Summary
In 30 years of research, Professor James Gilbert has tackled a wide range of challenges with a common theme of measuring, modelling and controlling engineering systems.
These include robotics and manufacturing systems, medical rehabilitation and energy harvesting systems ranging from microwatts generated from human movement to megawatts from offshore wind turbines. Recent work focused on speech restoration using articulator movement measurements for people who have had a laryngectomy.
Current work is primarily focused on sensing and measurement in offshore renewable energy systems, particularly offshore wind. He is the Research, Development and Innovation lead for Aura, a collaboration between Siemens Gamesa Renewable Energy, Ørsted, University of Sheffield, Durham University and the Offshore Renewable Energy Catapult. He is Hull PI on the £7.6M EPSRC Prosperity Partnership ‘A New Partnership in Offshore Wind’ (EP/R004900/1, 2017-2022) and the £9M EPSRC Supergen ORE Hub (EP/S000747/1, 2018 – 2022). He leads industry interaction for the EPSRC/NERC funded CDT in Offshore Wind and the Environment (EP/S023763/1, 2019 – 2027) and is UoH lead for the Operations and Maintenance Centre of Excellence, a £2M collaboration between UoH and the Offshore Renewable Energy Catapult.
Journal Article
Decoupling the Effects of Temperature, Strain, and Refractive Index in Long-Period Fiber Grating Used for Epoxy Resin Cure Monitoring
Ivanov, O. V., Bhavsar, K., & Gilbert, J. M. (2025). Decoupling the Effects of Temperature, Strain, and Refractive Index in Long-Period Fiber Grating Used for Epoxy Resin Cure Monitoring. Sensors, 25(3), Article 786. https://doi.org/10.3390/s25030786
Wind resource assessment and site selection of offshore wind farms in the state of Kuwait
Hasan, A. H., Umoh, K., Al-Qattan, A., Al-Awadi, L., Rajab, A., Adouane, M., & Gilbert, J. (2025). Wind resource assessment and site selection of offshore wind farms in the state of Kuwait. Energy Sources Part B: Economics, Planning and Policy, 20(1), Article 2507683. https://doi.org/10.1080/15567249.2025.2507683
Presentation / Conference Contribution
Tidal Turbine Benchmarking Exercise: Environmental Characterisation and Geometry Specification
Tucker Harvey, S. W., Chen, X., Rowe, D., Bhavsar, K., Allsop, T., Gilbert, J., Stallard, T., Vogel, C. R., & Willden, R. H. J. (2021, September). Tidal Turbine Benchmarking Exercise: Environmental Characterisation and Geometry Specification. Presented at European Wave and Tidal Energy Conference (EWTEC) 2021, Plymouth, UK
Research interests
Offshore renewable energy systems including:
Monitoring and optimisation of manufacturing processes
Measurement systems for offshore wind turbine performance and reliability optimisation
Operations and maintenance in offshore wind systems
Lead investigator
Project
Funder
Grant
Started
Status
Project
Heterogeneous Fibre Optic sensor Arrays to Monitor Composite Manufacture
Funder
Engineering & Physical Sciences Research Council
Grant
£702,385.49
Started
1 September 2022
Status
Ongoing
Project
EPSRC Centre for Doctoral Training in Offshore Wind Energy Sustainability and Resilience
Funder
Engineering & Physical Sciences Research Council
Grant
£2,949,377.34
Started
1 April 2024
Status
Ongoing
Project
Supergen Offshore Renewable Energy (ORE) Impact Hub 2023
Funder
Engineering & Physical Sciences Research Council
Grant
£479,687.00
Started
1 July 2023
Status
Ongoing
Project
STREAM 2: EPSRC Place Based IAA (PB-IAA); Northern Net Zero Accelerator - Energy Systems Integration for a Decarbonised Economy
Funder
Engineering & Physical Sciences Research Council
Grant
£51,435.74
Started
1 February 2024
Status
Ongoing
Project
Prosperity Partnerships: EPSRC, Business and Universities
Funder
Engineering & Physical Sciences Research Council
Grant
£731,985.30
Started
1 November 2017
Status
Complete
Project
Project Aura: Visiting Appointments and Post-Graduate Placements
Funder
Hull City Council
Grant
£50,000.00
Started
11 January 2017
Status
Complete
Project
Speech Rehabilitation from Articulator Movement (SRAM)
Funder
National Institute for Health Research
Grant
£243,973.01
Started
1 January 2016
Status
Complete
Project
Diversity to Decarbonise: Promoting EDI in the future workforce
Funder
Engineering & Physical Sciences Research Council
Grant
£168,790.06
Started
1 January 2023
Status
Complete
Project
Supergen Hub 2017 - Offshore Renewable Energy (ORE)
Funder
Engineering & Physical Sciences Research Council
Grant
£531,942.32
Started
1 July 2018
Status
Complete
Co-investigator
Project
Funder
Grant
Started
Status
Project
TRANSECTS: TRANSitions in Energy for Coastal communities over Time and Space
Funder
Economic & Social Research Council
Grant
£104,849.59
Started
1 April 2024
Status
Ongoing
Project
PBIAA NNZA - Novel Curing Models for the Acceleration of Fibre Reinforced Composites-Based Blade Manufacturing
Funder
Engineering & Physical Sciences Research Council
Grant
£53,386.59
Started
1 April 2025
Status
Ongoing
Project
Feasibility Study for Enhanced Local Grid Stabilisation Using a 100 MWh Vanadium Redox Flow Battery (VRFB) System to Support Critical Infrastructure
Funder
University of Hull
Grant
£5,000.00
Started
27 January 2025
Status
Ongoing
Project
The EPSRC Centre for Doctoral Training on Offshore Wind Energy and the Environment
Funder
Engineering & Physical Sciences Research Council
Grant
£3,840,952.27
Started
1 April 2019
Status
Ongoing
Project
Low Energy Dew Point Cooling for Computing Data Centres
Funder
European Commission
Grant
£327,560.00
Started
1 January 2017
Status
Complete
Project
Turning the Tide – Hull’s part of the ‘Women’s movement 100 – Angels of the North’ project
Funder
Ferens Education Trust
Grant
£9,778.43
Started
1 July 2021
Status
Complete
Project
A Proposal to Natural England to investigate and improve environmental skills and recruitment to the offshore wind sector from academia.
Funder
Natural England
Grant
£14,200.00
Started
17 January 2022
Status
Complete
Project
A comprehensive offshore wind resource assessment for a smooth near-term transition towards offshore wind farm deployment in Kuwait
Funder
Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office
Grant
£13,108.00
Started
2 November 2022
Status
Complete
Project
Digital Twin through Physics-Informed Deep Learning for Offshore Wind Turbine Gearing Fault Diagnosis and Prognosis
Funder
University of Hull
Grant
£5,000.00
Started
1 March 2024
Status
Complete
Project
Evaluation of TurbineGRID
Funder
Green Port Hull
Grant
£33,700.01
Started
1 February 2019
Status
Complete
Postgraduate supervision
Prof Gilbert welcomes applications form well-qualified students in instrumentation, modelling and control applied to offshore renewable energy systems.
Recent Completed PhDs
- Nonlinear Energy Harvesting for medical sensing applications
- Multi input footfall energy harvesting
- Vibration based energy harvesting
- The Design and Control of a Mechanical Multi-Mode Drive
- The design and control of mechanical switched mode drives