Duncan is the Professor of Cancer Therapeutics at the University of Cambridge. He is the Cambridge Experimental Cancer Medicine Centre (ECMC) Lead, Director of the Cambridge Cancer Trials Centre (CCTC) and an honorary consultant at Addenbrooke’s Hospital. Duncan is a fully trained and accredited Medical Oncologist who completed his doctoral thesis work at the Institute of Cancer Research. He undertook post-doctoral research at the University of Maryland, before returning to the Royal Marsden Hospital and subsequently the Beatson Oncology Centre, where he completed his clinical speciality training.
In 1994, Duncan joined the faculty at the University of Edinburgh where, in addition to his clinical practice, he established research teams undertaking Early Phase clinical trials and a pharmacology laboratory. He was awarded a personal chair by the University of Edinburgh in 2006 and in 2008 he moved to Cambridge, after election to the Chair of Cancer Therapeutics.
Since moving to Cambridge, he has been involved in establishing the specialist oncology clinic for patients with pancreatic cancer (in 2009), which, together with his research activity in cancer therapeutics, were major factors in Cambridge's successful application to become the Regional Centre for Pancreatic Cancer (in 2010). As the Cambridge ECMC Lead, he manages a research team and clinic, facilitating access to clinical trials of new therapeutics for patients across the East of England.