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Research & new treatments

Medicine & Health

Studying diseases in the lab and developing the treatments that reach patients.

This suits you if…

You find the narrowing of a possibility space satisfying rather than disappointing, and you can work with real meaning on something that will most likely not turn into the thing you hoped for.

Look elsewhere if…

You want your work in front of people within a few years, or you aren't genuinely comfortable with animal research where your area requires it. Laboratory to patient typically takes over a decade, and the overwhelming majority of candidates fail somewhere along the way.

What the work actually is

What the work is actually like

Cell culture, assays, sequencing, analysis, and waiting. Biological experiments run on their own timescale, so the week is structured around when cells or animals or samples are ready rather than around your preferences. Clinical trial roles are different again: protocols, ethics approvals, patient records and meticulous compliance.

The catch

The timelines are brutal by any other field's standards. Bringing a treatment from laboratory to patients typically takes over a decade, and the overwhelming majority of candidate drugs fail somewhere along the way. You must be able to find meaning in careful work that will probably not produce the thing you hoped for, and be genuinely comfortable with animal research if your area requires it.

What people get wrong about it

That progress comes from breakthroughs. It comes from thousands of negative results narrowing a space, and the people who sustain a career here are those who find that narrowing satisfying rather than disappointing.

The jobs inside this area

  • Biomedical researcher
  • Pharmacologist
  • Geneticist
  • Clinical-trials coordinator
  • Medical-device researcher

A list, not a recommendation. You narrow it, we don’t.

What this kind of work usually offers

Helping people · Making thingsA generalisation about the sphere, not a promise about a salary. Pay and security vary enormously by country and employer.

How you get there

The one-line version

Biomedical science, then research. Research programs and ISEF are the early proving ground.

Stage by stage

  1. While you are still at school

    Biology and chemistry, plus statistics. Modern biomedicine is data-heavy. Research placement programmes and ISEF are the accessible early proving ground and are taken seriously by admissions.

  2. What you study

    Biomedical science, biochemistry, pharmacology or genetics, then usually a PhD for research independence. Choose a group whose techniques you want to learn, because your first job will largely be defined by the methods you can already run.

  3. How the first years actually go

    Research assistant or doctoral researcher on one small piece of a larger question. Industry alternatives such as trials coordination, regulatory affairs and medical science liaison are well-paid, stable and often overlooked by students who assume academia is the only destination.

Where this work lives, and how you reach it

What you would study for it

Each says what the first year is really made of, and who should study something else instead.

13 countries · 9 cities · 24 institutions named for this field. Each one states its catch as well as its appeal.

  • Kazakhstan

    Named here: Nazarbayev University · Al-Farabi Kazakh National University

  • Georgia

    Named here: Tbilisi State Medical University

  • Italy

    Named here: Sapienza University of Rome · University of Bologna

  • Switzerland

    Named here: University of Geneva

  • United Kingdom

    Named here: Imperial College London · University College London · University of Oxford · University of Cambridge

  • Poland

    Named here: Jagiellonian University

  • United Arab Emirates

    Named here: United Arab Emirates University

  • Türkiye

    Named here: Koç University

  • Singapore

    Named here: National University of Singapore

  • Hong Kong

    Named here: The University of Hong Kong · The Chinese University of Hong Kong

  • China

    Named here: Peking University · Fudan University · Shanghai Jiao Tong University

  • United States

    Named here: Harvard University · Columbia University · University of Washington

  • Canada

    Named here: University of Toronto · McGill University

Without leaving home

1 of the routes that need no visa and no move lead into this field.

Test it this month

Free, and finishable in a few evenings

Read the full published report of one clinical trial, including the methods and the limitations. Following how a claim is actually built and hedged in this field tells you whether the rigour appeals to you.