Funding schemes
open to researchers at any career stage
Discovery research has the potential to transform the way we understand life, health and wellbeing. We give researchers from any background the freedom and flexibility to be ambitious in their search for new understanding.
Advances in health come from unexpected sources and many interventions have already come from curiosity-driven discovery research. That why we’re funding research where the pathway to health impact is not immediately clear, or may take a long time.
The knowledge and tools our researchers generate through discovery research could inspire future improvements in human health or open up new fields of research to explore.
The greatest opportunities for discovery will come from a diversity of people, places and approaches. We work closely with partners and the people we fund to promote optimal research environments, solve bottlenecks, and support a thriving research culture.
By focusing on discovery research, we want to enable researchers to be ambitious, take on difficult problems, and adopt creative and innovative approaches to push the boundaries of our understanding of life, health and wellbeing.
We support a broad programme of discovery research that can build and shape new fields of enquiry or open up brand new ones through:
Discovery research we fund may, but does not have to relate to the health challenges that Wellcome is taking on.
Watch our webinars for early-career and established researchers and collaborative teams to hear more about our goals for Discovery Research at Wellcome.
open to researchers at any career stage
we can all help to build a better research culture – one that is inclusive, ethical and engaged
we're committed to making health research open to anyone with a great idea
Director of Discovery Research
Wellcome
See everyone who's in our discovery research team.
At the end of 2018, Wellcome launched a review to look at the way it funds science. This report presents the main findings.