AI and copyright law: The problem of authorship
The University of St Andrews and Macquarie University are pleased to offer a scholarship funded by both institutions to support an exceptional student undertaking doctoral research.
This project explores how AI challenges copyright’s concept of authorship, with legal and technical insights into ownership, creativity, and control.
Key details
- 20257862
- PhD
- Expressions of interest open now until 3 December 2025
- Domestic, International
- Information technologies, law
- AUD39,700 (2026 rate, tax-exempt) while on Macquarie University campus; £19,775 per annum pro rata while on University of St Andrews campus with an annual uplift published by the University each year
About the scholarship
Artificial Intelligence (AI) is increasingly important as businesses begin to use it to undertake work traditionally done by humans. As AI systems become more sophisticated and capable, they become more significant in content creation. But the use of AI complicates the determination of authorship of the work created using it; and, as a consequence, the subsistence and ownership of any copyright in that work. This project explores the challenges that arise when copyright’s concept of authorship meets AI from an interdisciplinary perspective.
Authorship is at the heart of copyright law in most legal traditions. Copyright protection usually requires some ‘authorial’ input, but jurisdictions differ on the amount and type of human contribution that counts. As AI transforms creative processes and supercharges content generation at scale more clarity is urgently needed. Many are concerned that AI output will displace human creativity – and as such they question whether it should be incentivised via copyright at all. Human creators who turn to AI to augment and complement their own practices will be equally concerned about whether the use of AI tools affects their ability to exploit their work. There is a public interest in ensuring that creativity is encouraged and rewarded.
Whilst it is clear that human input shapes AI output, AI developers and users have much less control over output than a writer does over the words produced by a pen. Is AI output authored in a sense that copyright can, or should, recognise? This question has important implications for the economic exploitation of work made using AI. Uncertainty and variation between the law of different jurisdictions creates economic and cross-border friction. An important and related question is how market participants – both rights-holders and users of creative work – know whether the level of human input rises to the level of copyrightability. Can technology, the law, or both, help provide these participants with sufficient transparency and control over their input?
While current research focuses on the technological abilities of AI to respect copyright, or the legal application of copyright to AI output, we wish to go beyond this and seek student-led proposals on the application and limits of copyright’s concept of authorship from an interdisciplinary computer science and law perspective. Our experience indicates that successful interdisciplinary projects still reside in a ‘home’ discipline, and so we would welcome proposals that use legal approaches such as doctrinal or comparative methods and are informed by CS, as well as CS-driven proposals such as the development of new AI systems that are informed by legal requirements. Projects might address questions such as:
- what amount and type of human contribution suffices to establish authorship of AI output?
- what sort of causal relationship must exist between human input and AI output to establish authorship?
- how can human contribution be verified, measured, traced or evidenced?
- is control over the output an appropriate touchstone for authorship?
- how can existing AI systems be adapted to provide sufficient attribution?
- how do provisions relating to computer-generated works apply?
- what is the proper scope of copyright in AI output?
The student would join the St Andrews School of Computer Science’s Responsible and Sustainable Research Theme, and be a part of the Scottish Informatics and Computer Science Alliance, a research pool of all 14 computer science departments across Scotland.
Depending on the focus of the proposal, the student will be able to join in the activities of Macquarie’s Data Horizons Research Centre, Centre for Applied Artificial Intelligence, and/or the Ethics and Agency Research Centre.
Resources provided by both universities will include computing equipment, essential research funding, conference travel funding (via a competitive scheme) and access to GPU-equipped servers.
This project 'Artificial intelligence and copyright law: The problem of authorship' will be co-supervised by Tristan Henderson and Daniela Simone.
Eligibility
Admission and scholarship criteria of both universities must be met.
For St Andrews, please refer to details of how to apply and of entry requirements here.
For Macquarie University, please refer to the PhD entry and English language requirements, and graduate research scholarship eligibility criteria.
Desirable experience or education: Solid foundational knowledge of law and/or computer science, and a willingness to engage with related disciplines, ideally demonstrated through research experience or a dissertation in a relevant area.
Mode of study
Full-time
Year of entry
2026-2027 academic year (St Andrews), 2026 academic year (Macquarie).
Students will enrol at both institutions from the outset. In terms of their location for study, the entry point for students beginning at St Andrews is 27 September. If beginning at Macquarie, entry point is 1 October.
Additional criteria
Applicants must not already (i) hold a doctoral degree; or (ii) be matriculated for a doctoral degree at the University of St Andrews, Macquarie University, or another institution.
Duration of award
Up to three and a half years. The student will be expected to spend half of the award term at the University of St Andrews and half at Macquarie University. The successful candidate will be expected to have completed the doctorate degree by the end of the award term. The award term excludes the continuation period and any extension periods.
Funding
Funding arrangements are made on the basis that:
For the period spent at the University of St Andrews, the scholarships will comprise a full tuition fee award and an annual stipend paid at a rate set by the University of St Andrews. For 2025-2026, the stipend is £19,775 p.a., with an annual uplift published by the University each academic year.
Macquarie will fund a living allowance scholarship per position at an annual rate of AUD39,700 (2026 rate, tax exempt), paid pro-rata while the student is in Australia. A tuition fee scholarship will be granted for the period of joint enrolment up to 42 months.
Macquarie will also provide an airfare allowance for flights between the UK and Australia up to a maximum of $4,000 AUD to be arranged by the Graduate Research Academy.
Unless otherwise specified, the scholarships do not cover:
- any continuation, extension, or resubmission period/fees
- a research training grant or another equivalent award for research expenses
- support for travel, immigration, health insurance and related charges between the partner institutions.
Expressions of interest open now until 3 December 2025.
Students are to submit their EOIs to the MQ and St Andrew’s supervisor and cc gr.globalprograms@mq.edu.au. The participating schools at St Andrews and the Graduate Research Academy at Macquarie in coordination with the academic supervisors will be expected to complete the selection process.
EOI documents to be submitted:
- CV including information about publications
- transcripts of most relevant or recent degrees
- information about thesis components (thesis mark, word count, weight or length in comparison to the degree overall)
- a research proposal, which is up to three pages in length. This proposal should include specific details about the role of legal, computer science or other disciplinary approaches when describing the proposed methodological approach for the project.
- indication that the student meets the English language requirements for entry into a PhD program at both universities, or willingness to obtain relevant English language proficiency test results.
The Global Office at St Andrews will work with the Graduate Research Academy at Macquarie to arrange official notification of scholarship awards, invite scholarship awardees to formally apply for admission to both universities by mid-January 2026, and conclude contractual arrangements which must be in place prior to the start of the degree.
Shortlisted applicants will be invited for an interview. The successful applicant will then be asked to formally apply for the relevant PhD course code and Cotutelle/joint PhD scholarship through the MQ application portal.