Students from over 120 countries choose to study at Aston University - a safe and friendly campus enjoyed by a global, multicultural community. Birmingham is one of the UK’s most diverse cities and home to an unrivalled cultural heritage, top sporting events, music, performing arts and outstanding world cuisine.

Aston University

New Row

Visit our Expert Center. Aston University is home to leading experts and thought leaders on a wide range of topics. Connect for media, speaking, professional opportunities and more.

Aston University Expert Center

Home

Open Sans

Instagram

YouTube

Snapchat

The Student Room

Aston Life

WeChat

As customer demand for low carbon goods and services is rising, it is becoming increasingly important for suppliers to demonstrate their carbon footprint. More and more businesses are reviewing their supply chain emissions.
 
All of these factors will drive growth in the low carbon market sectors including bioenergy, energy-from-waste, energy systems and bioproducts.
 
The Energy & Bioproducts Research Institute (EBRI) at Aston University can help you explore these increasingly important, vibrant market. Our new two-day Value from Waste Master Class course provides exclusive content for entrepreneurs and business leaders, covering the technical and commercial fundamentals of these market sectors. Over previous years this course has been highly acclaimed by the West Midlands business community. (96% of attendees have rated it ‘Excellent’ or ‘Very Good’.)
 
Discover more from EBRI Director of Engagement, Tim Miller about how we can help you.
 
www.aston.ac.uk/ebri
www.bioenergy-for-business.org

EBRI – Helping your business on the path to Net Zero

Jonathan Hemus, Managing Director of Crisis Management consultancy Insignia explains what crisis management involves and why it is vital for businesses.

What is Crisis Management?

Aston University is the Official University Partner of Aston Villa Football Club. Watch Aston Villa footballers Marvelous Nakamba, Tom Heaton and Frederic Guilbert discuss moving to Birmingham, easy travel to London and Manchester, and the famous Library of Birmingham. Find out more about our location: https://www2.aston.ac.uk/birmingham

Aston Villa players on living in Birmingham

Birmingham Enterprise Community (BEC) supports the next generation of entrepreneurs in the UK’s second-largest city. Watch Aston graduate and BEC founder Daniel Evans introduce the network. Find out about the start-ups of Aston graduates and BEC entrepreneurs Mubasher Ahmed (Founder, HiERD) and Danielle Roberts (Founder, Unlimited You), as well as current student Mohammed Ali (Freelance Photographer). 



Find out more about BEC: http://www.birminghamenterprisecommunity.co.uk/


Find out more about study opportunities for future entrepreneurs at Aston University: https://www2.aston.ac.uk/study/enterprise

Birmingham Enterprise Community – meet the next generation of entrepreneurs

Watch how Aston graduate and entrepreneur Adil Delwar from Bangladesh founded biodegradable tableware manufacturer Palm Life, how his Aston master’s helped him to develop entrepreneurial skills and international business strategies, and how he started his business with the support of the BSEEN programme #wedobusiness #entrepreneur https://www2.aston.ac.uk/study/enterprise

How I became an entrepreneur – Adil Delwar’s story

Watch how Aston graduate and entrepreneur Shivang Mehra from India founded sportswear brand Kryjer, how the work placement year in his Aston degree helped him to decide to be an entrepreneur, and how he started his business with the support of the BSEEN programme #wedobusiness #entrepreneur https://www2.aston.ac.uk/business/aston-enterprise/start-a-business-bseen/index

How I became an entrepreneur – Shivang Mehra’s story

See how international student Raveena Shekhar from India gained global advantage at Aston Business School. Our professional development programme gave her the opportunity to work as an Audit Assistant at KPMG in Birmingham. Raveena studied our MSc International Accounting and Finance #WeDoBusiness 

https://www2.aston.ac.uk/study/postgraduate/taught-programmes/abs/the-aston-global-advantage/index

The Aston Global Advantage - Raveena's story

The role of doctors in the fight  against Antimicrobial Resistance (AMR)

The role of  nurses in the fight against Antimicrobial Resistance (AMR

How can the public fight the threat of Antimicrobial Resistance (AMR)

Margarita takes you through her experience of studying BSc Business & Management.

You can find more detail, including fees, modules, study modes etc here: https://www2.aston.ac.uk/study/courses/business-and-management-bsc

If you have any questions don’t hesitate to contact our admissions team: ugadmissions@aston.ac.uk

HERE IS BUSINESS & MANAGEMENT

Linglin takes you through her experience of studying International Business & Management as an international student.

