This weekend will see the UK celebrate the coronation of King Charles III almost 70 years to the day after his mother’s coronation.
Like the royal family, the genomics industry, and the wider life sciences sector is considering how best it can fly the flag for Britain globally.
This weekend will see the UK celebrate the coronation of King Charles III. For the majority, it will be the first such pomp and circumstance in their lifetime – indeed, the King’s accession to the throne comes almost 70 years to the day of his mother’s coronation.
For the scientific community, though, 1953 remains a standout year for other reasons, with research institutes and industry bodies across the UK having just celebrated the 70th anniversary of Cambridge researchers discovering ‘the secret of life’. To underline its importance, Francis Crick and James Watson’s breakthrough in identifying the structure of the double helix DNA molecule, aided in no small part by the work of Rosalind Franklin, catalysed the creation of an entire genomics industry for which the UK is now world-renowned.
Fast forward to the present day and, like the royal family, the genomics industry, and the wider life sciences sector of which it is part, is considering how best it can fly the flag for Britain globally. How will it look in another 70 years’ time? Will it continue to be a pioneer?
For me, the major concern is that the conditions created to support and commercialise R&D become eroded over the next decade, something I have talked about at length when it comes to the UK’s ongoing exclusion from the EU research programme Horizon.
