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| Professor Qasim Aziz | |||
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Professor Aziz graduated from King Edward Medical College , Lahore , Pakistan . He started his training in general medicine in the UK in 1988 and worked as senior house officer and registrar at Hope Hospital Salford. He started his research training in 1992 and held the posts of lecturer, senior lecturer and professor of gastroenterology at Hope Hospital , University of Manchester between 1994 and 2006. He moved to Barts and The London in December 2006.
Professor Aziz has pioneered the use of neurophysiological techniques to study human brain gut interactions in health and disease. His PhD work led to the identification of the cortical representation of swallowing muscles and also he also identified the cortical centers involved in processing gut sensation. He currently holds the MRC Career Establishment Award and prior to that was an MRC Clinician Scientist. He was awarded the Sir Francis Avery Jones Research Gold Medal by the British Society of Gastroenterology in 1998 and the Janssen Award for Basic and Clinical Research by the American Gastroenterology Association in 2000. He is currently the Chairman of the Neuro-Gastroenterology Section of the British Society of Gastroenterology and a member of the executive committee of the European Society of Neurogastroenterology and Motility.
| Professor David Baker | ||
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David Baker spent his academic career based at different places of the University of London . He was awarded a BSc (Hons) in Zoology from Bedford College in 1983 and was awarded a PhD from London University in Immunology/Pathology in 1987 for work at the Institute of Basic medical Science on immunological tolerance induction in delayed hypersensitivity of the s kin. He then spent six years as the Angela Limerick lecturer, for multiple sclerosis research at the Hunterian Institute, The Royal College of Surgeons of England working on delayed hypersensitivity in the brain, where he developed an active research interest in multiple sclerosis. He took a 5 year Principal Fellowship to the Institute of Ophthalmolog y , University College London in 1994 and became the first Senior Fellow of the Multiple Sclerosis Society and moved to the Institute of Neurolog y , University College London in 1999. He became a senior lecturer in 2003 and got a personal chair in 200 4 as P rofessor of Neuroimmunology. He moved to Queen Mary in the autumn of 2006.
| Dr Matthias Dittmar | ||
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Matthias T. Dittmar graduated in Biochemistry from University Frankfurt/M., Germany (1994) studying variability and pathogenicity of the envelope proteins of simian immunodeficiency viruses (SIV). After a post-doctoral time at the Institute of Cancer Research, London (1995-1997) he established his own research group at the Henrich-Pette-Institute, Hamburg, Germany before moving to Heidelberg where he took up a lecturer position with the Medical Faculty at Ruprecht-Karls-University Heidelberg.
In April 2007 he joint the Blizard Institute of Cell and Molecular Science, Centre for Immunology and Infectious Disease and will continue his work on emerging drug resistance and v iral fitness of HIV-1 and HIV-2 and the identification of novel cellular targets to interfere with virus-cell fusion.
| Professor Inderjeet Dokal | ||
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Inderjeet Dokal graduated in Medicine from the University of Leicester in 1983. He moved to Hammersmith Hospital in 1984 where he received his post graduate clinical and research training. He was appointed Consultant in Paediatric Haematology in 1995 and was conferred the title of Professor of Haematology at Imperial College in 2003. In 2006 he was recruited to the Chair in Child Health at Queen Mary College/The Royal London.
The main clinical and research focus has been in the the field of aplastic anaemia (AA). In collaboration with Dr Tom Vulliamy he has developed a research programme for AA (dyskeratosis congenita, Fanconi anaemia and other types of AA) as treatment for some AA patients remains unsatisfactory. Many patients have been treated using protocols pioneered by his group. In addition to aplastic anaemia he has a clinical and research interest in other haematological disorders including haemoglobinopathies. The group's research is currently funded a Wellcome Trust Programme grant and an MRC project grant.
| Professor Marco Falasca | ||
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After my initial research training in Italy, Consorzio Mario Negri Sud, I took up a position at New York University Medical Center, Department of Pharmacology (Head Prof Joseph Schlessinger). During these years I developed my interests in inositide signalling linked to disease such as cancer and diabetes. In 2001 I was appointed as a Principal Research Fellow at University College London, Department of Medicine. In March 2007, I was appointed Professor of Signal Transduction within the Centre for Diabetes at QMUL with a remit to study signal transduction in diabetes, cardiovascular disease and cancer.
