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Research formula will reward elite

Physics and chemistry departments up and down the country are axing courses as student recruitment problems and the research assessment exercise take their toll.

Undergraduate courses and whole research areas are under threat at universities including Essex, Birkbeck, Brunel, Coventry and the University of East Anglia.

According to Alan Smithers of Brunel University, a decline over the past ten years in the numbers studying A level physics and chemistry is feeding through to universities, where places cannot be filled.