Queen Mary University of London co-leads £43.6m initiative to accelerate AI-powered cancer breakthroughs

Published on:

11 February 2025

Led by researchers and clinicians from Queen Mary University of London, King’s College London, Barts Health NHS Trust and Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust, PharosAI will consolidate decades of NHS and biobank cancer data on one powerful, secure platform, ready for AI-driven studies.

The initiative builds on Queen Mary’s extensive work in cancer research, biobanking and data science, with the ultimate goal of accelerating the development and deployment of next-generation AI models for cancer diagnosis and drug discovery, leading to faster and better-informed healthcare for UK cancer patients.

PharosAI will link different forms of data (‘multimodal data’), such as patient records, gene sequencing and tissue imaging, while also overcoming legal and logistical complexities of accessing sensitive, anonymised patient data.

Professor Louise Jones, Professor of Breast Pathology at Queen Mary University of London and Chief Scientific Officer of PharosAI says: “PharosAI will make rich multimodal datasets from patients with cancer more accessible for AI analysis, unlocking the untapped potential of these valuable resources.

“By applying AI tools to health data, we can uncover insights that remain hidden through human analysis alone. Ultimately, this will support earlier diagnoses and more accurate predictions of cancer progression and therapy responses, improving patient outcomes.”

Professor Sir Mark Caulfield, Vice-Principal for Health at Queen Mary University of London, says: “PharosAI will help us to unlock the power of AI to transform cancer care. We look forward to harnessing our strengths in biobanking and data curation here at Queen Mary University of London as part of this partnership.

“We serve an incredibly diverse population here in London and have been working with our close partners Barts NHS Trust and Barts Charity to ensure that algorithms and AI tools in healthcare are developed to serve everyone. This collaborative work has helped us become AI-ready and set us up to be a pioneer in this space.”

The funding announcement comes as the world looks to the AI action summit in Paris and the UK government reaffirms its commitment to seizing the potential of new AI technologies. The investment aims to foster stronger relationships between academia and the commercial sector, advance research, encourage entrepreneurship and seize the potential of new technologies.

The Research Ventures Catalyst funding from the UK Government adds to £24.7 million raised from partners including charities – such as Breast Cancer Now, Guy’s Cancer Charity and Barts Charity – AI developers, pharma, biotech and technology companies, and public research organisations. PharosAI was the top-funded initiative of three selected from over 250 applications to the programme.

Opening the door to better, more equitable cancer care

The Queen Mary team will draw on their expertise in pioneering cancer research and practice-changing collaborative initiatives. Professor Louise Jones and Professor Claude Chelala co-lead the Breast Cancer Now Biobank at Queen Mary, the UK’s largest unique collection of high-quality breast tissue, breast cells and blood samples from breast cancer patients alongside rich clinical, imaging and genomics data. For over a decade, the team has been working with these rich, multimodal data and developing effective ways to manage, structure and perform AI analytics – a model that will form a foundation to build upon with PharosAI.

Since 2021, Professors Jones and Chelala have also co-led Queen Mary’s contribution to OPTIMA – a €21.3 million research programme aimed at using AI to improve care for patients with prostate, breast, and lung cancer. Funded by the European Union and the European Federation of Pharmaceutical Industries and Associations, this project brings together 36 partners in 13 countries to share insights and develop AI-driven healthcare solutions.

PharosAI benefits from our close collaboration with Barts Health NHS Trust, which bridges the gap between Queen Mary’s innovative research and clinical application in London’s patient population. The trust serves a highly diverse population of around 2.5 million people living in east London, providing a crucial reference point to ensure that research and AI tools serve people of all backgrounds and counter existing health inequalities when rolled out on a larger scale.

Another important enabler of PharosAI is the Barts Life Sciences Precision Health Programme, a partnership between Queen Mary’s and Barts Health NHS Trust funded by Barts Charity. Professor Chelala leads the team working closely with Professor Jones on analysing data from the patient health records held by GP practices and hospitals, and data derived from tissue samples, imaging and genomics. The programme has attracted top talent in data science and AI research to Queen Mary and enabled the setup of a Barts Health NHS Trust secure research environment to become ‘AI-ready’.

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