We are empowering our people to deliver impact through everything we do

Kenny Baillie is Professor of Experimental Medicine at the University of Edinburgh and Consultant in Intensive Care Medicine. He leads a research programme in translational genomics.
His work is focused on using genetic signals from critically ill patients to identify drug therapy targets and testing those
therapeutic ideas in highly efficient model systems.

Kenny is committed to create a research culture that encourages and promotes creative thinking and novel approaches. This enables researchers to answer urgent research questions more efficiently
and quicker for the benefit of all.

Kev is Professor of Molecular Imaging and Healthcare Technology at the University of Edinburgh and a Consultant Physician in Respiratory Medicine.

He has a passion for developing new technologies for healthcare impact and early phase clinical trials. He has led multiple first-in-human trials of drugs and devices across the UK and abroad and works closely with external partners. He has a focus on entrepreneurship and product development and building translational ecosystems.

Collaborating widely with industry, he is an advocate of the need to work across scientific disciplines to translate physical science research into healthcare. Kev builds team-based cultures and values-led ecosystems.

In his free time, Kev enjoys playing competitive tennis.

Keith is currently the Director of Industrial Partnerships and has considerable experience in industrial and translational collaboration and commercialisation. In his previous role, he was the Head of the Business Development team in Edinburgh Innovations, leading a pan-university team for over 10 years, with a personal focus on drug discovery and transformative bio-medical technologies.

Before this, Keith worked in industry for almost 20 years, including working with the Japanese Pharmaceutical company, Astellas, where he lead a team focussed on Alzheimer’s disease and neuro-degeneration/inflammation, covering bench to bedside activities from establishing in vitro high-throughput screens to conducting complex in vivo cognitive behavioural pharmacology. Prior to that he worked with GSK, focussing primarily on the role of inflammatory cells in lung disease including asthma.

Wilna Oosthuyzen is a Senior Programme Manager at PSH, focused on delivery of drug target discovery and validation across the portfolio of genomic research.

Wilna was the lead project manager for the highly successful ISARIC4C consortium, during the COVID-19 pandemic. She managed project activity, finances and legal agreements across 14 UK academic institutions and industrial partners, organised sharing data and samples with over 100 groups, and directly contributed to the delivery of high impact research studies across the ISARIC4C and GenOMICC studies.

Before COVID-19, she was a postdoctoral fellow, establishing a new global theme for drug-induced liver injury in TB and HIV patients between the universities of Edinburgh, Makerere (Uganda) and Cape Town (South Africa). She was also involved with the design and development of a new point-of-care device for the rapid isolation of micro-rnas and contributed to a phase 1 safety and tolerability study in patients with paracetamol overdose. Wilna played a key role in establishing mirVetlab, a veterinary diagnostic and research laboratory based at the University of Edinburgh.

Throughout her career, she has focused on improving health outcomes for all through the development of quicker, easier and more affordable approaches or methodologies and is excited to bring this passion and focus to the PSH.

Primrose Panai Chikowore is the Senior Research Administrator whose role primarily revolves around keeping the genomic research portfolio running smoothly.

With an MBA from Heriot Watt and a background in Arts and Social Sciences, Primmy brings a unique blend of business acumen and research expertise to her role as Senior Research Administrator. Her extensive experience in research management, particularly in clinical trials, has honed my skills in governance and ethics, and is passionate about upholding the highest standards of research ethics. She is committed to fostering a positive research culture, ensuring scientific excellence, and supporting a collaborative environment. Her goal is to facilitate responsible and efficient research practices, allowing our researchers to excel in their work.

In simpler terms, Primmy manages various aspects of the day-to-day operations, which include handling emails, maintaining databases, and making sure we meet all the necessary rules and regulations. Think of her as the person who ensures that everything is organized, documented, and follows the ethical guidelines for research. She also provides support for GenOMICC and ISARIC4C as well as general assistance across the entire research program. Her job is essentially to make life easier for the researchers, so they can focus on their work while she handles the administrative aspects to keep everything on the right track.

Abi trained as an adult nurse at Homerton College, University of Cambridge, and completed an MSc in Critical Care Medicine at Queen Mary’s University London. A critical care nurse by background Abi has worked clinically with international organisations providing emergency surgical and medical care during conflict in West Africa and Asia.

