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Participants at the DPUK Datathon in Exeter

Our latest report, titled 'Accelerating translation for dementia research', explores DPUK's ongoing efforts to help bridge the gap between scientific discoveries and the development of new treatments.


Introducing the report, Professor John Gallacher, Director of Dementias Platform UK, writes: 'One of the highlights of being a scientist is belonging to a truly international community that transcends race and creed whilst making sense of the world around us. Key to the effectiveness of this community is creating and sustaining high-quality research environments. 

'For dementia, stakeholders from industry, academia, and charities are coming together to share risks and benefits in finding life-changing treatments. Dementias Platform UK (DPUK) is at the heart of this endeavour.

Speaking about the challenge DPUK is meeting Prof. Gallacher said: 'The mission is to address barriers to translating research into treatments. Through our big data theme, we have built a world-leading Data Portal; enabling end-to-end data management for cohorts, clinical studies and trials. Our research-ready data enable rapid discovery and access to 60 datasets totalling 3.5 million people (p.14-15). Our Trials Delivery Framework enables precise recruitment to, and delivery of, mechanistically targeted multi-site studies for pre-clinical and early clinical disease (p.16-17). Our Experimental Medicine Incubator is where academic and industry partners co-design studies to address specific mechanistic questions that inform drug development (p.18-19).

Accelerating translation for dementia research

'Our high-trust pre-competitive ethos has been critical to developing the collaborative relationships that underly these programmes. It has allowed flexible knowledge and technology sharing, and the incremental

development of innovative solutions that don’t always work first time!

'This also means DPUK is conducting what is essentially an ongoing natural experiment of strategic change to the research environment. DPUK is continually looking for new ways to make translation easier, better, and faster. We look forward to working with you in this. We also anticipate aligning closely with the Government’s recently announced Dame Barbara Windsor Dementia Mission; making our learnings and technologies available to ensure the Mission ‘hits the ground running’.

Click here to download a PDF version of the report.

 

Previous reports (downloadable PDFs)

2023 Annual Report: Accelerating translation for dementia research

 

2020: Meeting the challenge of dementia

2018

2017

2016