Biomedical Research Group
Our Biomedical Research Group aims to integrate research into the genotypic and phenotypic relationships underpinning our understanding of health and disease.
We're a diverse research group with interests in biochemical and molecular mechanisms that underpin the pathogenesis and aetiology of mammalian diseases, such as rheumatoid arthritis, myeloproliferative diseases, inflammation, thrombosis, tumorigenesis, vascular injury, and diabetes. Additionally, we have interests in G-protein coupled receptor signalling, the genetics of antibiotic resistance, virulence and evolution of bacteria.
The Biomedical Research Group is located in ARU's Science Centre, a £45m state-of-the-art teaching and research facility. Included in the centre are dedicated research laboratories with space for more than 50 staff and postgraduate students, providing specialist tissue culture, molecular biology and microbiology research spaces. The centre incorporates a 300-seat lecture theatre adapted for science teaching and a 200-station biosciences laboratory.
If you're part of an organisation, biomedical science provider, or research group who wishes to collaborate or explore possible areas of research our specialisms might support, then please contact a member of the group or our Faculty Director of Research and Innovation, Prof Nicholas Pugh, at [email protected]
We offer our Biomedical Science PhD, and a range of innovative research project opportunities for postgraduate researchers.
Headed by Prof Havovi Chichger, the Biomedical Research Group is grouped into several specialist research areas which include:
Members
Find out more about our members on their profile pages.
- Dr Joseph Bird - Skeletal disorders, ageing mechanisms and vascular disease
- Prof Havovi Chichger - Vascular disease and diabetes
- Dr Clett Erridge - Innate immunity, atherosclerosis, and microbiota
- Dr Richard Jones - Macular degeneration
- Dr Linda King - Lipotoxicity and impairment of insulin signalling in type II diabetes
- Dr Helen McRobie - Melanism in the grey squirrel, mechanisms of antibiotic resistance
- Dr Chris O’Kane - DNA nanotechnology, cancer biology and pharmaceutical nanoscience
- Prof Christopher Parris - Human cancer and DNA repair
- Dr Claire Pike - Cancer, molecular biology, molecular genetics, epigenetics
- Dr Grisha Pirianov - Regulation of the inflammatory response, proinflammatory mediators, tol-like receptors, anti-inflammatory drugs
- Prof Nicholas Pugh - Platelet signalling pathways
- Dr Jim Sullivan - Ubiquitin, post-translational modification, protein trafficking
- Dr Caray Walker - Pathogenesis of bacterial animal pathogens
ARU Biomedical Science students receive £2,000 Vacation Studentships from the Wellcome Trust
Hollie Allison and Katie Choi, Biomedical Science students at ARU, have both received a £2,000 Vacation Studentship from the Wellcome Trust. Hollie is isolating and identifying antibiotic-resistant strains of bacteria from dog faeces found in recreational areas of Cambridge. Katie Choi is working on the development of novel therapeutics against antibiotic resistance.
Funding awarded for collaborative project in School of Life Sciences
Dr Dannielle Green and Dr Paul Dyer from our School of Life Sciences have been awarded £10K for a collaborative project to investigate the biomedical implications of environmental microplastics.
Dr Dannielle Green, Director of our Applied Ecology Research Group and Dr Paul Dyer from our Biomedical Research Group, were recently awarded funding by a charitable foundation interested in environmental issues.
Danielle, a marine biologist who studies plastic pollution in the oceans, and Paul, a biomedical scientist, have joined forces to develop tools to investigate the human implications of microplastic accumulation using cell models.
The impact of plastic pollution on marine life has been generally well documented on TV programmes such as Blue Planet II. Smaller plastic particles, microplastics, are most often derived from mechanical degradation of larger pieces and from the cosmetic industry. Microplastics are generally thought to be the most prevalent contaminants in the human environment, being in the air that we breathe, the food we eat and the water we drink.
Much has been learnt about the environmental impact on marine fauna, however the human implication on the accumulation of microplastics in the main site of exposure, the lungs and intestine, has not been well characterised. This exciting development will help support our understanding of how many microplastics enter our systems, and how these interact with the cells and tissues of our bodies.
This successful award follows a School investment in specialist technology to enable us to count for the first time very small micro- and nano-sized particles derived from environmental samples.
This article originally appeared in the June 2019 issue of First, our Faculty Research Newsletter.