Richard Adams is Professor and Honorary Consultant Clinical Oncologist at Cardiff University and Velindre Cancer Centre. He is Director of Cancer Trials for the Centre for Trials Research and clinical Director of the Wales Cancer Bank. His clinical practice and research is focused on lower gastrointestinal cancers. He is chair of the National Cancer Research Institute CTRad WS2 (UK radiotherapy research) subgroup and the Clinical Expert Review Panel for CRUK. He is active in national and international research organisations including IRCI the International Rare Cancer Initiative (for anal cancer) and ARCAD (for metastatic colorectal cancer).

Richard chairs the biomarker development group for the UK phase III FOCUS4 trial in metastatic colorectal cancer and is Chief investigator for the FOCUS4 D and N trials. He leads on the radiotherapy quality assurance programme for the UK rectal cancer trials. He has a role within Wales to engage researchers in cancer clinical research . He oversees collaborative translational research in numerous phase II/ III colorectal cancer trials. He was a founder member of and now chairs the South Wales Sierra Leone Cancer Care link.