University of Wolverhampton predicts Team GB could win 45 medals at the Rio de Janeiro Olympic games in 2016

Rio de Jeniro could prove to be another medal winning Olympic Games for Team GB, researches have predicted.

Scientists, based at the University of Wolverhampton, have used a mathematical formula based on the average number of medals Britain has won in the past and the likelihood of podium success of host and post-host countries.

The authors findings, published in the British Journal of Sports Medicine, predict that a host nation's odds of winning medals will be more than double.

The model suggests that having the home advantage should bring in 2.05 medals for every single medal usually won.

Britain's historic medal average is 31, when that was multiplied by 2.05 it produced a predicted medal win of 63.5 for London 2012. In the end, Team GB earned 65 medals.

The model is created from the medal tallies of all countries that have hosted the Games since World War II.

Logit regression, as the approach is known, looks at medals won before, during and after a nation has hosted the games.

The researchers also found that objective and subjectively judged sports had different outcomes.

They found that more medals were gained in subjectively judge sports than they were in objectively judged ones.