Over 20,000 people work at the site, which is home to Cambridge University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, Royal Papworth Hospital NHS Foundation Trust, AstraZeneca's headquarters, Abcam, the Wellcome Trust, Cancer Research UK, the University of Cambridge's medical school, and the United Kingdom's governmental Medical Research Council, which has National Institute for Health and Care Research-designated biomedical research centre status.

Research activities span all preclinical functional groups, including antibody engineering, medicinal chemistry and high throughput screening.

It was founded in Cambridge in 1947 as the Unit for Research on the Molecular Structure of Biological Systems and moved to a site adjacent to Addenbrooke's Hospital in 1962.

The Wellcome Trust also funds the SCI's internationally competitive 4-Year PhD Programme in Stem Cell Biology and Medicine.

Research in the Institute focuses primarily on Tumour Ecology and Evolution, with investigations across four main areas:[12] The centre was officially opened by Queen Elizabeth II in February 2007.

The MRC Mitochondrial Biology Unit is a department of the School of Clinical Medicine of the University of Cambridge, funded by the Medical Research Council.

Lead researchers include Krishna Chatterjee, David Dunger, Sadaf Farooqi, Nita Forouhi, Stephen O’Rahilly, Nigel Unwin, Antonio Vidal-Puig, Nick Wareham, and Giles Yeo, among many others.

It is a research institute aiming to "understand, and eventually to alleviate and repair damage to the brain and spinal cord which results from injury or neurodegenerative disease.

[22] The Cambridge Academy for Science and Technology is a secondary school for 14- to 18-year-olds offering GCSE, B-Tech and A-Level courses.

On Friday 19 September 2017, it moved into its own building on Robinson Way, situated next to the Long Road Sixth Form College, parallel to the Bio-Medical Campus which encompasses Addenbrooke's Hospital, rebranded as Cambridge Academy for Science and Technology.