15 July 2026

The second round of the CTM Research Partnership Catalyst Awards has been awarded.  

This scheme offers two-year funding of one day a week of protected research to postdoctoral consultant or senior health professionals at one of the King’s Health Partners (KHP) Trusts. These awards are designed to provide a part-time route for research experienced health professionals to increase their research activity and enable the formation of strong research partnerships across and beyond KHP. 

Patient representatives and clinical academics across all four partners have been involved at every stage of decision-making on funding awards.  

The following nine doctors, one clinical psychologist, and one dietician were awarded a Research Partnership Catalyst Award.

  • Antonio D'Alessio - A prospective liquid biopsy strategy to support treatment de-escalation in advanced hepatocellular carcinoma. 
  • Asit Arora - Translational Pathway Modelling and Early Clinical Validation in Head and Neck Cancer.  
  • Benjamin Blaise - VDLI - Video versus Direct Laryngoscopy in Infants. 
  • Salwa Idle - Closing the Iron-gap: Improving Recognition and Outcomes through Novel Community-Based Point-of-Care Testing for Iron Deficiency and Anaemia in Women with Heavy Menstrual Bleeding (IRON-GAP Study). 
  • Anthony Hart - Continuous Amplitude Integrated EEG Monitoring in Preterm Infants: A Pilot Study to Inform Multicentre Trials. 
  • Arief Gunawan - Machine Learning-driven Risk Stratification for MGUS: Towards Equitable and Sustainable Digital Monitoring. 
  • Christopher Harris - The effect of dexamethasone and diuretic therapy on the lung function of infants born prematurely with evolving or established bronchopulmonary dysplasia. 
  • Katherine Myall - Identifying Early Predictors of Fibrotic Lung Disease Using Sleep-Derived Hypoxic Burden. 
  • Cliona Brennan - Bridging the Gap: Adapting Intensive Community Treatment to Better Serve Autistic Young People with Eating Disorders. 
  • Natasha Vorontsova - Schema Therapy adapted for paranoia in psychosis.  
  • Nick Medford - The relationship between insight and interoception in acquired brain injury. 

The Centre for Translational Medicine brings together the organisations of King’s Health Partners to work in partnership to improve the health of people locally, nationally, and globally, accelerating targeted, sustainable and more equitable health outcomes for patients and communities across south east London and beyond.

The Centre for Translational Medicine aims to: 

  • address the major health burdens for local, national and global communities – and to challenge existing health inequalities;  
  • combine our outstanding clinical and scientific expertise to deliver excellent outcomes for patients;   
  • develop the next generation of clinical-academic leaders, skilled in delivering impactful translational biomedical research.   

Thanks to generous funding from the Guy’s & St Thomas’ Charity, King’s College London, and Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust - together we have:  

  • Generated more than 590 publications in a single year and supported practice changing studies, including major clinical trials and AI enabled diagnostics that are already influencing care. 
  • Delivered strong return on investment with over £83 million secured to expand research and innovation across the partnership. 
  • Improved outcomes for patients, contributing to regulatory decisions, new treatments, and clinical tools - as well as supporting spinouts and technologies now being adopted in healthcare settings. 
  • Strengthened the clinical academic workforce, with high progression rates into further funding and a diverse pipeline of researchers, including under represented professional groups. 
  • Embedded health equity and community partnership into research - ensuring studies are co designed with patients and communities and better reflect real world populations and needs.   

Find out more about funding opportunities from the KHP Centre for Translational Medicine.