| Professor Gavin Giovannoni | ||
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I took up the Chair of Neurology at Barts and The London Hospital and Queen Mary University London on 1st November 2006. I did my undergraduate medical training at the University of the Witwatersrand, South Africa , where I graduated cum laude in 1987, winning the gold medal in both medicine and surgery. I moved to London after completing my specialist training in neurology in 1993. I was awarded a PhD from the University of London in 1998, having worked on biomarkers in multiple sclerosis. My research and clinical interests include multiple sclerosis and other inflammatory disorders of the central nervous system. I run a MS clinical trials unit and I am the principal investigator on several phase II and III MS trials. Other interests include biomarker discovery, both for studying both pathogenesis of MS and to establish predictive testing. I believe the latter will become increasingly important in the future to identify patients most likely to respond to disease modifying therapies, to select patients for clinical trials and to assess individual patient's response to treatment. I am particularly interested in issues that relate to optimizing MS disease modifying therapies and particularly the impact and immunology of neutralizing anti-interferon beta antibodies. I run a specialist clinical neuroinflammatory service a research group investigating both basic science and clinical aspects of MS. Other research interests include antibody mediated autoimmune disorders of the central nervous system.
| Professor Jonathan Grigg | ||
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Previously at the Department of Child Health, University of Leicester, Professor Grigg's area of research lies in the mechanisms of respiratory disease in children, and new treatments for wheezing disorders in young children. He is particularly interested in the hidden adverse costs of air pollution and how environmental factors, such as particles of carbon from exhaust pipes, impact on lung growth. By measuring, for example, carbon content in the lower airway cells of children aged between 7 and 18 years, Professor Grigg and his team have found that higher levels of carbon equate to lower levels of lung function. He is also investigating the mechanism underlying the increased vulnerability to pneumonia in children exposed to air pollution in the developing world. (Indoor smoke is an additional factor here - over two million children a year die as a result of an increased susceptibility to infection). This represents a new area of research, and is the first phase of a strategy to link an understanding of basic mechanisms to effective exposure reduction in the field. Professor Grigg is also looking at ways in which children might be protected from these effects - for example the development of new stove designs in Guatemala , and biogas stoves in India.
More broadly, Professor Grigg has plans to develop a Centre for Children's Environmental Health at Queen Mary. There are several in the US and Canada but none in the UK . At its core
will be programme of clinical research with the strategic aim of reducing environmental threats to children's health in the UK.
| Dr Stephen Kempley | ||
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Steve Kempley has recently joined the Centre for Paediatrics, having been a Consultant Neonatologist and Honorary Senior Lecturer at Barts and the London for the last 14 years.
He graduated in Medical Sciences and Experimental Psychology from the University of Cambridge in 1979, subsequently graduating in Clinical Medicine from Cambridge in 1981. He moved into Paediatrics in Glasgow immediately from medical school, also gaining early paediatric training at King's College, Great Ormond Street , Liverpool and Camberwell. He took up the post of Clinical Lecturer in Neonatal Medicine at King's College in 1998 where he developed an interest in the use of Doppler ultrasound to study the neonatal circulation, with particular reference to the role of mesenteric circulatory disturbances in the aetiology of necrotising enterocolitis.
He joined the Neonatal unit at the Royal London in 1993 and been actively involved in developing standards and capacity in this service. He also lead the development of the Neonatal Transfer Service for London , Kent , Surrey and Sussex , setting up and delivering the first intensive care Neonatal Transport Team for London .
He has been actively involved in student education, developing the school's first Paediatric OSCE examination in 1993, as well as contributing actively to the delivery and development of the neonatal and paediatric teaching in the Human Development module. He has now taken on the role of Module Convenor for Human Development.
Steve is a keen mountaineer, with climbing experience in the UK , Alps and Kyrgyzstan . He is involved in Barts and the London Alpine Club.
| Dr Charles Knowles | ||
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Charles Knowles undertook his preclinical training at Cambridge University and then moved to the London Hospital Medical College , qualifying in 1992. He quickly progressed with a career in surgery, passing the FRCS examination (London) in 1996. Prior to specialist training, he undertook a considerable body of research based at Barts & the London , and funded by the Royal College of Surgeons of England . During this time, he was awarded the degree of PhD at the University of London entitled 'clinical and aetiological studies in slow transit constipation'. He continued to actively participate in research during Specialist Registrar training (General Surgery) in the North-East Thames Region in the role of Clinical Lecturer in Academic Surgery. After successfully completing the final Intercollegiate Specialty Boards Examination in General Surgery (sub-specialty: Colorectal) he entered the Specialist Register in 2005. In September 2006 he was appointed Senior Lecturer in Colorectal Surgery on the basis of a prestigious award from HEFCE partnered by Honorary Consultant appointments at Barts and the London and the Homerton University NHS Foundation Trusts. His main clinical interest is in the management of benign coloproctological conditions.
