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Contact information


alison.noble@eng.ox.ac.uk


Noble Group

Alison Noble

Professor Alison Noble CBE FRS FREng FIET is currently the Technikos Professor of Biomedical Engineering in Department of Engineering Science and a Professorial Fellow of St Hilda’s College, at the University of Oxford, UK. She is a former Director of the Oxford Institute of Biomedical Engineering (2012-16).

Professor Noble’s research interests sit at the interface of AI with computer vision and clinical medicine. In recent years, her research group has been at the forefront of international thinking on how to bring machine learning to ultrasound working closely with clinical research groups in Oxford and overseas. This includes global health ultrasound applications research with groups in India and Africa, and pioneering research on multi-modal ultrasound and sonography data science. In 2016, she was the recipient of a 7-year ERC Advanced Grant entitled “Perception Ultrasound by Learning Sonographer Experience (PULSE)”, to advance understanding of how to develop next-generation ultrasound systems by utilising machine learning. In 2023, she was the recipient of a 5-year UKRI Turing AI World-leading Researcher Fellowship on human-AI collaboration and federated learning for international research partnerships in healthcare imaging. She has attracted international awards and distinctions including the BMVA Distinguished Researcher award (2022), the Royal Society Gabor Medal (2019), the MICCAI Society Enduring Impact Award (2019), and the International Federation of Medical & Biological Engineering Laura Bassi Award (2015) in recognition of her contributions to biomedical engineering.

Professor Noble has a strong and sustained track record of service to the academic and engineering community at a national and international level, particularly in research and innovation in healthcare technologies. She received an OBE for services to Science and Engineering in the Queen’s Birthday Honours list in 2013. She was also appointed a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) for services to Engineering and Biomedical Imaging in the King’s Birthday Honours list in 2023.

From 2013-16, she served as the President of the MICCAI Society. She served as a Trustee of the IET from 2016-19 and as a Vice President (2019). She served as chair of the EPSRC Healthcare Technologies Strategic Advisory Team from 2017-19 and is a current member of the EPSRC Science, Engineering and Technology Board. She was a member of REF 2021 Subpanel 12 (Engineering) 2018-22. She is currently a Vice President and a Foreign Secretary of the Royal Society.

At a regional level, Professor Noble is currently a Trustee of The Oxford Trust, which promotes enterprise as well as communication of SET to schools and the public in the Oxfordshire region.

Professor Noble has combined academic research with innovation throughout her career. She was a co-founder, director and senior consultant to her laboratory spinout Intelligent Ultrasound Ltd, which became the Clinical AI division of MedaPhor PLC (subsequently renamed Intelligent Ultrasound PLC) which in turn was sold to GE Healthcare in 2024.