Pioneering Research 2015/16: our annual research publication

Celebrating CRUK research community achievements

Pioneering Research celebrates some of the many achievements for CRUK and for researchers in our community over the last year, and the work we are doing right now as we implement our research strategy.

The publication features stories highlighting examples of your incredible work and outlines a few areas of current interest to us and the wider community, from Nobel Prize-winning research to building team science.

How we funded research in 2015/16

Funding by location map

Last year we spent £376 million on your research, funding 4,000 researchers plus infrastructure and partnerships across the full breadth of basic, translational, clinical and population research.

You can explore these numbers in-depth to discover what, where and how we fund research.

Funding facts and figures
 

Getting a grip on hard-to-treat tumours

Pancreatic cancer cells - CRUK London Research Institute, Electron Microscopy Unit

Our researchers are increasingly turning their attention to cancers with substantial unmet need but great potential for breakthroughs.

The cancer drugs cost conundrum

Pharmaceutical manufacturing

Skyrocketing drugs prices are increasing pressure on an already troubled NHS and becoming a barrier to bringing new therapies to patients.

Harnessing the power of diverse perspectives

Team science

We're driving collaboration and strengthening networking as multidisciplinary team science becomes ever more essential to beating cancer.

The psychologist who changed cancer research

Prof Jane Wardle

Jane Wardle, the pioneer of the behavioural sciences in cancer research, died in 2015 leaving an incredible research legacy.

Richard Gilbertson: Coming home to the UK

Prof Richard Gilbertson

In 2015, Richard Gilbertson returned to the UK to lead the CRUK Major Centre at Cambridge after 15 years at St Jude Children's Hospital in Memphis.

Where next for cancer immunotherapy?

Biotherapeutics diagram (Pioneering Research 2015/16)

We're driving discovery research in immuno-oncology which is leading to new and exciting immunotherapeutic possibilities.

Discover more research features

Feature stories explore the progress that we're making.

Getting under the cover

cover image

The striking data visualisation used on the cover of our 2015/16 publication has CRUK research at its heart. It shows international collaborations resulting from CRUK research.

Building on Researchfish™ submissions, the graphic uses the addresses of co-authors of research papers, resulting from CRUK funded research and published in the last five years, to map collaborations across countries.

Download the visualisation (PDF, 15MB)

Download the PDF of the print publication

publication cover

Our print publication contains all of the above stories and more. In the print publication, hear from Dr Iain Foulkes, Executive Director of Strategy and Research Funding at CRUK, about our current priorities, and get the view ahead from Professor Peter Johnson, our Chief Clinician, and Professor Karen Vousden, Chief Scientist.

Download this year's edition (PDF, 5MB)

 Archive

Help us improve our content in the future

What did you enjoy reading in this year's publication? What would like to hear more about from Cancer Research UK? Help shape our future content by giving us feedback.