You can absolutely make a career in academia by chasing whatever the Funding agencies want you to chase, because that's where the funding is. Doesn't mean your

You can absolutely make a career in academia by chasing whatever the Funding agencies want you to chase, because that's where the funding is. Doesn't mean your research is actually contributing to anything useful though. Look at this :https://www.epsrc.ac.uk/funding/calls/irc-targeted-therapeutic-delivery/ https://www.epsrc.ac.uk/funding/calls/irc-targeted-therapeut... a couple of companies are paying for research that THEY want done. Doesn't meant that research is actually benificial for the field of study. People from minorly related fields will be applying for this and doing research for them just to get funding, not because they have an interest in the field or in the research results.