You can find more detail, including international fees, courses, visas etc here: www.aston.ac.uk/international

If you have any questions don’t hesitate to contact our admissions team: ugadmissions@aston.ac.uk

HERE IS INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS & MANAGEMENT

Aslaug takes you through her experience of studying BSc International Business & Management.

You can find more detail, including fees, modules, study modes etc here: https://www2.aston.ac.uk/study/courses/international-business-and-management-bsc

If you have any questions don’t hesitate to contact our admissions team: ugadmissions@aston.ac.uk

Amelia takes you through her experience of studying at Aston Business School.

You can find more detail, including fees, modules, study modes etc here: https://www2.aston.ac.uk/study/undergraduate/courses/abs/index

If you have any questions don’t hesitate to contact our admissions team: ugadmissions@aston.ac.uk

HERE IS ASTON BUSINESS SCHOOL

Ella takes you through her experience of studying International Business & Modern Languages.

You can find more detail, including fees, modules, study modes etc here: https://www2.aston.ac.uk/study/courses/international-business-and-modern-languages-bsc

If you have any questions don’t hesitate to contact our admissions team: ugadmissions@aston.ac.uk

HERE IS INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS & MODERN LANGUAGES

new-book-from-aston-university-academic-shows-that-christmas-tasks-mostly-fall-on-women

New book from Aston University academic shows that Christmas tasks mostly fall on women

Lecturer, Sociology and Policy

  New book by Dr Emily Christopher shows differences in how household tasks are divided by men and women Book highlights that women tend to buy the Christmas presents and send cards Men often see women as being more thoughtful or having better knowledge of what people would like.  A new book from Aston University’s Dr Emily Christopher reveals that when it comes to sending Christmas cards and buying Christmas presents, women are still mostly doing the work as they are perceived to have better knowledge of what people would like.

 Dr Emily Christopher, a lecturer in sociology and policy at Aston School of Law and Social Sciences, has recently published her book Couples at Work: Negotiating Paid Employment, Housework and Childcare, which look at how household tasks are divided by men and women and the reasons behind these divisions. The data for the book has been collated over an eight-year period with couples being interviewed twice to provide a robust set of results. It looks at how different sex parent couples combined paid work, housework and childcare. 

The research revealed how gender norms continue to shape how certain daily household jobs are divided. Women were more likely than men to clean the house, especially bathrooms, wash clothes and put clothes away. Men still tend to do tasks like mowing the lawn and DIY but now are also more likely to do the cooking and the grocery shopping.

The research shows that the key to understanding how household tasks are divided lies in the meaning they hold for partners.

With the festive season upon us, the book reveals that woman are largely responsible for the Christmas present buying and sending cards with 100% of those taking part in the research saying that women mostly carried out these tasks. This also included buying for the male partner's relatives. 

In instances where men had a 'helping' role in these tasks, this included being involved in the discussion or consulting on choice of presents, especially for children, with only a small minority buying presents for their own family. 

The data revealed that where women didn't choose and buy presents for their partners family, they were still involved in reminding their partners that this needed to be done or advising on choice of gifts, showing that women were still taking on the mental load of planning for the festive season.

The book reveals that when men were questioned about why they didn't get involved in present buying, they drew on gender norms. 

Women were often described, by the men, as being more thoughtful or having better knowledge of what people would like. Men often described how family members wouldn’t receive presents at all if it relied on them. 

Although much of the gift giving and organising represented love and affection for the women, which many found enjoyable, many still saw it as work and expressed that they would like their partners' to be more involved. 

Dr Christopher said: “This book takes an in-depth look at the way in which everyday roles around the household are divided between men and women. “The research shows that over a period of eight years fathers increased their role in childcare tasks but this did not always extend to housework. “The pandemic was an opportunity to change how couples share housework but women were still more likely to carry out tasks like cleaning, washing clothes and putting clothes away and overwhelmingly remained responsible for the mental orchestration of family work.” 

aston-universitys-professor-gina-rippon-wins-british-psychological-society-book-award-for-the-lost-girls-of-autism

Aston University’s Professor Gina Rippon wins British Psychological Society book award for The Lost Girls of Autism

Professor of Cognitive Neuroimaging

  Gina Rippon, professor emeritus of cognitive neuroimaging at Aston University, has won an award for her book, The Lost Girls of Autism The book won the 2025 British Psychological Society Popular Science Award It explores the emerging science of female autism, and examines why it has been systematically ignored and misunderstood for so long.  The Lost Girls of Autism, the latest book from Gina Rippon, professor emeritus of cognitive neuroimaging at Aston University Institute of Health and Neurodevelopment (IHN), has won the 2025 British Psychological Society (BPS) Popular Science Award.

