University College London University College London UCL (legally University College London) is a public research university in London, England, and a constituent college of the federal University of London. It is the largest university in the United Kingdom by total enrolment, and the largest by postgraduate enrolment. Established in 1826 as London University by founders inspired by the radical ideas of Jeremy Bentham, UCL was the first university institution to be established in London, and the first in England to be entirely secular and to admit students regardless of their religion. UCL also makes the contested claims of being the third-oldest university in
University College London working on the theory and simulation of materials; the other members are Imperial College London, King's College London and Queen Mary University of London. UCL is one of the five founding members of the Alan Turing Institute, the UK's national institute for data sciences (together with the universities of Cambridge, Edinburgh, Oxford and Warwick). It also operates the London Centre for Nanotechnology, a multidisciplinary research centre in physical and biomedical nanotechnology, in partnership with Imperial College London. UCL has a close partnership with University College London Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust; the Trust's hospitals are teaching sites for the UCL Medical