The UK government is backing five new health research hubs with more than £52 million to develop technologies that spot serious illness years earlier, UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) announced on 6 November 2026.

Partners including the NHS, charities and global industry firms such as Google, Siemens and Medtronic are contributing a further £37.5 million in cash and in-kind support, bringing the total programme value to more than £89 million.

The hubs, funded through UKRI's Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council, are based in Exeter, London, Southampton and Sunderland, and will bring together engineering and physical sciences experts from across England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.

Each hub targets a different clinical challenge. BRAINIAC, led by the University of Exeter, will create the UK's first network of NHS brain health clinics, where AI combines blood tests, brain scans and memory tests to speed dementia diagnosis by up to 50%. BRAIN-SAFE at Imperial College London focuses on traumatic brain injury, while the HeartTech hub at King's College London works on personalised cardiovascular care.

The CRISP hub at the University of Southampton will develop wearable sensors, smartphone tools and at-home tests to monitor flu and other acute respiratory infections. NORI, at the University of Sunderland, will use AI to read routine eye scans for early signs of diabetes and heart disease. Science minister Chris McDonald visited the Sunderland hub to announce the funding.

This is research funding, not a deployed NHS service: no clinical timelines for patient-facing use have been announced, and the aims — such as faster diagnosis — are targets, not reported results. UKRI says the hubs build on earlier work, including what it describes as the world's first AI-assisted brain tumour surgery.