The UK's historic environment is a great national resource and a major contributor to the UK economy. The complex interplay of cultural, economic and physical forces that make up the historic environment means that successfully addressing a range of issues requires input from across the academic disciplines.
To this end, the AHRC, together with the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC), the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC), the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) and English Heritage, invited participants to a workshop event exploring issues relating to the historic environment.
This cross-council initiative enabled academics from a range of disciplines to investigate areas of concern that provided the opportunity for collaboration across the historic environment research community.
Following the workshop held on 29h March 2006, participants were eligible to apply for funding to set up research clusters to develop those areas of concern identified at the workshop. The applications for research clusters awards were commissioned by a commissioning panel composed of representatives from across the domains of participating Research Councils. Two awards were made: