healthcare system and requires no special preparation of samples. As part of embedded research in a learning healthcare system, standardised broad genomic profiling, such as the Glasgow Cancer Test, can provide the large datasets that researchers need to continually refine current treatments and develop new ones as part of precision medicine. Biankin has said that "While this is an entirely new way of looking at the world of drug development and delivery, there are no options. The pressures of an ageing population mean that we must rethink the way we approach healthcare." "Finding the right way for precision medicine to work in healthcare systems is a bit like breaking a wartime code – the stakes are high and time is against us. Breaking the cancer code that connects the cancer genomes to the patient's treatment is what drives me as a scientist and a doctor." Global data sharing In 2018 Biankin took over as Executive Director and Chairman of the International Cancer Genome Consortium and set about developing the Accelerated Research for Genomic Oncology (ICGC-ARGO) initiative. ICGC is an international network of cancer clinicians, researchers and clinical trials groups and the ARGO initiative aims to capture, aggregate and harmonise the rich, longitudinal, clinical data of some 200,000 people to provide a million patient-years of precision oncology knowledge in a manner that allows for broad, but ethically responsible, data sharing and research. The aim with ICGC-ARGO is to change culture and practice on an international level with support for the embedding of clinical trials in learning health systems and the development of a standardised assays used in the clinical trials of the consortium to produce rich comparable and shareable longitudinal data globally References Living people Academics of the University of Glasgow Australian medical researchers Officers of the Order of Australia 1966 births