BRAINIAC – A new £20 million research hub led by the University of Exeter will build the artificial intelligence and data systems behind ten new NHS brain health clinics, with the aim of spotting dementia risk earlier and making assessment and diagnosis 30 to 50 per cent faster.
The BRAINIAC Hub (AI and Emerging Technologies for Next Generation Brain Health Clinics) was announced today. It is funded with £10 million from the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC), part of UK Research and Innovation, with a further £10 million coming from industry, charity and NHS partners. The project runs for six years and links universities with ten NHS sites across all four UK nations.
The ten clinics will be networked together, creating one of the biggest research platforms yet for testing what really works to diagnose, prevent and treat dementia. The first clinics are expected to open in 2029, initially taking patients by NHS referral.
Why now
Around 982,000 people in the UK live with dementia, a figure projected to reach 1.4 million by 2040. Around a third have never received a diagnosis, and many of those who are referred wait months to be seen. The NHS has committed to diagnosing 92% of people referred with suspected dementia within 18 weeks by 2029.
The science is moving faster than the clinic. Blood tests can pick up the first signs of Alzheimer’s disease years before symptoms appear, brain scans can reveal early changes, digital tests can track memory over time, and the first treatments that slow the disease are arriving. But those treatments only work in the earliest stages, and today’s memory clinics have no reliable way to bring all that information together and decide who will benefit.
BRAINIAC Director Professor David Llewellyn, Professor of Clinical Epidemiology and Digital Health at the University of Exeter Medical School, said:
“Nearly a million people in the UK have dementia, and the hardest problem is detecting the earliest changes so we know who can benefit from treatment and prevention. The tools we build in these NHS clinics will let us pick up the first signs before symptoms show, and offer people a personalised prevention plan to help them keep their brains sharp for longer.”
Professor David Llewellyn, BRAINIAC Director
What the hub will build
BRAINIAC will develop AI that combines blood biomarkers, brain imaging, genetics, health records and digital cognitive assessments into a single, clear picture of a person’s brain health.
The interesting part for researchers is where that happens. Rather than building the technology in the lab and hoping it transfers, the hub will develop and test it inside the ten clinics, run as living laboratories with more than 1,700 patients. The idea is that whatever comes out is ready for everyday NHS use, not just a promising result in a paper. It’s a problem the field already knows well: when experts set out what AI brain scan tools need to reach memory clinics, clinician trust and real-world validation were high on the list.
Other plans include:
Federated systems
Let hospitals share AI models without sharing patient data
Assessment at home
Online or through an app, building on Exeter’s PROTECT study
Earlier identification
An aim of flagging more than 40% of people assessed as at early risk, before symptoms develop
A trial-ready cohort
One of the UK’s largest, making it easier to offer people places on clinical trials of new treatments
People living with dementia and carers will co-design the tools throughout, working with Innovations in Dementia, and Alzheimer’s Society will support the route into NHS use.
Deputy Director Professor Chris Fox, Professor of Clinical Psychiatry at the University of Exeter Medical School and a practising clinician, said:
“Every week I see people who have waited far too long to be seen, and how little we can offer once dementia is advanced. The treatments now arriving only help if we find people early. BRAINIAC will give the NHS the tools to do that at scale, designed with patients and clinicians from the start so they work in a busy clinic and not just on paper.”
Professor Chris Fox, BRAINIAC Deputy Director
Who’s involved
Led by Exeter, BRAINIAC brings together the universities of Cambridge, Edinburgh, Manchester, Newcastle, Oxford, Strathclyde and Swansea, Imperial College London, Queen Mary University of London, Queen’s University Belfast and UCL.
Partners include the NIHR HealthTech Research Centre in Sustainable Innovation, Alzheimer’s Society, Dementia Adventure, Beckman Coulter Foundation, IQVIA, Linus Health and a long list of smaller health technology companies. The hub will also support 10 to 20 small companies to bring new technologies into the NHS.
BRAINIAC is one of five new hubs funded by EPSRC. Professor Charlotte Deane, Executive Chair of EPSRC, said the hubs “build on the proven success of our previous hubs, which are already translating cutting-edge research into real benefits”, adding: “By working closely with patients, the NHS and industry, we’re helping people live healthier lives and preventing ill health before it starts.”
Dementia Researcher and BRAINIAC
People and skills, and where we come in
New tools are only as good as the people using them. Alongside the technology, BRAINIAC plans to train more than 200 clinicians and engineers, and that’s where Dementia Researcher has a part to play.
Professor Karen Mattick from University of Exeter and Adam Smith, Programme Director of Dementia Researcher at UCL, are co-leading part of the hub’s work on people, skills and capacity building. That means looking at the AI skills the people working in brain health clinics will need, helping build a community of practice where clinicians, engineers and researchers can share what’s working, and developing training to go with it.
It’s a natural fit. Bringing AI into memory services will need people who can work across clinical care, data science and engineering, and many of them will be early career researchers. We’ll share more here as the work takes shape, including ways to get involved.
What it means for dementia research
For the research community, BRAINIAC is more than a funding headline. Ten networked clinics, a large trial-ready cohort and AI built and tested in real NHS settings could change how quickly new diagnostics and treatments are evaluated in practice. It also signals where careers in the field are heading: towards teams that mix clinicians, engineers, data scientists and people with lived experience.
If you’re working on AI for dementia diagnosis, digital cognitive assessment, biomarkers or health services research, this is one to watch over the next six years.
Read the full announcement from the University of Exeter.
Dr Connor Richardson
Nature Careers Blog
Dr Yvonne Couch
