AI and Cross-Border Research: QUB–UCD Partnership Could Tackle Health Pressures 

By Aditwaa Vijayasundar 

The Irish News recently reported that nearly 80% of people in Northern Ireland say the NHS is their top concern — the highest proportion in the United Kingdom [1]. This anxiety is encouraging policymakers to seek immediate improvements in health services, with AI being a prominent focus for solutions in the NHS. The new AI collaboration between Queen’s University Belfast and University College Dublin could support this by speeding up research, making it easier for industry to adopt new tools, and potentially translating academic work into healthcare solutions. 

Innovation centres specialising in AI research within QUB and UCD have now begun collaboration to allow for faster development of AI technologies, make it easier for industry to adopt these technologies and reduce the friction that often stops academic ideas reaching patients. This initiative is part of the broader trend of universities in and around the UK forming AI research networks, sharing computing resources and collaborating with industry—a pragmatic response to both funding pressures and the scale required for credible AI work. 

Locally, the partnership builds on recent investments in AI capacity. Queen’s has announced an AI h

called Momentum One Zero (M1.0), a £70 million programme intended to expand digital research in Northern Ireland and improve existing facilities like ECIT [2]. M1.0 is designed to bring academics, businesses and public-sector partners together so that research is more likely to become real-world tools. The timing of the QUB–UCD link reflects both recently developed infrastructure and new cross-border funding streams established since 2020 [3, 4], to encourage collaboration between ROI and the UK. 

Northern Ireland is taking a significant step forward in healthcare innovation with the rollout of Encompass—a single electronic record system that links hospitals, GPs and community services across all five HSC trusts [5]. Health Minister Mike Nesbitt says Encompass “is already driving a digital transformation across our health service” [6]. By pulling patient information into one structured record, researchers now have a more integrated health dataset that makes testing and training of AI studies much more practical. 

This partnership means current AI research (such as developing tools to better understand the biochemical profiles of individual patients to improve personalised treatment) at QUB can be accelerated [7]. Potentially, an island-wide AI diagnostics platform could identify patients at risk, like those with early sepsis or stroke signs, and suggest specific management plans using combined NI–ROI clinical data.  

Anxiety and depression among young people in Northern Ireland is a critical concern, having rates around 25% higher than in other UK nations [8]. To address this issue, QUB’s €3m CO-PRIME all-island mental health network is being used to support 10 research projects that aim to progress understanding of mental health [9]. The AI partnership between the two countries can allow for population-level survey data to predict areas of need, large-scale analysis of mental-health records and development of AI-assisted support tools for crisis management. 

Those possibilities are real, but not automatic. Cross-border data sharing is complicated. Although both jurisdictions refer to the General Data Protection Regulation as a baseline, they operate under different legal systems, regulators and ethics procedures. That means any dataset combining records from hospitals in the north and south requires dual approvals and carefully negotiated safeguards — extra red tape that slows things down. Health research also faces the familiar tension between the vast amount of high-quality data AI needs and the privacy protections designed to keep patient information safe. 

Public trust sits at the centre of that tension. When health services are already a significant public concern, fears about data misuse or unclear AI decisions can amplify scepticism and make implementation harder. Groups such as the All-Island Cancer Data Forum are working on governance models and secure data pathways aimed at speeding cancer research while protecting patients [10]. 

The QUB–UCD partnership offers a practical route to accelerate health research on the island and potentially create more AI systems that are trusted by clinicians and approved by regulators. For a generation of students entering fields such as data science, medicine and health policy, these challenges will likely define the next phase of digital healthcare. If the partnership succeeds in navigating them, it may demonstrate how academic collaboration can translate public concern about health services into tangible improvements in how care is delivered across the island. 

Bibliography 

[1] irishnews.com. “UK Survey Finds Northern Ireland Most Worried about NHS as Well as Rise in Concern about Immigration.” Irishnews.Com, February 27, 2026. https://www.irishnews.com/news/northern-ireland/northern-ireland-most-worried-about-nhs-out-of-all-uk-regions-X3JYQE5XXBGJTMVR3JDHJ76N3Y/. 

[2] Queen’s University Belfast. “Momentum One Zero.” Accessed March 6, 2026. https://www.qub.ac.uk/about/belfast-region-city-deal/momentum-one-zero/?utm_source=chatgpt.com 

[3] Department of the Taoiseach. “Shared Island Initiative.” Government of Ireland, October 6, 2021. https://www.gov.ie/en/department-of-the-taoiseach/campaigns/shared-island/?utm_source=chatgpt.com. 

[4] Research and Innovation. “Horizon Europe.” Accessed March 6, 2026. https://research-and-innovation.ec.europa.eu/funding/funding-opportunities/funding-programmes-and-open-calls/horizon-europe_en. 

[5] DHCNI. “Encompass – DHCNI.” August 2, 2022. https://dhcni.hscni.net/digital-portfolio/encompass/. 

[6] “Driving Cancer Research across Ireland and Northern Ireland | National Health Executive.” 2026. National Health Executive. 2026. https://www.nationalhealthexecutive.com/articles/driving-cancer-research-across-ireland-and-northern-ireland. 

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[7] “Harnessing AI to Transform Healthcare.” 2021. Qub.ac.uk. October 2021. https://www.qub.ac.uk/Research/case-studies/ai-transforming-healthcare.html. 

[8] “First Ever Survey of the Mental Health of Children and Young People in Northern Ireland Supports the Need for Prevention and Early Intervention.” 2020. Www.ulster.ac.uk. 2020. https://www.ulster.ac.uk/news/2020/october/first-ever-survey-of-the-mental-health-of-children-and-young-people-in-northern-ireland-supports-the-need-for-prevention-and-early-intervention. 

[9] 2019. Qub.ac.uk. September 2019. https://www.qub.ac.uk/schools/psy/News/queens-team-key-first-all-island-mental-health-network.html. 

[10] Belfast, Queen’s University. “Cancer Leaders Launch New Plans to Build an All-Island Digital Cancer Research Powerhouse.” Queen’s University Belfast, n.d. Accessed March 6, 2026. https://www.qub.ac.uk/News/Allnews/featured-research/cancer-leaders-new-plans-all-island-digital-cancer-powerhouse.html.