UK Clinical Research Infrastructure Initiative Gets Boost

The Clinical Research Infrastructure Initiative (CRII) will benefit from additional funding from the UK government and organizations like Arthritis Research UK, British Heart Foundation, the Wellcome Trust, and Cancer Research UK to advance clinical research in 23 key projects at centers across the UK.

Led by the UK's Medical Research Council, the CRII says it will invest more than 230 million pounds (around $368 million) on a range of medical and healthcare technologies for cancer and dementia and advanced diagnosis and treatment. For instance, Cardiff University will receive a total of 6.7 million pounds (8.47 million euros), including 3.4 million pounds (4.3 million euros) from the Welsh Government, for new ultra-high-field MRI technology to investigate the causes and treatments of dementia and other brain conditions, such as schizophrenia, Parkinson's disease, Huntington's disease, and multiple sclerosis.

Also, teams from the University of Leeds and the University of York are developing a new method that has the potential to increase the signal in an MRI scan by up to 100,000 times. The aim is to magnetically ‘label’ specific molecules so that they can be visualized as they pass through the body without changing their role. With this technique, it should be possible to label both drugs and substances that occur naturally in the body, making the method widely applicable. The technique could be applied to patients with heart disease, cancer and joint disease within five years and help speed up the development of new drugs.

Read the full release here.