• Question: Why do scientists seem to spend a large amount of money on smaller scale things instead of looking into developing the cure for cancer?

    Asked by amyhoughton to Andrew, Daniel, Hayley, Peta on 23 Nov 2011.
    • Photo: Daniel Scully

      Daniel Scully answered on 23 Nov 2011:

      Well the science being used to develop cures for cancers are all based on science we learnt years ago while investigating other things, like particle physics, which had no obvious immediate medical benefit at the time. So our treatment for cancer would be a lot further behind if we didn’t do that.

      Throwing all your effort at one problem is not always the best way to solve it. You can learn from solving other problems too.

    • Photo: Peta Foster

      Peta Foster answered on 23 Nov 2011:

      I believe a lot of money is going towards the cure for cancer, but there are many other diseases that also need work, heart disease, Alzheimer’s etc and there are also many technological problems that need work… development of clean energy, better computers for modelling science.

      One of the beautiful things about science is that there are so many different things you could get involved in and all of them could be used to help people and to make the world a better place…

      .. i do hope you’ll get involved 😀

    • Photo: Hayley Smith

      Hayley Smith answered on 23 Nov 2011:

      My answer is kind of a combination of both Daniel’s and Peta’s…

      Firstly, although curing cancer is obviously a huge scientific problem there is no point fuelling all resources into that – there are many other problems (some larger scale, some smaller scale) that demand scientific input and large sums of money. These could be anything from other diseases to tecnological experiments.

      Often, advances in one area lead to massive advances in other areas… things develop and other applications of science and technology are found.

      Without doing particle physics, new detectors wouldn’t have been made – these are really important in the treatment of cancer. Without accelerator physics (including the design of large accelerators like the lhc) advances in accelerator design wouldn’t have happened as fast and this would have hampered the development of proton therapy machines which is a new technology for shrinking cancer tumours. For me, this is the beauty of science – most things being researched can be applied to many large global challenges!

      And I should also bang the drum here for STFC (Science and Technology Facilities Council – which is all of the scientists in this zone’s employer, essentially), and say that the research program that STFC is geared to cover all the grand challenges of today, medical, technological, climate based, security etc etc be that through the central labs (where I work) or through university funded research….

      Hopefully I’ve been able to demonstrate why all science is important and hopefully your generation will be able to continue the work by becoming the next scientists working at these frontiers…! 🙂

    • Photo: Andrew Cairns

      Andrew Cairns answered on 23 Nov 2011:

      I have to agree with all the others – yes it is important to do direct research into big problems in healthcare etc, like cancer, and indeed a lot of scientists do, but it is also critical that we do not neglect other things going on. Advances in one area can often lead to important and interesting advances in another area of science, and these areas of interdisciplinary research will be the most likely place where big answers to big problems will be found.

      As Peta says, there are also other diseases that are having devastating effects on people around the world – not least of all HIV/AIDS. As scientists we have a responsibility to advance *all* areas for the benefit of as many people as possible.

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