New £150m world class cancer research centre to open in Manchester

A £150m world class cancer research centre is due to open in Manchester.

The Paterson Building has been rebuilt following a devastating fire in 2017.

The new centre will be home to the Cancer Research UK Manchester Institute, which is part of The University of Manchester. The institute was based in the previous Paterson Building.

The centre, which is a partnership between The Christie NHS Foundation Trust, The University of Manchester and Cancer Research UK (CRUK), will bring together the largest concentration of scientists, doctors and nurses in Europe, collaborating to accelerate crucial research and care.

CRUK Manchester Institute’s chief operating officer, Dr Caroline Wilkinson, said: “It is incredibly exciting to start our relocation to this amazing new building. It has been designed to facilitate and promote collaborations between scientists and with our clinical colleagues which is key to furthering our discovery and translational research ambitions with the ultimate aim of improving outcomes for cancer patients. 

“The project has highlighted the strengths of the Manchester Cancer Research Centre partnership between The University of Manchester, Cancer Research UK and the Christie NHS Foundation Trust and has also benefitted from a wide and productive collaboration between all who have worked so hard on this project”.

Arcadis has supported the partnership with project management and construction management services to The Christie and acting as client representative and providing relocation programme management to the University of Manchester.

Tom Finch, an associate at Arcadis acting as project manager lead for the Trust’s delivery, said: "This is a significant project that has brought our team’s depth of science and health experience to the fore in particular around life science delivery. 

“With a great deal of care and determination taken to understand the project and its impact, and working alongside an exceptional delivery team, including IHP, Imtech, CCTech, Actua and the critical stakeholders, we have created a facility that we can proudly state will be improving the quality of life for many, many people. 

“The research goal of this project is to understand the complexity of cancer and to translate that understanding into new approaches for the early detection and treatment of cancer and their ultimate adoption into clinical application.

“We are immensely proud to have played a part in achieving that on such a hugely complex scheme, and it has been a monumental effort by the team to achieve this success."

Arcadis also provided governance, stakeholder management and programme management for UoM to ensure operational readiness through the co-ordination of various workstreams, including technical integration of specialist equipment, logistics, operational plans and relocation management. 

Jade Flay, project director, Arcadis and client representative to The University of Manchester, said: "To be part of this scheme and seeing the new Paterson building re-emerge brings pride and the biggest sense of achievement. 

“But my role does not end here; we have planned and strategised as a group to bring back together 300 researchers, 1,800 assets and their invaluable work seamlessly into this fantastic new facility. 

“I cannot wait to see this facility in full operation and it will be an enabler to transforming patient outcomes through integrated advances in the prevention, early detection and treatment of cancer. The collaboration between The University of Manchester, Cancer Research UK and The Christie is a powerful partnership, rewriting the future of cancer."

The building will also house a centre of excellence for biomarker discovery and facilitate the co-location of the UoM’s and the Christie’s joint-appointed academic clinician scientists and research-active clinical consultants, alongside laboratory-based researchers from the Trust. 

For the past six years since the fire, the researchers have been split across various locations including Alderley Park where most of the Institute has been housed.