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Asked by to Daren on 19 Jun 2014. This question was also asked by .
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Daren Fearon answered on 19 Jun 2014:
The prize money isn’t allowed to be used for our personal research. Instead it has to be used to communicate with people about how amazing science is and how important it is to their lives. So if I win (and I hope I do!), I would like to buy a 3D printer which I can use to build models of proteins to take around and show people what they look like and how we can use this to design new drugs to treat diseases – there is a picture of a 3D-printed model of a protein on my profile if you want to have a look.
In scientific research £500 isn’t a lot of money, it probably wouldn’t cover my work for more than a week or two. To discover a new drug it can cost billions of pounds.
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Comments
molly14 commented on :
Ok, where would you like your research to be in 5 years time?
molly14 commented on :
Also, if it costs billions of pounds to discover a new drug then where do you get your research from?
molly14 commented on :
sorry funding
Daren commented on :
The money comes from companies, governments, charities.
In 5 years I would like to say I have been highly involved in getting a drug candidate to clinical trials.
ruta commented on :
Will there ever be a cure for cancer? And do you think the 3D printer will make a new drug to cure cancer? @darenfearon
Daren commented on :
Hi Ruta. Unfortunately, there will never be a single cure for cancer as it isn’t a single disease but a term used to describe a number of diseases. We have drugs that can treat some cancers and there is a lot of research going on in developing new drugs for other cancers. Improving diagnostics is also an important part of treating cancer. Cancer cells are human cells that have mutant to grow uncontrollable. That face that they often mutate means that they can develop resistance to the drugs we have so we will eventually need new ones.