A new £20m programme has been launched to create new Centres of Excellence for Regulatory Science and Innovation (CERSIs) to strengthen the UK’s capability and agility in regulatory science and help ensure regulation keeps pace with rapid advances in healthcare and life sciences.
Each centre will be funded for up to five years.
The funding opportunity has been developed between the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA), the Medical Research Council (MRC) and the Office for Life Sciences (OLS) and is now inviting applications to establish the four centres.
The centres will bring together world-leading expertise from across academia, industry, healthcare and regulation to develop practical solutions to emerging regulatory challenges and help ensure new innovations can be safely adopted in practice.
Four strategic areas have been identified where regulatory science capability is required to support the next generation of healthcare innovation. These include data-driven approaches and artificial intelligence; prevention, early detection and novel evidence approaches; personalised healthcare and pharmacogenomics; and novel platform technologies.
MHRA Chief Medical and Scientific Officer, Professor Jacob George, said: "The biggest challenges facing healthcare innovation can’t be solved by any one organisation alone.
"These centres of excellence in regulatory science will bring together the right expertise from across the system to help us address emerging challenges in regulation, keep pace with advances in science and technology, and ultimately help patients benefit from new innovations more quickly and safely."
MRC Executive Chair, Professor Patrick Chinnery, said: "Advances in areas such as artificial intelligence, personalised healthcare and novel technologies are creating exciting opportunities to improve people’s lives.
"Through this partnership with the MHRA and Office for Life Sciences, we are inviting applications that bring together researchers, regulators and innovators to help ensure regulation keeps pace with innovation to deliver benefits for patients, strengthen the health system and support the UK’s world-leading life sciences sector."
