diff --git a/distributed/protocol/pickle.py b/distributed/protocol/pickle.py
index 8419541687f..1a0ce6c6371 100644
--- a/distributed/protocol/pickle.py
+++ b/distributed/protocol/pickle.py
@@ -7,8 +7,10 @@
 
 if sys.version_info.major == 2:
     import cPickle as pickle
+    from pickle import load as pyload
 else:
     import pickle
+    from pickle import _load as pyload
 
 logger = logging.getLogger(__name__)
 
@@ -27,6 +29,67 @@ def _always_use_pickle_for(x):
         return False
 
 
+class _BytelistFile(object):
+
+    def __init__(self, chunks=None):
+        if chunks is None:
+            chunks = []
+        self._chunks = chunks
+        self._pos = sum(len(c) for c in chunks)
+
+    def __len__(self):
+        return sum(len(c) for c in self._chunks)
+
+    def write(self, chunk):
+        self._chunks.append(chunk)
+
+    def read(self, size=None):
+        return b''.join(self._collect_chunks(size=size))
+
+    def readline(self):
+        raise NotImplementedError
+
+    def _collect_chunks(self, size=None):
+        pos = self._pos
+        remainder = (len(self) - pos) if size is None else size
+        if remainder <= 0:
+            return []
+        collected = []
+        left_to_skip = pos
+        for chunk in self._chunks:
+            if remainder <= 0:
+                break
+            if left_to_skip > 0:
+                if left_to_skip > len(chunk):
+                    left_to_skip -= len(chunk)
+                else:
+                    chunk = chunk[left_to_skip:left_to_skip + remainder]
+                    left_to_skip = 0
+                    collected.append(chunk)
+                    remainder -= len(chunk)
+            else:
+                if len(chunk) <= remainder:
+                    collected.append(chunk)
+                    remainder -= len(chunk)
+                else:
+                    chunk = chunk[:remainder]
+                    collected.append(chunk)
+                    remainder = 0
+        self._pos += sum(len(c) for c in collected)
+        return collected
+
+    def tell(self):
+        return self._pos
+
+    def seek(self, pos):
+        if pos < 0:
+            raise ValueError("Negative position %d is invalid." % pos)
+        elif pos > len(self):
+            raise ValueError("Position %d is larger than size %d."
+                             % (pos, len(self)))
+        self._pos = pos
+
+
 def dumps(x):
     """ Manage between cloudpickle and pickle
 
@@ -54,9 +117,40 @@ def dumps(x):
             raise
 
 
+def dump_bytelist(x):
+    """Serialize the list of chunks using the pickle protocol
+
+    Note that cloudpickle leverages nocopy semantics using memoryviews on
+    large contiguous datastructures such as numpy arrays and derivatives.
+    """
+    # TODO: if Python 3 dump supports nocopy dump we should try use it first
+    # and only fallback to cloudpickle
+    try:
+        writer = _BytelistFile()
+        cloudpickle.dump(x, writer, protocol=pickle.HIGHEST_PROTOCOL)
+        return writer._chunks
+    except Exception as e:
+        logger.info("Failed to serialize %s. Exception: %s", x, e)
+        raise
+
+
 def loads(x):
     try:
         return pickle.loads(x)
     except Exception:
         logger.info("Failed to deserialize %s", x[:10000], exc_info=True)
         raise
+
+
+def load_bytelist(bytelist):
+    try:
+        reader = _BytelistFile(bytelist)
+        reader.seek(0)
+        # Use the Python-based Unpickler to avoid a memory-copy when loading
+        # large binary data buffers that back numpy arrays and pandas data
+        # frames.
+        return pyload(reader)
+    except Exception:
+        logger.info("Failed to deserialize %s", bytelist[0][:10000],
+                    exc_info=True)
+        raise
diff --git a/distributed/protocol/serialize.py b/distributed/protocol/serialize.py
index 1b7b99b9edb..089b7420198 100644
--- a/distributed/protocol/serialize.py
+++ b/distributed/protocol/serialize.py
@@ -17,7 +17,7 @@
 
 
 serializers = {}
-deserializers = {None: lambda header, frames: pickle.loads(b''.join(frames))}
+deserializers = {None: lambda header, frames: pickle.load_bytelist(frames)}
 
 lazy_registrations = {}
 
@@ -132,7 +132,7 @@ def serialize(x):
     else:
         if _find_lazy_registration(name):
             return serialize(x)  # recurse
-        header, frames = {}, [pickle.dumps(x)]
+        header, frames = {}, pickle.dump_bytelist(x)
 
     return header, frames
 
diff --git a/requirements.txt b/requirements.txt
index 79b2ed02d12..0a0796cb1e1 100644
--- a/requirements.txt
+++ b/requirements.txt
@@ -1,5 +1,5 @@
 click >= 6.6
-cloudpickle >= 0.2.2
+git+git://github.com/cloudpipe/cloudpickle@nocopy-memoryviews#egg=cloudpickle
 dask >= 0.16.0
 msgpack-python
 psutil