Professor Bryan W. Roberts has been awarded a prestigious European Research Council (ERC) Consolidator Grant. He is among the 328 exceptional researchers across Europe to have been selected.

LSE Philosophy Professor Bryan Roberts has been awarded ERC funding for his project, The Edge of the Universe.

He said about the award: “It is an honour and really a breathtaking opportunity to work with the ERC, which challenges researchers to engage with some of humanity’s biggest questions. For a philosopher of physics, it’s hard to imagine a more immense and tantalising topic than the edge of the universe.”

The Edge of the Universe project seeks to establish a new account of our universe at its furthest fringes. Drawing on frontier ideas in both the philosophy and physics of boundaries in general, the project will explore the properties, uses, and epistemology of boundaries as they apply to the universe as a whole.

This five-year project is a collaboration with Dr Karim Thébault at the University of Bristol, together with a team of postdocs, PhD students, and visitors working in the philosophy of physics at LSE’s world-renowned Centre for Philosophy of Natural and Social Sciences (CPNSS).

ERC Consolidator Grants aim to support outstanding scientists and scholars as they establish their independent research teams and develop their most promising scientific ideas. The funding is provided through the EU’s Horizon Europe programme.

List of all awardees 2024.