Posts Tagged ‘biomedical sciences’

helen maddock

June 21st, 2010

There are many perspectives on the relationship between blue skies research and its application, perhaps none more important than the potential of what’s known as ‘translational medicine’.

Dr Helen Maddock‘s work is in this important ‘translation’ — and crosses disciplinary boundaries. For example, she’s currently investigating drug-related cardiovascular complications with biomechanical, quantitative pharmacological and biomedical techniques, and collaborating with cardiologists and cardiothoracic surgeons to study how a heart attack results in injury or death of the heart muscle.

Dr Helen Maddock is Principal Lecturer in Cardiovascular Physiology and Pharmacology at Coventry University, and is Editor of the British Society for Cardiovascular Research Journal Bulletin. She’s worked for AstraZeneca and GlaxoSmithKline as well as undertaking research at UCL’s Hatter Institute and Centre for Cardiology. Her current research includes investigating the role of reactive oxygen species, mitochondrial injury and apoptosis in myocardial stress, and also the development of novel therapies for the treatment of diseases related to the cardiovascular system.

michael overduin

June 19th, 2010

We can now number of genes, proteins and cells, and we can see their individual shapes in motion. One of the greatest opportunities in biomedical research today is to understand how these various jigsaw bits fit together. Currently, however, says structural biologist Michael Overduin, we have little idea of what the individual jobs are of each protein produced by our genes.

His work is to find this out, using computer programmes which scan the surface of each protein and predicts whether it can interact with membranes, proteins or small molecules.

Professor Michael Overduin is Professor of Structural Biology art the University of Birmingham. His research team solve the structures or proteins involved in cancer and infection in NMR Facility in the Henry Wellcome Building.(note: NMR is the abbreviation for nuclear magnetic resonance.)

This HWB•NMR is the UK’s largest NMR facility, providing academic and industrial users with open access to six NMR spectrometers operating at 500-900 MHz, four cryogenic probes and high throughput autosamplers.

peter lane

June 19th, 2010

The capacity to decipher the DNA encoding our genes, and techniques to make antibodies of exquisite mono-specificity are the foundations of modern molecular medicine.

Experts such as Professor Peter Lane, however, still don’t know how to allow a transplanted organ to survive indefinitely without immunosuppression of  the host, but they do know it’s an achievable goal — during pregnancy, the mother ‘tolerates’ the developing child without mounting a damaging immune response. Modern molecular medicine affords us glimpses of the processes that enable this to happen.

Peter Lane is Professor of Clinical Immunology and the MRC Centre for Immune Regulation, part of the Institute of Biomedical Research at Birmingham Medical School. He works on the molecular and cellular basis of CD4 memory as he believes that understanding these mechanisms will provide important new therapies for human diseases.

helen griffiths

June 13th, 2010

The payoff against an increase in life span has been than health span does not necessarily follow suit, says Helen Griffiths, Aston University’s Professor in Biomedical Sciences and Acting Director of Aston Research Centre for Healthy Ageing.

Before, many people died suddenly from infection. Nowadays, however, women will typically experience the last 9.1 with chronic, debilitating illness, and men 6.8 years. But the routes to solve the puzzle of ageing are being mapped.

Professor Griffiths’ research interests are proteomic approaches to biomarker determination, and the interplay between lips/sphingolipids and reactive oxygen spaces in inflammataion and ageing.

She won the 1st Catherine Pasquier Prize from the European Society for Free Radical Research, and the Aston Excellence Award in 2009 for Outstanding Researcher of the Year.