The annual BPS Book Awards recognise exceptional published works in the field of psychology. There are four categories – popular science, textbook, academic monograph and practitioner text.

With the subtitle ‘How Science Failed Autistic Women and the New Research that’s Changing the Story’, The Lost Girls of Autism explores the emerging science of female autism, and examines why it has been systematically ignored and misunderstood for so long.

Historically, clinicians believed that autism was a male condition, and simply did not look for it in girls and women. This has meant that autistic girls visiting a doctor have been misdiagnosed with anxiety, depression or personality disorders, or are missed altogether. Many women only discover they have the condition when they are much older.

Professor Rippon said:

“It's such a pleasure and an honour to receive this award from the BPS. It’s obviously flattering to join the great company of previous winners, but I’m also extremely grateful for the attention drawn to the issues raised in the book. “Over many decades, due to autism’s ‘male spotlight’ problem, autistic girls and women have been overlooked, deprived of the help they needed, and even denied access to the very research studies that could widen our understanding of autism. This book tells the stories of these girls and women, and I’m thrilled to accept this prize on their behalf.” 

budget-25-initial-reactions-related-to-personal-financial-wellbeing

Budget 25 – initial reactions related to personal financial wellbeing

Professor Andy Lymer, director of the Centre for Personal Financial Wellbeing at Aston University, looks at what the latest UK government budget announcements mean for households

Professor of Accounting

  As the director of the Aston Centre for Personal Financial Wellbeing, and a professor of taxation, I obviously take particular interest in the annual budget day as it sets a tone for much of the personal finance changes that are likely to occur in the near future.

The lead up to this year’s budget had unprecedented levels of speculation with much of the press and commentators trying to get attention with ever more it seemed wilder guessing of what the chancellor might do – largely unhelpfully and worrying people and the markets unnecessarily. Almost all of this proved wide of the mark as the budget didn’t increase any of the main taxes at all, and where it might nudge National Insurance contributions (NICs) up for some, this won’t be for a few years and only in a small area (pension payments for employees) that won’t actually affect most people.

Small and cautious steps to reform The reason for all this speculation of key changes needed was that everyone suspected there was a big hole in the national finances. This was shown not to be the case. In fact, predictions provided in the budget documents are we’d in fact be in budget surplus by the end of this parliament period even before the changes announced take effect. This was a surprise to many and meant the chancellor could actually focus on at least some small and cautious steps towards reforming how our tax, benefit and government spending systems work. What she proposed therefore is currently predicted will raise circa £26bn and give the government ‘head-room’ to cope with economic changes later rather than needed to fill a feared financial black hole now – good news all round!

This meant what we actually got was lots of smaller changes with fewer ‘rabbit out of a hat’ big tax surprises than we have had in recent years – a welcome steadying trend I hope will continue.

She also promised some short-term spending that can be paid for with a combination of extra borrowing now and with increased taxes later – again a trend of recent budgets. If these tax changes actually happen in the end, then it will be down to what happens between now and when these were proposed to commence – by no means a guarantee these will ever happen. Later budgets, or other rule changes in the future, could easily retract or counter them (all chancellors like to announce planned tax changes aren’t going to happen for obvious political gain reasons!).

Income tax changes The largest share of the extra £26bn raised will come from extending the income tax thresholds for a further period – now to 2031. These have been fixed (at £12,570 for example for the point at which income tax starts to need to be paid on personal incomes) since at least 2023, some well before this. This matters, as, when wages rise due to inflation, people are not better off in reality (you get more income but things cost more), but may end up paying more tax than before as the thresholds haven’t increased with inflation to the same degree (what we call ‘fiscal drag’). As such, holding these thresholds fixed for longer will raise extra money for the government (predicted to be over £12bn a year in 2030-31 for example) – largely unnoticed as to many it doesn’t feel like the tax rise it clearly is.
 

The threshold fixing extension announced today will mean that as many as 700,000 more people will start to pay some income tax when they wouldn’t currently, and up to 1 million more people will start to pay higher rates of tax than currently – all without being actually better off in real terms. Some call this stealth tax, but it feels very real when it starts to affect you if your total taxable incomes fall near these threshold levels.