| Dr James Lindsay | ||
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I studied medicine at Cambridge and Oxford Universities before coming to the Hammersmith Hospital to do my basic medical training. I undertook a PhD in the immunology of Crohn's disease at Imperial College , before finishing Gastroenterology specialist training at Chelsea and Westminster Hospital and St Mark's Hospital. I have been a consultant Gastroenterologist at Barts and the London NHS trust since 2004. After my PhD I continued research into the role of dendritic cells in Crohn's disease with a focus on their manipulation with prebiotic dietary therapies. I am a senior lecturer at QMUL and am PI for a multicentre trial of prebiotics in Crohn's disease funded by a grant from the Broad foundation.
| Dr Tanya Maffucci | ||
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After graduation in Chemistry at the University of Naples, Italy, I worked three years at the Consorzio Mario Negri Sud, Italy and then gained a PhD in Oncology at the University of Chieti, Italy. In 2001 I moved to London and joined Dr Marco Falasca's laboratory at the University College London. We were interested in understanding the mechanisms responsible for insulin resistance. Our attention was focused in particular on signals involving phosphoinositide 3-kinase (PI3K). After one year at the University College London, I started being supported by a Diabetes UK Project Grant to Dr Falasca which lasted three years (Apr 2002-March 2005). I was then awarded with a Diabetes UK RD Lawrence Fellowship (started on Apr 2005). In 2007 I was appointed as a Lecturer in Cell Signalling at the Centre for Diabetes within the Blizard Institute of Cell and Molecular Medicine.
| Dr Olivier Marches | |
| Non-Clinical Lecturer in Bacteriology | |
I obtained my PhD in September 2003 from the University Paul Sabatier in Toulouse ( France ) working on molecular and cellular basis of pathogenic Escherichia coli virulence in the team of Dr Eric Oswald (Laboratoire Interactions Hotes-Agents Pathogenes (IHAP)). Then I was awarded a Marie Curie fellowship to conduct post-doctoral research in Pr Gad Frankel's lab at the Imperial College where I have carried on my studies on pathogenic E. coli from December 2003 to September 2007. Since October 2007, I have joined the Centre for Immunology and Infectious Disease within the Blizard Institute of Cell and Molecular Science, where I have been appointed as a Non-Clinical Lecturer in Bacteriology.
| Professor Silvia Marino | |
| Professor of Neuro-oncology | |
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Silvia Marino graduated from the medical school at the University of Turin ( Italy ), trained in molecular genetics at the Netherland Cancer Institute in Amsterdam (The Netherlands) and in Histopathology and Neuropathology at the University of Zürich , Switzerland . In 2000 she established her own research group at the Department of Pathology of the University of Zurich , working on development of the cerebellum, experimental models, neural stem cells and tumourigenesis of the central nervous system. In January 2006 she joined the Blizard Institute of Cell and Molecular Science of Queen Mary University of London as Professor of Neuro-oncology.
| Professor Áine McKnight | |
| Professor of Viral Pathology | |
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Throughout her academic career, Prof McKnight has been interested in HIV/AIDS. In 1987, she joined the team of Robin Weiss at the Institute of Cancer Research, London, to study the role of neutralizing antibodies to HIV-1 and HIV-2 in pathogenesis. She was awarded MSc in Immunology in 1990 by King's College, London , and a PhD in 1996 by University of London (supervised by Paul Clapham). In 2000, she won a fellowship (RCDF) by The Wellcome Trust to develop an independent research group to focus on non-coreceptor determinants of HIV replication in cells at The Wohl Virion Centre, University College London. She is currently a Medical Research Council (MRC) Senior Non-clinical Fellow (awarded in 2005).
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I completed my BSc (Hons I) at Sydney University, Australia in 1998. For my PhD (1999-2002), I investigated transgenerational epigenetic inheritance under the supervision of Assoc. Prof. Emma Whitelaw at the School of Molecular and Microbial Bio science s, Sydney University . From 2003-2007, I was a CJ Martin Postdoctoral Fellow at the Sanger Institute, Cambridge, U.K., where, under the guidance of Dr Stephan Beck , I used high-throughput and genome-wide epigenetic profiling to identify tissue-specific regulatory elements. In 2007 I was appointed as a Lecturer within the Blizard Institute of Cell and Molecular Science.
| Professor Denise Sheer | ||
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After completing a B.Sc (Hons) in Embryology and Zoology at the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg in 1973, I ran a diagnostic genetics laboratory at the South African Institute of Medical Research for two years. I then moved to the University of Oxford , where I was awarded a D.Phil. in 1980. Following a Post-Doctoral Research Fellowship at the Imperial Cancer Research Fund (now the Cancer Research UK London Research Institute), I became Head of the Human Cytogenetics Laboratory in 1983, where I conducted research on genome biology and cancer genetics. I moved with my group to the Blizard Institute of Cell and Molecular Science in November 2006.
