation capabilities for Trusted Research Environments (TREs) and enable new, innovative forms of sensitive data research as part of DARE UK Phase 2.
The projects will run for 12 months, developing early-stage prototypes that test bold, future-forward ideas beyond DARE UK’s current programme of work to explore what the next era of secure data research could look like.
These awards are the outcome of an open call in April 2025, inviting applications, which were reviewed by an independent panel, including members of the public, ensuring that they met both the needs of the data research community and public expectations.
Unlocking new possibilities for sensitive data research
Trusted Research Environments play a vital role in protecting privacy and maintaining public trust, but they can also limit the types of data, tools, and computing power that researchers can use. The newly funded projects aim to push those boundaries safely and responsibly, helping to unlock research questions that are currently challenging to answer.
Across the portfolio, some of the most pressing challenges in the TRE landscape will be tackled, including:
- Safely enabling research using free-text and narrative data, such as clinical notes and reports
- Developing transparent, trustworthy synthetic data as a route to faster collaboration
- Strengthening software governance and reuse across federated TREs
- Linking sensitive data across organisations while protecting privacy
- Expanding access to advanced computing power, including systems needed for AI research
- Embedding public involvement and engagement into the design of future TRE capabilities
Rather than delivering finished services, the projects will generate evidence, working prototypes, and practical guidance to inform future national infrastructure and policy decisions.
The funded projects
The eight funded projects are:
- STAR-TRE: Safe and Trustworthy Assessment of Risk in TREs for Sensitive Free-Text Access – £282,917
- Led by the University of Edinburgh, STAR-TRE will address one of the most significant gaps in secure data research: the safe use of sensitive free-text data for research, such as clinical notes and social care records. By developing scalable, language-model-enabled tools and transparent risk assessment methods, the project aims to help researchers and data custodians understand when and how free-text can be used responsibly — without undermining privacy or public trust.
- TRESS: Trusted Research Environments Software Stewardship – £319,477
- Led by the University of Oxford,TRESS will tackle duplication and fragmentation in TRE software by pioneering a federated, open-source approach to software stewardship. Working across major research organisations, the project will develop shared, production-grade TRE software and governance frameworks that enable collaboration while maintaining strong security standards
- FIREDANSE: Federated Infrastructure for Digital Pathology Reporting and Expert Data Annotation in a Secure Environment – £356,961
- Led by the Institute of Cancer Research, FIREDANSE will demonstrate how sensitive medical images and related data can be securely linked across hospitals to support trustworthy AI development. By enabling expert clinicians to review and annotate pathology data within federated TREs, the project aims to improve the safety, transparency, and public confidence of AI tools used in healthcare.
- FORTRESS-TeHR: Federated, Open and Reliable TREs for Synthetic Textual Healthcare Records – £319,099
- Led by the University of Manchester, FORTRESS-TeHR will explore how synthetic clinical text can be generated and validated for safe use in TREs. Combining differential privacy with strong public and regulatory engagement, the project will test whether synthetic free-text data can meaningfully support research and federated learning while reducing privacy risks.
- The Data Matryoshka: Progressive Synthetic OMOP Data Layers for Secure Health Research Collaboration Across UK TREs – £308,854
- Led by University College London, this project proposes layered access to synthetic and real NHS data. By developing transparent tools and governance pathways for different types of synthetic data, the project aims to speed up collaboration, improve public visibility of health data assets, and reduce delays in health research.
- TRExt: TRE Text Analytics – £310,975
- Led by the University of Nottingham, TRExt will explore approaches to enable TREs to convert sensitive unstructured text into structured, analysable formats suitable for federated analytics. Using only anonymised and synthetic data, the project will build reusable pipelines that allow researchers to analyse text safely, opening up new possibilities across health, justice, and social research.
- GROVE: Governance for Household-Level Environment and Health Data – £315,859
- Led by the University of Liverpool, GROVE will engage with professional and public stakeholders to develop safe governance and technical methods for linking health records to environmental and housing data. By enabling large-scale, privacy-preserving analysis of how places affect health, the work will support whole-system evidence-based decisions to reduce health inequalities and prevent illness.
- TRUSTEE: Trusted Research on Untrusted Systems using Trusted Execution Environments – £319,731
- Led by The Alan Turing Institute, TRUSTEE will explore how advanced “confidential computing” technologies can allow sensitive data to be analysed securely on a much wider range of computing systems — from local machines to national supercomputers. This could dramatically expand the scale and affordability of AI-enabled sensitive data research.
Public involvement and engagement are integral to all the projects, with patients and the public helping to shape governance approaches, validate new tools, and inform guidance on acceptable data use. These contributions will ensure that emerging capabilities for sensitive data research are developed in ways that are trustworthy, proportionate, and focused on public benefit.
By supporting innovation beyond current models, DARE UK aims to ensure that the UK remains at the forefront of responsible, high-impact data research that delivers public benefit.
Commenting on the awards, Prof Emily Jefferson, Interim Director of DARE UK, said:
“These projects are intentionally exploratory. They give researchers the freedom to test bold ideas that challenge current assumptions about how Trusted Research Environments work. By investing in early-stage prototypes and strong public engagement, we are building the evidence needed to shape future infrastructure that is secure, flexible, and worthy of public trust.”
Findings and outputs from the projects will be shared across the research community, helping to inform the future direction of DARE UK and the UK’s approach to secure, sensitive data research.
Public webinar
Join us for an two-hour session on 4 March 2026 (1 – 3pm) to introduce the eight DARE UK Next-Gen Catalysts, discuss their ambitions, and highlight the role of public involvement and engagement in shaping their innovations. Project teams will share what they aim to achieve over the next 12 months, with time for questions and discussion.
