The REMODEL consortium gathered at King’s College London on 9–10 September 2026 for its first annual meeting, bringing together researchers from Swansea University, Imperial College London, King’s College London, Queen’s University Belfast and the University of Edinburgh, alongside members of the project’s Advisory Board. Hosted at Bush House, the two-day event provided an opportunity to share research progress, discuss emerging challenges and strengthen collaboration across the programme as it moves into its next phase.
Connecting Research Across the Programme
The first day was dedicated to technical discussions spanning REMODEL’s six work packages, with presentations providing an overview of recent developments, ongoing challenges and priorities for future research. Beginning with multi-physics integration and the simulation capabilities the programme ultimately aims to deliver, the sessions worked back through the computational methods and technologies needed to support these objectives.
Topics included parallel and exascale computing, adaptive and hybrid mesh generation, geometry representation, and the application of artificial intelligence to mesh generation and computational workflows. Together, the presentations highlighted how advances in individual research areas contribute to the wider simulation pipeline, while providing an opportunity to explore technical dependencies and identify where closer collaboration could help address shared challenges.
These discussions reinforced the importance of developing REMODEL as an integrated programme, ensuring that progress across the different work packages can be brought together to support increasingly complex and computationally demanding simulations.
Engaging with the Advisory Board
The second day included the first meeting of the REMODEL Advisory Board, bringing together representatives from Rolls-Royce, Imperial College London, ITI, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and Politecnico di Milano. Drawing on expertise spanning industrial simulation, numerical methods, mesh generation and high-performance computing, the Board reviewed the programme’s first-year progress and provided external perspectives on its research direction and longer-term objectives.
The Advisory Board responded positively to the progress achieved during the first year, particularly the level of collaboration already established between the different work packages. Discussions highlighted the importance of maintaining this integrated approach, ensuring that developments in geometry representation, meshing, adaptation and parallel computing contribute towards a complete simulation workflow rather than being developed in isolation.
A recurring theme was the industrial relevance of REMODEL’s research, particularly the need to address the challenges of geometry handling and mesh generation at the scale increasingly demanded by modern high-performance computing systems. Looking ahead, the Board encouraged the development of common benchmarks and demonstrators, progressing from controlled test problems towards realistic industrial applications. These would provide opportunities to evaluate the technologies being developed across the programme and demonstrate their potential within practical engineering simulations.
Strengthening Collaboration and Research Practices
Alongside the technical presentations and Advisory Board discussions, the meeting also considered how the consortium could strengthen collaboration across its participating institutions. With researchers contributing to different stages of the simulation pipeline, effective communication, shared software development practices and coordination between work packages are essential to bringing these developments together.
Sessions explored the growing role of artificial intelligence in research and software development, including the opportunities and challenges presented by generative AI tools. Discussions also covered collaborative coding practices, version control, documentation and code sharing, with an emphasis on supporting the development of software that can be used and extended across the consortium.
These conversations complemented the technical sessions by considering the practical aspects of delivering a large, multi-institution research programme, and how the consortium can continue to work effectively as its research develops.
Looking Ahead
The meeting concluded with discussions on upcoming milestones, research priorities and opportunities for further collaboration, providing a shared understanding of the programme’s direction for the coming year.
As REMODEL continues to progress, the integration of expertise across geometry representation, mesh generation, artificial intelligence, high-performance computing and multi-physics simulation will remain central to achieving its objectives. The first annual meeting provided a valuable opportunity to strengthen these connections and build on the research already underway.
The consortium would like to thank King’s College London for hosting the event, the Advisory Board members for their contributions, and everyone who participated in the discussions over the two days.
The full meeting programme can be found here.