The brief
When I was at Alzheimer’s Research UK I was given a golden opportunity. A broad brief: we want to do something in diagnosis — what should it be?, and the space to answer it properly.
Finding the gap
I started with a landscape analysis — bibliometrics across publications and grants, a look at what industry players were doing, and a long series of one-on-one interviews with researchers and research funders to understand where the field was actually heading.
What became clear was that blood-based biomarkers for Alzheimer’s disease were progressing fast internationally. Promising data was emerging on several markers, and small-scale clinical studies were showing real potential. But there was a specific gap: most of the work was about whether these markers worked. Very little was asking what would actually be needed to use them — in real-world NHS clinical settings, at scale, with the health economic evidence to back up implementation. That was the gap, and it was one a UK funder could do something about.
From analysis to funded challenge
From the landscape I developed a set of opportunities based on the gaps and ARUK’s existing portfolio, then shortlisted down to the strongest one. Getting internal buy-in was the next step, and then the partnership building began.
This turned into a close collaboration between Alzheimer’s Research UK, Alzheimer’s Society, and NIHR. What made it work was the breadth of the partnership, particularly between the two charities — communications, policy, research, and philanthropy teams from both organisations all pulling in the same direction. That collective effort helped secure a major £5 million grant from the People’s Postcode Lottery.
I then set up the funding call end-to-end: from designing the application form (with help from wonderful colleagues), the drafting the public announcement, leading a webinar for researchers, handling queries, assembling the review panel, developing the review criteria, and chairing the review board meeting.
What it led to
The Blood Biomarker Challenge attracted ~£12 million in total investment (part of it after I left the charity) and funded two major UK clinical trials:
- READ-OUT (REAl world Dementia OUTcomes), led by Prof Vanessa Raymont with Dementias Platform UK researchers from the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge, testing multiple existing and novel blood tests across a range of dementia types.
- ADAPT (Alzheimer’s Disease Diagnosis and Plasma pTau217), led by Prof Jonathan Schott and Dr Ashvini Keshavan at University College London, focused on the most promising Alzheimer’s biomarker, p-tau217.
Both trials are looking at whether blood tests can detect these diseases at various stages in real clinical settings — exactly the question the landscape analysis identified as the missing piece.
The initiative has been covered extensively in the news, including in the BBC and The Guardian.
What I take from it
This project is a good example of what a landscape analysis can actually do when it goes beyond mapping a field. The bibliometrics and interviews were important, but what mattered was translating them into a specific, fundable opportunity — and then doing the work to make it happen, from partnership building to running the funding process.
It is the same approach I now use at Magenti Methodologies: combining data with stakeholder insight to help research funders see where they can make the most difference, and then helping them act on it.
“Jorge was the architect of the Blood Biomarker Challenge, an initiative that not only advanced our research agenda but also attracted significant funding and key collaborators. His knack for building relationships and understanding the bigger picture makes him an invaluable asset.”
— Dr Sara Imarisio, Strategy Leader – Neuroscience, Medicines Discovery Catapult
Want to discuss this work?
I'm always happy to talk about methodology, data infrastructure, or how these approaches could apply to your organisation.