Oxford gets £60m to solve world's problems

A computer entrepreneur has given Oxford University £60m to kick-start research into 21st century problems such as AIDS, climate change and poverty.

James Martin, a former Oxford student who has written 101 textbooks on IT, is donating £3m per year to the newly established 21st Century School. The school will have research institutes to focus on technological and environmental change, ageing, disease, ethics, migration and the brain.

Martin, who founded an IT consultancy called Headstrong in the 1980s, said: "New technology also offers revolutionary new opportunities. One of the most important activities for a leading university today should be the multi-disciplinary academic thinking needed to find solutions to humanity's biggest problems and address our future opportunities."

The former student has donated a total of £165m to the university, including previous contributions to Oxford's Said Business School.

Dr John Hood, a vice-chancellor at the university, said: "We are enormously grateful to James Martin for funding this project with this exceptional gift. [This] will allow us to continue playing our part in helping tackle the seismic social and technological challenges ahead."