News

New £50 million centre for neurodegenerative disorders

31 October 2017

Gifts totalling more than £32 million, together with government funds of over £17 million, have enabled the launch of a highly innovative Centre in Cambridge that is pioneering new approaches to understand and treat neurodegenerative disorders such as Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s diseases, motor neurone disease and...

Synthetic organs, nanobots and DNA ‘scissors’: the future of medicine

12 October 2017

Nanobots that patrol our bodies, killer immune cells hunting and destroying cancer cells, biological scissors that cut out defective genes: these are just some of technologies that Cambridge researchers are developing which are set to revolutionise medicine in the future. In a new film to coincide with the recent launch of...

Join Medical i-Teams for Lent Term – APPLY by 11th DECEMBER

4 October 2017

Interested in commercialising new medical inventions and matching them to user needs? Looking for some hands-on experience? Then read on! The Cambridge Academy of Therapeutic Sciences is collaborating with Cambridge i-Teams to offer an exciting opportunity to early career researchers across the University. By joining a...

Study clears important hurdle towards developing an HIV vaccine

25 September 2017

An international team of researchers has demonstrated a way of overcoming one of the major stumbling blocks that has prevented the development of a vaccine against HIV: the ability to generate immune cells that stay in circulation long enough to respond to and stop virus infection. In a study published in 2009, results...

Cambridge researchers help develop new diagnostic test for African sleeping sickness

25 September 2017

A new diagnostic test developed from research carried out at the University of Cambridge and the University of Dundee has been launched with the aim of helping eliminate the disease known as African sleeping sickness. Sleeping sickness, or Human African Trypanosomiasis, is caused by parasites transmitted by tsetse flies in...

Cambridge ready to lead UK’s industrial renaissance

1 September 2017

With the official launch of the next stage in the Government’s Life Sciences Industrial Strategy, Cambridge can have a key role to deliver jobs, growth and investment for the East of England. With its pre-eminent strengths in life sciences, the Cambridge Biomedical Campus (CBC) will be looking to work with the Government...

Biomedical science fellowships to be established after gift reflecting Vice-Chancellor's legacy

1 August 2017

Much of the world-changing research at the University of Cambridge is underpinned by postdocs - qualified researchers with fixed term contracts. With more postdoctoral researchers than most other institutions, Cambridge sees postdocs as key to its future research strength. Now, a gift from the members of the Collegiate...

Research Horizons Issue 33: Future Therapeutics

27 July 2017

The latest issue of Research Horizons focuses on future therapeutics and provides a snapshot of cutting-edge research from across the University of Cambridge. Nanobots small enough to move around our bloodstream, damaged hearts repaired with ‘off-the-shelf’ pieces of beating tissue, genetic diseases cured by ‘molecular...

Snip, snip, cure: correcting defects in the genetic blueprint

26 July 2017

Gene editing using ‘molecular scissors’ that snip out and replace faulty DNA could provide an almost unimaginable future for some patients: a complete cure. Cambridge researchers are working towards making the technology cheap and safe, as well as examining the ethical and legal issues surrounding one of the most exciting...

The self-defence force awakens

7 July 2017

Our immune systems are meant to keep us healthy, but sometimes they turn their fire on us, with devastating results. Immunotherapies can help defend against this ‘friendly fire’ – and even weaponise it in our defence. An army of cells constantly patrols within us, attacking anything it recognises as foreign, keeping us...