Dr. Santiago Ramón y Cajal, head of the Molecular Pathology Service and group at the Vall d’Hebron Institute of Research (VHIR), has entered the Spanish Royal Academy of Doctors as full member. The topic chosen for his speech was the challenge of the pathological and molecular heterogeneity of cancer, and the new paradigms of the research. In his speech, he reviewed the research lines that his group has developed during the last years, as well as the most relevant advances in this field. He also suggested a change in the structure of the research, based in the creation of multidisciplinary teams in order to manage the knowledge, and to coordinate and monitor the projects.During his lecture, Dr. Ramón y Cajal also explained that the research is advancing a lot in the knowledge of cancer. In fact in the field of Molecular Pathology, researchers are continuously describing new variants of tumors, and in the field of molecular biology, they are identifying genetic and biochemical alterations.