2025 BACR Student Impact Award Winner

07 Jul 2025

Kyle Greenland

Doctoral Researcher

Department of Surgery and Cancer

Imperial Centre for Translational & Experimental Medicine

My name is Kyle Greenland, and I’m a final-year PhD student at Imperial College London, about to submit my thesis at the end of this month. I’m thrilled and deeply honoured to receive the BACR Student Impact Award, which celebrates both research achievement and community engagement.

Growing up in a rural Welsh comprehensive school, I loved science and maths but struggled with reading, writing, and spelling. It wasn’t until I began my undergraduate degree at Imperial that I was diagnosed with dyslexia, an explanation for years of difficulty and the start of a new chapter. My parents, who were completely unfamiliar with university applications, and a group of teachers who “went the extra mile,” believed in me long before I learned to believe in myself. Their support taught me that everyone deserves a chance to shine in STEM, regardless of background or learning style.

At Imperial, I earned a place on the inaugural Medical Biosciences programme and discovered my passion for cancer biology.  Studying at Imperial and living in London opened doors that I couldn’t have imagined before I started. I also met some of my best undergraduate friends, many of whom remain part of my day-to-day life today. I was drawn to translational oncology and planned to stay on for an MRes, but the £13,000 tuition fee felt insurmountable; my parents even considered remortgaging our home. However, a generous Imperial scholarship changed everything, covering my fees and allowing me to focus on research. During my master’s, it suddenly dawned on me how much I loved the hands-on environment of discovery and problem-solving, and I knew I wanted to pursue a research career.

When I finished my MRes, I was fortunate to earn a place on Imperial’s MRC Doctoral Training Partnership. The DTP gave me the freedom to design a PhD project around my core interests. Together with Professor Charlotte Bevan, we developed a multidisciplinary project engineering a novel liposomal drug-delivery system for advanced prostate cancer. Half my time has been spent in the chemistry lab, formulating and characterising enzyme-responsive liposomes alongside colleagues in the Department of Chemistry, and the other half in biology, testing those liposomes in cell-based assays to see how they remodel the tumour microenvironment. Working across disciplines pushed me to speak different scientific “languages,” troubleshoot unfamiliar protocols, and build a toolkit I wouldn’t have gained in a single lab alone.

Soon after starting my PhD, I also co-founded STEMaccess (www.stemaccess.co.uk), a tuition and mentoring company that provides extensive outreach for students from under-represented backgrounds. Partnering with the Seren Network and The Elephant Group, we ran workshops on personal statements, degree choices, and interview skills. One student’s story still moves me: the student was offered a place to study dentistry but was only achieving D grades. The student was then paired with one of our expert tutors, who helped her structure revision and rebuild confidence. By exam day, her grades had soared from D to A, and she was able to start her dream course.

Over the past four years, STEMaccess has reached more than 1,000 pupils across the UK. I’ve led our “Spotlight on Biology” webinars, covering topics from CRISPR to tumour immunology, to give school students a window into real university-level science. Hearing a Year 11 pupil say, “I never knew cancer research could be so exciting,” reminds me why outreach matters; it plants seeds of possibility in minds that might otherwise never consider a career in STEM.

Public engagement has been another key part of my PhD journey. In 2022, I was invited to speak at the Big Bang Fair, a large STEM event for school students, a particularly meaningful moment for me, since I attended the same fair in Year 10 and credit it with sparking my interest in science. More recently, I presented at Pint of Science 2023, where I spoke about the challenges of treating cancer and how we’re using nanomedicines to overcome resistance. Engaging directly with the public, including people who had personal experience with cancer, reminded me how important it is to explain science clearly and compassionately.

I also participated in STEM for Britain 2024, a national competition where early-career researchers present their work to MPs and policymakers in Parliament. I was incredibly proud to be awarded 1st place in the Biomedical Sciences category, not just for the recognition but because it confirmed the importance of making complex science accessible. Following the competition, I was asked to write an article for Science in Parliament, a magazine distributed to all MPs, where I summarised my liposome research in plain, engaging language. It was a great opportunity to advocate for cancer research and science-informed policy on a national level.

I’ve also worked to support the cancer research community more directly. In 2023, I was part of the organising committee and served as co-chair for the inaugural BACR Early Career Conference, Trailblazers in Cancer Research. The event brought together over 85 early-career researchers from across the UK for a packed programme that included patient and public involvement training, career development panels, and cutting-edge research talks. It was a privilege to help shape a conference that supported and celebrated the next generation of cancer scientists.

Since then, I’ve also taken on the role of Student Manager of the Drug Discovery Student Research Network, a student-led platform at Imperial aimed at connecting students, academics, and industry professionals working in therapeutic development. In September 2024, we ran our first conference, which featured expert talks on emerging drug discovery platforms, roundtables on academic-industry collaboration, and networking sessions for early-career researchers. Feedback was overwhelmingly positive, and we’re now planning to expand the event into an annual fixture.

Outside of academia, I’ve looked for ways to support cancer causes more broadly. In 2024, I ran the London Marathon in support of Prostate Cancer UK, raising over £2,000 to fund vital research and patient support services. As someone working in prostate cancer research, the cause is especially close to home, and the experience reminded me of the real lives behind the science we do.

Looking back, the most rewarding part of my PhD has been the people: the students I’ve mentored, the collaborators who taught me new techniques, and the public audiences who shared their experiences. These citizenship activities have shaped me into a scientist who not only pushes boundaries in the lab but also strives to make science more open, inclusive, and impactful for everyone. I’m profoundly grateful to BACR for this award and excited to carry these lessons forward into my post-PhD career, where I hope to continue championing both tumour-microenvironment research and wider access to STEM.

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