There were in total more than 70 other tax measure changes in this budget – a huge number and lots to get your head around. However, most of these will not affect most people and are relatively small in nature – targeted at making the tax system a little fairer (i.e. those on higher incomes, with more savings, dividends, receiving additional income from property they own etc – paying more taxes as a proportion of the total amount raised in tax from all sources). This is clearly welcome news (at least for those not being asked to pay this extra) in the current climate.

The biggest changes for financial wellbeing As a research centre focusing on individual and family financial wellbeing, what do we think are the specifics announcements made that are most likely to affect people – several headline announcements are worth highlighting: - 

1. The removal of the two-child limit on benefit eligibility is obviously a key headline – long touted as a key reason larger families are much more likely to be in poverty than smaller families. This is a key change that many Labour MPs wanted to see happen and the chancellor has delivered on it. This is very welcome news – although it won’t start to affect these families until after April 2026 to give time to bring these measures into place – but then predicted to lift 450,000 children out of poverty.

2. As part of making the tax system more progressive, a brand-new tax was announced on very expensive houses in England – to be snappily called the High Value Council Tax Surcharge (or HVCTS) – although expect it to be called the ‘mansion tax’ by everyone! The UK’s main local tax (council tax) isn’t going to be reformed as such in this change – despite being the target of much speculation that it is just too regressive to leave unreformed any longer after we haven’t revalued houses in most of the UK since 1991. This will instead be an additional tax, commencing in April 28, on those whose properties are valued (now) at £2m or more – with higher rates rising to those with properties over £5m. Clearly this will affect relatively few in most of the UK (only expected to affect 1% of properties nationally), but will affect some and will raise extra revenues (expected to raise circa £400m+ a year) to directly support provision of local services – much needed in many parts of the UK.

3.  New taxes on electric cars – given fuel duty is not paid by those who drive electric cars (as they don’t buy petrol or diesel) there have been calls for new taxes to be charged to electric car drivers. While these cars may be better for the environment when driven, they continue to wear roads and contribute to congestion. The government is proposing a per mile charge from April 28 (to be called the Electric Vehicle Excise Duty or eVHD) for these vehicles which will be painful for electric car divers – not least as this cost as not known when purchase decisions were made. No-one likes a tax charged on something you have already made the decision to buy so expect this to be unpopular. It is proposed currently to cost EV drivers around £20/month – about half the rate of fuel duty on average – and expected to raise circa £2bn a year by 2030-31. I expect this tax will become more nuanced in future perhaps as technology enables perhaps different charges to be applied to use of congested city roads compared to open rural driving perhaps - we will see. 

4.  National Insurance deductibility for pension contributions via salary sacrifice schemes operated by many employers for their employees is to be capped at £2,000 (although only from April 29 – so no immediate effect). This now very widely used approach to making pension contributions if you are an employee that in effect avoids you having to pay NIC on this income going into your pension. For those with larger pension contributions the bit that can be made before NIC is due on the extra this will be capped in the future to £2,000 per year – again affecting those who receive higher pension contributions most and affecting those at the bottom of the income spectrum, little if at all (74% of employees are predicted not to be affected). Is this a breach of the Labour manifesto promises not to increase the main taxes? For some it certainly seems that way. 

 What didn’t happen? There are many smaller measures to explore, or ones that are not coming into effect for the next year or more that might have been missed from the news headlines but that will almost certainly affect lots of people. To name just a few (including highlighting several things NOT going to happen – which will obvious not save people money per se, but help by not costing them more): -
above inflation increases to national minimum (‘living’) wage for all age groups from April 2026 (+4.1% for those over 21)– although still not raising this to ‘real living wage’ levels.   further extension of holding off on the 5p/litre fuel duty rise  not increasing prescription charges (staying at £9.90 for the next year)   confirming state pension rises by 4.8% from next April (worth £575/year) confirming £150 winter fuel payments again this winter to over 6 million homes  freezing regulated rail fares – preventing the usual annual increases from January (the first time this has happened in 30 years) extending the government’s Help to Save scheme to more benefit recipients than previously   No immediate impact for most Overall, this is therefore probably a welcome budget for many, those on lower incomes will likely get the most from these measures, if all are applied as proposed, but most won’t see much of an immediate impact immediately – and with the largest benefit likely to all on larger families in receipt of benefits from next April.



Aston University Expert Center

Featured Experts

Ali Al-Khattawi

Dr Haris Alexakis

Dr Muhammad Azmat

Dr Raj Badhan

Cliff Bailey

Tim Baines

Dr Hannah Bartlett

Dr Amreen Bashir

Dr Ilias G. Basioudis

Dr Lucy Bastin

Featured Spotlights

More about Aston University