| Professor Andrew Silver | ||
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| Dr Andrew Stagg | |
| Non-Clinical Lecturer in Immunology | |
Having obtained a first degree from the University of Birmingham , Dr Stagg conducted his PhD studies on T cells responses to Mycobacterium leprae at the National Institute for Medical Research at Mill Hill, London , under the supervision of Dr Jo Colston. His interest in dendritic cells developed during a post-doc in the laboratory of Prof. Stella Knight at the MRC Clinical Research Centre in Harrow where his research focused on the role of these cells in inflammatory joint disease triggered by bacterial infection. Next, Dr Stagg spent a short period as a visiting worker in the lab of Dr Joel Taurog at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas , where he explored the role of dendritic cells in a transgenic model of HLA-B27 spondyloarthropathy. Upon his return to the Antigen Presentation Research Group at Imperial College London, Dr Stagg's interests developed into the area mucosal immunology, focusing initially on the genital tract and subsequently on the intestine. Working with clinical colleagues at St Mark's Hospital, he researched the role of interactions between dendritic cells and bacteria in regulating intestinal immunity in humans with an emphasis on inflammatory bowel diseases. He now continues to develop and extend this programme at the Blizard Institute of Cell and Molecular Science.
| Professor David van Heel | |
| Professor of Gastrointestinal Genetics | |
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David van Heel was awarded a Natural Sciences BA at Cambridge University in 1990 and completed Clinical Medicine training at University of Oxford in 1993. A Medical Research Council Clinical Training Fellowship led to a DPhil in inflammatory bowel disease genetics from the Wellcome Trust Centre for Human Genetics, University of Oxford in 2002. He then undertook postdoctoral research at Imperial College , and completed specialist training as a Consultant in Gastroenterology in 2004.
He currently holds a Wellcome Trust Clinician Scientist Fellowship and project grant funding from Coeliac UK . He was appointed to Professor of Gastrointestinal Genetics at Barts and the London School of Medicine and Dentistry in 2006.
Main clinical interests are coeliac disease and Crohn's disease. Main research interests are the genetic causes of these diseases, and the functional/immunological consequences of these genetic variants on human biology.
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Tom Vulliamy obtained his PhD in the Zoology department at University College London under Martin Raff, defining neuronal cell surface antigens. After a post-doc at Harvard University in the Massachusetts General Hospital , searching for genetic linkage to the Huntington's Disease locus, he returned to London to join Lucio Luzzatto in the Haematology Department at the Hammersmith Hospital . There, he was involved in defining the molecular basis of G6PD deficiency and in establishing a molecular diagnostic laboratory, where he worked as a clincial scientist from 1987, becoming hpc registered and obtaining an MRCPath in 2001.
From 1996, in collaboration with Inderjeet Dokal and Philip Mason, he has held project and programme grants from Action Research and the Wellcome Trust for the study of an inherited bone marrow failure syndrome. He was appointed Honorary Lecturer (2000) and Senior Lecturer (2003) at Imperial College London, before joining the Blizard Institute of Cell and Molecular Science at QMUL as a Senior Lecturer in Molecular Biology (2006).
| Dr Richard Waite | |
| Non-Clinical Lecturer in Bacteriology | |
I obtained my PhD from the University of Warwick in 2001, under the supervision of Professor Chris Dowson. My research investigated biofilm formation in Streptococcus pneumoniae and identified a novel molecular mechanism of capsule phase variation. My postdoctoral research has been carried out here in the Blizard Institute of Cell and Molecular Science with Professor Mike Curtis, and has focused on the role of novel proteases in Pseudomonas aeruginosa pathogenesis. In 2005 I was awarded a Barts and the London Research Administration Board (RAB) non-clinical fellowship to continue this research and investigate the biology of P. aeruginosa Cystic Fibrosis (CF) lung infections.
| Dr Yi Zhang | |
| Non-Clinical Lecturer | |
Yi Zhang obtained her medical degree and MSc in Trauma in China . She worked as a Visiting Research Fellow in the University of Uppsala, Sweden, for 8 months in 1991. In later 1991 she obtained a Wellcome Trust Overseas Fellowship to study CNS injury and axonal regeneration in University College London (UCL). She obtained her PhD in Neuroscience in 1996 from University of London . She continued to work as a Research Fellow and then a Senior Research Fellow in UCL. In 2002 she was awarded the Wellcome Trust Research Career Development Fellowship and set up her lab in the University of Sheffield . In 2003 she moved her lab to Neuroscience Centre, Barts and the London School of Medicine and Dentistry. In 2008 she was appointed as a Non-Clinical Lecturer.