Set aside 3% of grant budgets to replicate findings before translation
Before spending millions to turn a lab finding into a drug, spend a little to have an independent lab check it is real. Funders would reserve a small slice of money for exactly this.
Funders reserve 3% of research budgets for independent, pre-registered replications of high-impact preclinical findings that are about to receive translational investment (IND-enabling work, company formation, phase 1). Replication is done by contract labs or a network of academic 'replication cores' with blinded protocols agreed with the original authors. The Reproducibility Project: Cancer Biology found that many landmark effects were smaller or absent when repeated; catching this before translation saves far more than it costs.
- Funding follows fashion, not burden · Money goes to the cancers and questions that are easy or popular, not the ones that kill most or where a dollar would do most.
- Preclinical results do not reproduce · Fewer than half of landmark cancer biology findings reproduce when someone else tries.
- The valley of death between lab and product · Most academic discoveries die before anyone tests them in people because nobody funds the middle step.
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not linked directly; found by shared links- IdeaAn independent replication institute that re-tests key preclinical cancer findings before trials
Shares Patient-derived xenografts, Patient-derived organoids, Preclinical results do not reproduce, The valley of death between lab and product.
- IdeaSelf-driving laboratories that run the cancer biology hypothesis loop autonomously
Shares CRISPR functional genomics, Patient-derived organoids, Preclinical results do not reproduce, The valley of death between lab and product.
- Key paperReproducibility Project: Cancer Biology found that landmark preclinical results mostly shrank or vanished on replication
Shares Patient-derived xenografts, Patient-derived organoids, Preclinical results do not reproduce, The valley of death between lab and product.
- InstitutionThe Jackson Laboratory Cancer Center
Shares Patient-derived xenografts, CRISPR functional genomics, Preclinical results do not reproduce.
- IdeaBarcode patient-derived tumours to watch which clones win under each drug
Shares Patient-derived xenografts, CRISPR functional genomics, Patient-derived organoids.
- IdeaMulti-centre randomised animal trials before committing to a human trial
Shares Patient-derived xenografts, Preclinical results do not reproduce, The valley of death between lab and product.
- IdeaScore every model system on how well it predicted real trial results
Shares Patient-derived xenografts, Patient-derived organoids, Preclinical results do not reproduce.
- IdeaMake in vivo metastasis screens a required step in drug discovery
Shares Patient-derived xenografts, CRISPR functional genomics, Patient-derived organoids.