BIOSCIENCES DEVELOPMENT | Donor Report

WHO:

Trinity College Dublin with its outstanding team

O’Byrne

Prof Ken

Lung Cancer

Prof O’Byrne works in the treatment of thoracic malignancies including lung cancer, mesothelioma and oesophageal cancer. These conditions have a poor median survival in the region of 12-15 months. Understanding the molecular biology enables the development of novel therapies to combat these cancers.

Gardiner

Dr Clair

Human Immunology

Dr Gardiner’s research focus is on Natural Killer cells. Part of her work involves identifi cation of genes of the immune system which determine disease outcome after HCV infection; this may help in the design of new therapeutic approaches or prognostic tests.

Khan

Dr Amir

Protein X-Ray

Dr Khan is investigating the molecular basis for various diseases by examining the structure of molecules in cells. Understanding the three-dimensional structure of molecules, such as proteins, allows us to develop possible therapeutic drugs that can modulate their activity in living cells.

6 | Trinity Today

Hun Mok

Dr Ken

Protein NMR

Dr Mok’s laboratory is developing a novel molecular entity (nicknamed HAMLET) that selectively kills cancer cell lines while keeping healthy cells intact. Successful pilot results on glioblastoma and bladder cancer show that the research is on the right track. His lab continues to elucidate its structural details.

Hardiman

Prof Orla

Prof Hardiman’s research interests are amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (motor neurone disease) and related motor neuron degenerations, phenotype/genotype correlations, population genetics and clinical epidemiology.

Nolan

Dr Derek

Parasitology

African trypanosomes are transmitted by tsetse fl ies and cause fatal sleeping sickness in humans and domestic animals. These parasites depend on their host for essential growth factors which they take up by a specialised pathway. Dr Nolan’s research involves characterising this pathway and fi nding ways to block it.

Motor Neurone Disease

Rozas

Dr Isabel

Medicinal Chemistry

Dr Rozas studies 2-adrenoceptor antagonists and has now two showing better antidepressant activity than known antidepressants. She is also studying new compounds that attack DNA in a dual manner (intercalation and minor groove binding), and how these molecules induce cancer cell death.

Mills

Prof Kingston

Auto-Immune Disease

Prof Mills is focused on understanding how dysregulation in the immune system results in the development of autoimmunity and how we can design new drugs for therapeutic intervention. His lab is developing a cell-based therapy approach for cancer.

McManus

Dr Ross

Dr McManus’s research focuses on identifying genes which predispose to infl ammatory diseases like coeliac disease, psoriasis and sepsis. This raises the prospect of identifying key therapeutic targets for a variety of common debilitating diseases.

Genomics