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Early Career Advancement Fellowships

Blood Cancer UK

To help us reach our strategic aims we are committed to increasing the funding we have available for world quality research and maximising the support we provide for the vibrant community of exceptional blood cancer researchers working across the UK.

As part of this aim, we are pleased to announce the next call for applications for our Early Career Advancement Fellowships.

Timelines

Applications open: Thursday 12th June 2025

Deadline for submission of applications: 3pm on Thursday September 25th 2025

Interviews: Early March 2026

Applicants notified of outcomes: Late March 2026

Online application system

All applications must be submitted via the Blood Cancer UK Grant Tracker grants management system.

Please follow the instructions in the guidance document for this scheme which can be accessed from the link below, and the Guide to using Grant Tracker on our website when completing and submitting an application. The application can be stored and edited at any time prior to submission.

The application deadline is 3:00pm on the date advertised. No applications will be accepted after the deadline. Applicants must submit the application ahead of this deadline, leaving sufficient time for the required signatories to approve the application.

For any enquiries about completing the application form or submitting your application, please contact research@bloodcancer.org.uk.

AI Based Application Success Predictor

1. Exceptional Scientific Quality

Decisions are driven primarily by scientific merit. Applications are rigorously peer-reviewed by both international scientific experts and individuals affected by blood cancer, with the highest-ranked proposals funded .

📉 2. Competitive Success Rates

Project grants (~£100K–£250K over 3 years) typically receive dozens of applications per cycle, with success rates around 30–40%, varying by year—e.g. 33% in 2023/24 .

Transformational Research Awards (£1M over 5 yrs) and Innovative Pilot Grants (£30K over 1 yr) follow similarly selective, strategic processes .

🤝 3. Alignment with Strategic Priorities

Successful proposals closely match Blood Cancer UK’s strategic focus areas:

Personalised/immunotherapies

Large-scale patient-relevant trials in poor-survival cancers

Data-driven research (e.g., genomics, big-data analytics)
Applications that reflect these priorities are notably favored .

🧩 4. Strong Multidisciplinary & Patient-Centered Design

Consortia that bring together academic, clinical, and patient expertise are encouraged.

Projects must incorporate Patient and Public Involvement (PPI) early on, ensuring inclusion, relevance, and sensitivity—an element actively reviewed .

🏥 5. Robust Peer Review with Applicant Rebuttal

Applications undergo external scientific review, patient interviews, committee assessment, and board approval .

Applicants can respond to reviewer feedback before final evaluations, helping clarify and strengthen their case .

💼 6. Capacity for Large-Scale Trial Management

For trials-focused grants, proposals must demonstrate capability in adaptive trial design, representative recruitment, and delivering paradigm-shifting outcomes .

Infrastructure must support complex, multi-arm clinical studies.

🛠 7. Feasible Budget & Project Scope

Budgets must be well-justified, focusing on direct research costs, and aligning with scheme-specific limits (e.g., up to £250K for Project Grants) .

Projects need to propose realistic milestones and outcomes achievable within the funding period.

📚 8. Support for Early Career Researchers

Early Career Fellowships (up to £350K over 3 yrs) explicitly support researchers developing independence and leadership in blood cancer research .

✅ Top Tips to Improve Competitiveness

Focus Area	Strategy
Science excellence	Clear rationale, rigorous design, strong preliminary data. Engage early reviewer feedback.
Strategic fit	Map aims to Blood Cancer UK priorities—personalisation, trials, big data.
PPI integration	Describe patient involvement from conceptual design through delivery.
Partnerships	Include clinical, academic, and patient expertise—demonstrate multidisciplinary collaboration.
Budget clarity	Justify all costs, align with scheme-specific limits.
Feasibility & milestones	Present realistic, time-bound objectives and management structure.
Career development (if ECR)	Show mentorship, independence, and a plan to transition to leadership (for Fellowships).

🧭 Summary

To stand out:

Submit scientifically rigorous, well-designed projects with strong preliminary support.

Connect clearly to Blood Cancer UK’s strategic goals.

Build multidisciplinary teams including PPI.

Follow funding limits and build a feasible plan with milestones.

If eligible, position yourself as an emerging leader in Fellowships.

Specialties

Cancer

Eligibility Requirements

An Early Career Advancement Fellowship is designed to enable the most talented early career blood cancer researchers who have already obtained a PhD and undertaken further research as a postdoc or equivalent, to transition towards independence as a researcher.

Fellowships will be awarded for up to three years’ full time or five years’ part time and we expect the awards to be in the region of £400,000-£450,000. The maximum budget will be £450,000.

We are aiming to fund four fellowships from our core budget for this round. In addition, we are pleased to announce our prestigious new Langmuir Fellowship, which will be specifically focused on myeloma. This has been made possible thanks to a generous gift from the Langmuir Family Foundation and will be awarded to the highest ranked applicant in the field of myeloma.

Applicants should be proposing to undertake a novel research project that is in line with our overarching strategic aim of bringing forward the day when no one dies either of blood cancer or the side effects of its treatments and with at least one of the three priority research themes from our new research strategy: Prevention, Early detection and predicting outcomes, and Treatment.

The fellowship should also provide the researcher with the leadership, career development and training opportunities needed for the applicant to reach the next stage in their career.

Fellows are permitted to undertake discovery or translational research, small scale clinical studies or research projects associated with ongoing clinical trials as part of a fellowship.

These Fellowships are not designed to directly support the design or delivery of clinical trials.

The fellowship candidate should be the lead applicant, but the application should include a named supervisor at the host institution who will be asked to provide a letter of support.

It is essential that all applicants read the full guidance document for this round before starting an application.

Sponsor Details

Sponsor Institute/Organizations: Blood Cancer UK

Sponsor Type: Corporate/Non-Profit

Address: Suite 31 Bonnington Bond, 2 Anderson Place, Edinburgh, EH6 5NP

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