Grants
Advanced Clinical Fellowship
Grant amount:
Advanced Clinical Fellowships – up to £750,000
Grant deadline:
15 October 2026
Our Advanced Clinical Fellowships will provide funding to support applicants wishing to develop and further a career combining dementia research and clinical practice. Funding will support the time, materials and training required for dementia clinicians to commit time and resource to research, informed and strengthened by concurrent clinical work as they move towards establishing independent research programmes.
Deadlines
Applications open
July 2026
Deadline
15 October 2026
Funding outcome
Between December 2026 to January 2027
Applicants should:
- Be registered healthcare professionals, including but not limited to neurologists, old age psychiatrists, clinical psychologists, nurses and allied health professionals.
- Hold a strong track record of original, impactful research, with increasing experience in publication, presentation and review.
- Be able to demonstrate progress made towards independence, and commitment to developing collaborations and partnerships.
Detailed skills and training which should be demonstrated are described in our Early Career Research Framework.
We welcome applications from individuals who have taken a break from research and wish to return.
These awards will support clinical and translational research projects that align with the Alzheimer’s Research UK Research Strategy, focusing on treatment, diagnosis and prevention of dementia. At this time, we are particularly interested in applications proposing to involve interventional clinical trials and samples. We welcome applications from those wishing to gain experience within a clinical trial alongside research as part of a Fellowship. Applicants with queries concerning their eligibility or project suitability for this grant call are encouraged to contact the Alzheimer's Research UK Clinical Research Team at research@alzheimersresearchuk.org.
Eligibility: Eligible candidates must be clinically qualified and active in the UK with adequate research experience and be proposing to work on clinical research projects that align with Alzheimer's Research UK's funding remit. Flexible approaches to research-dedicated time will be considered. Applicants should be supported via Supervisors or Mentors at a UK-based home institution.
Grant Amount: Awards will cover the applicant’s salary for 50% dedicated research time on the Fellowship (up to 0.5 Full Time Equivalent) alongside justified project costs that have not already been funded elsewhere. This may include training and development costs, including a period of overseas training, travel and subsistence to support conference and meeting attendance, and Patient and Public Involvement.
Duration: We expect fellowships to be completed within 5 years however this may be negotiated to allow a beneficial balance of clinical- and research-dedicated time. We anticipate 0.5FTE will be dedicated to the fellowship and we encourage applicants to justify their time-split with clinical duties within the application.
The Applicant:
- The applicant must be clinically qualified and active in the UK, as relevant to their discipline.
- As described above, applicants should hold a strong track record of original, impactful research, with increasing experience in publication, presentation and review. They should be able to demonstrate progress made towards independence, and commitment to developing collaborations and partnerships.
The Project:
- Research projects must align with the Alzheimer’s Research UK Research Strategy, focusing on treatment, diagnosis and prevention of dementia, however applications concerning clinical trials are particularly encouraged.
- Awarded grants will be dependent on requisite approvals (Ethics and/or Home Office Licences) and commitment to Alzheimer's Research UK Research Policies.
Host Institution, Supervision and Mentorship:
- Applicants are required to have secured a Sponsor, an established investigator at the prospective Fellow’s institution (Host Institution) who will provide the facilities required for the research programme to run successfully.
- The Host Institution must be UK-based however the application may include collaborators outside of the UK.
- Joint funding between Alzheimer's Research UK and the applicant’s Host Institution may be proposed, and clearly explained in the Application Form, Costings and Institutional Letter of Support. If this applies to you, please contact us to discuss this before you apply.
- A letter of support from the Host Institution is required to confirm support for the application, in addition to letters of support from any collaborating organisations.
Applications are made via our grant application website.
Grant schemes only appear on this website when the round is open and we are accepting new applications.
Alzheimer’s Research UK is a member of the Association of Medical Research Charities and follows their guidelines for best practice in peer review. Grants are awarded entirely on scientific merit in relation to Alzheimer's Research UK's remit and on the basis of open competition. The quality of the application and applicants is the key determinant of outcome, although the strength of the dementia research environment within the institution is also considered.
Triage
Three expert panel members from our Clinical Committee (CC), who are not conflicted, carry out an in-depth assessment of the applications drawing on their specific areas of expertise, and score each application. Applications are triaged based on score, to determine which applications move forward in the review process and invited for interview. Scoring and Review criteria are available here.
Rebuttal Opportunity
Before final review, applicants are given the opportunity to respond to the feedback from the CC members. This rebuttal stage allows applicants to address any concerns or questions raised by the reviewers, providing clarifications or additional information to support their application. For prospective fellows, this will be in the form of live rebuttal during the interview process.
Lived Experience Review
All applications are sent for Lived Experience Review. As part of the application, applicants are required to write a Plain English proposal, which are sent to volunteers from the Lived Experience Involvement Group, alongside with proposed PPI plans, for comments, and for scoring. Representatives from the Lived Experience Involvement Group sit on the CC and the lived experience reviews are made available to all CC members to ensure they are incorporated into the discussion at the committee meeting.
Fellowship Interviews
As part of our review process, for successfully triaged applicants, interviews will be conducted at the CC meeting. The interview panel will consist of scientific members and members with lived experience of dementia.
During the interview, prospective Fellows will be asked to deliver a 5 minute PowerPoint presentation outlining their work. This presentation provides an opportunity to showcase their research, respond to review comments, and discuss the proposal’s potential impact.
Final Funding Recommendations
Based on the in-depth discussions and assessments, the CC makes final recommendations for funding.
Success rate
In the last three years Alzheimer’s Research UK has received 19 applications for the Clinical Research Fellowship. 4 of these projects were awarded funding.
The terms and conditions of grant differ for each grant scheme and contracts are drawn up individually once the grants have been awarded.
Monitoring
All grant holders are expected to report on the progress of their project on a regular basis. Read more about our reporting requirements on the measuring impact page.
For more information about any of the grant schemes or the application process please contact the Research Team research@alzheimersresearchuk.org or 0300 111 5555
All applications submitted to Alzheimer’s Research UK are subject to the policies found in Research guidelines and policies. Please ensure you familiarise yourself with these policies and contact research@alzheimersresearchuk.org with any queries.
As a member of the Association of Medical Research Charities, Alzheimer's Research UK is only able to reimburse directly incurred research costs as justified in the submitted application. Inflation costs may be included but clearly indicated.
Costs may include, but are not limited to:
- Salary: Salary at the appropriate grade for time spent (up to 0.5FTE) on the Fellowship. This should be in line with published NHS salary bands and may not include proposed allocated time to clinical work.
- Justified project costs: consumables, materials, lab costs and small, project-specific pieces of equipment.
- Additional staff time: (technician, research assistant) if needed to support project progress.
- Travel and subsistence: to cover conference and meeting attendance, intended to facilitate broad collaboration.
- Training: costs to cover relevant training, including, where justified, a period of training overseas.
- Patient and Public Involvement: Justified support for participant recruitment and retention, and Patient and Public Involvement and Engagement.
- Open access publication costs following Alzheimer’s Research UK’s open access policy.