Cancer Imaging gets £3m from MRC
7 October 2008
The Medical Research Council (MRC) is investing £3 million in a nationwide initiative to improve the detection, diagnosis and treatment of cancer.
The £50 million initiative, in partnership with Cancer Research UK (CRUK), the Engineering Physical Sciences Research Council and the National Institute for Health Research, will help experts develop new techniques and uses for existing cancer imaging technologies.
The MRC’s investment is part of the organisation’s broader, long-term plans to inject funds into imaging and translational research and will help put the UK on track to lead the world in imaging research.
Investing in cancer imaging will help enable scientists to watch cells in action by tracing radioactive markers injected into the patient’s body; enable doctors to see therapies at work, identifying earlier which treatments work best for individual patients; and provide whole-body images so clinicians can see where cancers have spread and decide how useful surgery will be, or if radiotherapy and drugs will be more effective.
Dr Declan Mulkeen, Director of Research and Training at the Medical Research Council said: “There are around 289,000 new cases of cancer diagnosed in the UK each year and one in three people will develop some form of cancer during their lifetime. Supporting innovation in cancer imaging is imperative.”
In addition to the £3m contribution towards the nationwide initiative, the MRC has also agreed to pledge £2m towards a new cyclotron – a particle accelerator used to produce radioactive tracers for cancer studies – at the University of Oxford.
This investment builds on the MRC’s funding for the Oxford MRC/CRUK Gray Institute for Radiation Oncology and Biology, which includes £2m for new imaging facilities.
“The MRC is also increasing its support for biological and medical imaging by investing in new PhD studentships in the next two years”, Dr Mulkeen said.
“This is part of the MRC’s commitment towards strengthening imaging support and creating strategies for advancing innovation in imaging technologies.”
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