She completed a postgraduate training in Advanced Practice at King’s College London, and completed a PhD at University of Amsterdam. Abi’s PhD focused on developing the methodologies and implementing the infrastructure for learning health systems in resource constrained settings. During this period co-founded NICS MORU - a non-profit research unit based in Sri Lanka, which develops and curates digital registries to strengthen research capacity and facilitate data driven service improvement in over 17 countries internationally.

Abi was appointed as a Reader in Critical care Medicine and Health Systems Development at the University of Edinburgh in 2022.

Adam is a Consultant in Respiratory Medicine based in the Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh. He trained in Respiratory across Scotland in Aberdeen, Glasgow and Edinburgh including a period of postgraduate research in translational optical imaging, bronchoscopic endomicroscopy and human ex vivo lung perfusion.
His clinical interest lies in interventional bronchoscopy including peripheral bronchoscopy and electromagnetic navigation with a research interest in bronchoscopic translational studies and recent involvement in experimental medicine trials of COVID19 therapies. Adam loves woodwork and red wine.

Ahsan is currently a CRUK Clinician Scientist. His group looks at the bidirectional crosstalk of fibroblasts with immune cells, as well as developing translational methods to image these in vivo. This includes both an optical high-resolution method looking at fibroblast activity and whole-body approaches for activated fibroblast presence.

Ahsan previously undertook a PhD in optical molecular imaging and have been involved in several of the first-in-human imaging studies.
Outside of work, he excels in the fields of gluten-free, dairy-free, egg-free, soya-free and nut-free baking and enjoys cycling.

Asta completed her PhD in the lab of Professor Djillali Sahali (University of Val-de-Marne, Creteil, France). Here, her research focused on NF-kB signalling and immunopathology mechanisms in Minimal change nephrotic syndrome, a renal disorder effecting children.
Asta’s current research aims to understand cellular stress and also to develop organoid models to investigate the effects of inflammation and infection on lung epithelial cells and specifically to address the following key questions:
How do viruses or bacteria induce pro-inflammatory responses in human lung organoids in vitro?
How do viruses or bacteria trigger immune responses in human lung organoids?
Can we identify specific pathways and drugs to modulate an immune crosstalk to reduce pro-inflammatory response and cell death in human airway organoids?
Outside of work Asta enjoys painting, photography, making silver jewellery, reading, cooking, gardening, flower arranging, knitting, hiking, visiting museums and art exhibitions, travel, and volunteering.

Balint did his BSc in Mechatronics Engineering at the Budapest University of Technology and Economics. After graduating in 2016, he decided to move to Edinburgh where he started to work for Kaiam as a graduate engineer. Initially joining the R&D team first, he was then mainly responsible for building production software for optical alignment. In September 2017 he decided to do an MSc in Embedded Systems at Heriot-Watt University Edinburgh, where he graduated with distinction and was awarded the AWE Price for excellence in MSc. During the master’s he kept working for Kaiam part-time. In 2019 Balint started his PhD in Medical Robotics at the University of Edinburgh. He joined the Surgical and Interventional Robotics Group where he works on motion control of Concentric Tube Robots and Continuum Robots. He likes spending his free time actively and also joined the University’s futsal club.

Barry is a PhD student. His topic aim is to identify sub-groups within Parkinson’s Disease using Patient Similarity Networks. His research interests look to apply artificial intelligence to biomedical applications. He is interested in classical machine learning and graphical methods.
Barry also has professional interest in using Machine Learning Algorithms for Electrical Engineering purposes.

After completing her MSc in Cognitive Science at the University of Edinburgh, Becky worked as a ‘Neurohumanities’ Research Assistant in Trinity College Dublin with Dr Tomás Ryan’s lab. Following this, she joined the Translational Healthcare Technologies team in 2023 as Project Support Officer. Her role involves assisting with the day-to-day project management tasks of several clinical trials.
In her spare time, Becky enjoys playing board games, reading, and going on dog walks to the beach or countryside.

Beth graduated from the University of Sheffield with a 1st class degree in Medical Microbiology and was awarded her PhD in Molecular Microbiology from the University of Nottingham.
She subsequently joined the University of Edinburgh in 2015, where she led infection model development and the validation of optical SmartProbes and imaging devices for clinical translation in pulmonology.
More recently Beth has been exploring how such technologies can be adapted for point-of-care diagnosis of infection, considering technological, user and health system requirements in low-resource settings. Beth completed an MSc in Global Health Policy in 2019 at the University of Edinburgh, and has built extensive networks across healthcare settings in India with whom she collaborates to co-design and evaluate these technologies, particularly in the field of microbial keratitis.
Beth was awarded a UKRI Future Leaders Fellowship in 2021 to develop pathways to diagnose, treat and reduce the burden of microbial keratitis in India, with project partner Aravind Eye Care System.

