Can any of the unreal maps be used for academic research (non profit) without incurring any financial charge or IP concern?
Yes, you can even use them for commercial projects 
When you mean the UT maps -> no
What about the learning content thats provided by epic for ue4?
Such as the suntemple in Engine feature samples?
Are there any maps that are freely available for such a purpose?
You can use **everything **for your projects (except of the ut stuff)
can you please differentiate what the ut stuff is, for somebody who’s not really clued up and is new to unreal.
would the suntemple in Engine feature samples count as UT?
UT = Unreal Tournament = the free to play game from epic games
So basically everything that you can find in the marketplace - Unreal Engine tab is free to use in commercial and non-commerical projects
Ah OK great!
Are there any free complete maps to use anywhere?
You can find some in the learn tab -> effects demo, shooter demo,… 