Expansion plan for Sheffield high-tech research centre

The AMRC park houses research and manufacturing facilities

Plans to expand a University of Sheffield research centre could create more than 1,800 new jobs, it has been claimed.

A application has been submitted to extend the Advanced Manufacturing and Research Centre Campus (AMRC) on the site of the old Sheffield Airport.

The centre is already home to a number of high technology companies, including a £110m Rolls Royce jet engine factory.

If approved, the new site would be developed over the next 10 years.

Located on the Rotherham and Sheffield border, the site closed to commercial flying in 2008, although it is still the base for South Yorkshire Police's helicopter.

The business park, which is home to a training centre and a nuclear research facility, opened in 2012.

A new £43m "flexible factory" is being built in a partnership between the University of Sheffield and companies including Boeing.

As well as new research facilities, offices and workspaces would be also be built.

James Newman, chairman of the Sheffield City Region Local Enterprise Partnership, said he hoped the expansion would encourage more businesses to invest in the area.

"They will be right in the nerve centre of advanced manufacturing," he said.

"All around them will be people doing top research in nuclear, in aerospace and in other high-tech industries."

"If we can bring high-tech jobs then that's what we want."