Home| Professor of Neurogastroenterology |
| Director, Wingate Institute of Neurogastroenterology |
Contact details:
| Tel: | +44 20 7882 2630 |
| Fax: | +44 20 7375 2103 |
| Email: | q.aziz@qmul.ac.uk |
| Address: |
Centre for Digestive Diseases, |
Biography
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.
Research Activity
His major research interest is to study the mechanisms of visceral pain in health and disease. His work has contributed to the current understanding of the brain neural networks involved in processing human gut sensation using functional brain imaging techniques. He has a particular interest in how the perception and the brain processing of visceral pain are modulated by psychological factors. In addition he has studied the role of inflammation / injury in sensitising visceral nerves in health and in functional gastrointestinal disorders. His current research interests include the study of psycho-physiological factors that predict the inter-individual variability in pain perception.
Key Publications
• Hamdy, S., Aziz Q., Rothwell JC., Singh K., Barlow J., Hughes DG., Tallis R. C., and Thompson DG. The Cortical Topography of Human Swallowing Musculature in Health and Disease. Nature Medicine. 1996; 2 (11): 1217-1224.
• Hamdy, S., Aziz Q., Rothwell JC., Crone R., Hughes DG., Tallis RC. and Thompson DG. Explaining Oro-pharyngeal Dysphagia after Unilateral Hemispheric Stroke. Lancet 1997;350 (9070):686-692.
• Hamdy, S., Rothwell JC., Aziz Q., Singh K. and Thompson DG. Long-Term Reorganisation of Human Motor Cortex Driven by Short-Term Sensory Stimulation. Nature Neuroscience , 1998;1 (1):64-68.
• Aziz Q., Thompson DG, Ng VWK., Hamdy S., Sarkar S., Brammer MJ., Bullmore ET., Hobson A., Tracey I., Suckling J., Simmons A. and Williams SCR. Cortical processing of human somatic and visceral sensation. J Neuroscience. 2000 ;20 (7):2657-2663.
• Sarkar S., Aziz Q., Woolf CJ. and Thompson DG. Central sensitization may contribute to the development of noncardiac chest pain. Lancet 2000;356 (9236):1154-1159.
• Sarkar S., Hobson AR ., Hughes A., Growcott J., Woolf CJ., Thompson DG ., Aziz Q. The Prostanoid EP-1 Receptor Mediates Acid-Induced Visceral Pain hypersensitivity in Man. Gastroenterology 2003;124(1):18-25.
• Phillips ML., Gregory LJ., Cullen S., Coen S., Ng V., Andrew C., Giampietro V., Bullmore E., Zelaya F., Amaro E., Thompson DG., Hobson AR., Williams SC., Brammer M., Aziz Q. The effect of negative emotional context on neural and behavioural responses to oesophageal stimulation . Brain 2003 Mar;126(Pt 3):669-84.
• Willert RP., Woolf CJ., Hobson AR., Delaney C., Thompson DG., Aziz Q. The Development and Maintenance of Visceral Pain Hypersensitivity is Dependent on the N-Methyl-D-Aspartate Receptor. Gastroenterology 2004;126(3)
• Hobson AR., Furlong PL. , Worthen SF., Hillebrand A., Barnes G., Singh K and Aziz Q. Real-time imaging of human cortical activity evoked by painful esophageal stimulation. Gastroenterology 2005; 128(3):610-9.
• Yág üez L., Coen S., Gregory LJ., Amaro E., Altman C, Williams SCR, Aziz Q. Brain response to visceral aversive conditioning: a Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging study. Gastroenterology 2005;128(7):1819-29.