Charles obtained his PhD in the Department of Inorganic Chemistry at the University of Bayreuth (Germany) under the supervision of Professor Birgit Weber. During this time, he worked on the design and preparation of novel molecular magnetic switches with an optical read-out, for applications in the domains of sensors and memory devices.

After obtaining the PhD, he received a Research Fellowship from the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft to join the Institut de Science et d’Ingénierie Supramoléculaires in Strasbourg (France) where he developed platinum(II) luminescent probes capable to follow the aggregation of peptides.

In June 2020, Charles joined the THT Group’s Translational Chemistry Team as GMP Chemist. His role includes the development of synthetic pathway, formulation and GMP manufacture of the fluorescent probes to be used in clinical trials.

In his free time, Charles enjoys cooking, hiking through alpine landscapes, and, due to his Belgian roots, savouring a well-crafted beer.

Dominique McCormick is a Data Scientist, primarily based in the Baillie-Gifford Pandemic Science Hub and the Roslin Institute.

Her PhD, supervised by Prof. Andrea Munsterberg, characterised the biology of microRNAs during cardiogenesis. Subsequent post-doctoral fellowships have included studying both the non-coding landscape of human cytomegalovirus and rare genetic disease resulting in diabetes and lipodystrophy, giving her extensive in vitro and in silico experience in analyses involving omics, molecular biology, and biochemistry.

Currently her focus is on probing data from the world-leading ISARIC and GenOMICC studies to further characterise the mechanisms whereby genetic variance leads to clinical outcomes of critically ill patients.

Who am I? I’m a specialist in leading and managing operations of multi-partner complex research and innovation projects, hubs and programmes and for the past 10 years worked within different departments at the University of Edinburgh. I’ve had the privilege of co-leading large £multi-million collaborative research and innovation initiatives aiming to tackle our most intractable challenges; and worked with many of the UK’s Universities and partners in Asia, Latin America, Europe and Africa. My passion and focus has always been on ensuring that “management” strives to enable research and creates a smooth runway and landing space for all involved.

Prior to joining higher education I worked for 10 years in the not-for-profit sector as Assistant Chief Executive of a leading charity - working alongside the NHS, charities, central and local government to improve wellbeing and health outcomes. In my earlier career I headed-up Projects and Partnerships Teams within a large government agency aiming to improve sustainability, biodiversity and health outcomes. I started my career as a bacteriologist with the Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh and moved out of the lab to travel and live in Zimbabwe.

In my spare time I am a special technical adviser (on Programme/Project Management, Evaluation and Operational Management) to the UK Government Foreign and Commonwealth Office on their support for tackling the climate, health, economic crisis and also to the Scottish Government Fair Trade Scotland Panel. To relax, I write poetry and dabble on the occasional long-distant cycle adventure!

Emma is a GMP chemist. She is responsible for the GMP production and analysis of active pharmaceutical ingredients (API) developed within the translational team.
Emma carried out her PhD in medicinal chemistry at the University of Strathclyde. She then spent 4 years in industry working for a contract manufacturing organisation specialising in synthetic peptides. Emma joined the team in June 2020.

Florence completed her PhD at Nottingham Trent University in 2010 using proteomic approaches to study mitochondrial dysfunction in Parkinson’s disease. After her PhD, Florence moved to London to work on a biomarker discovery project in childhood severe malaria infection in NIMR.
In 2013, she joined Newcastle University where she successively investigated the cell loss mechanisms in mitochondrial optic neuropathies, the molecular pathways of childhood medulloblastoma and the cardiovascular tissue-specific molecular signatures in relevance to preterm birth. She is now in Dr Beth Mills group characterising molecular pathways in microbial keratitis.

Graham is a solicitor with a focus on IP and Life Sciences. He has a particular interest in licensing deals and progressing clinical assets from the bench to market authorisation. He is a member of Legal Services (the University’s legal team) but also embedded within the team. He provides dedicated support to the team on a wide variety of contractual matters. Graham likes to spend his free time outdoors – cycling, skiing (with a passion for the backcountry scene in Scotland), running, open water swimming

Ian is a senior clinical lecturer in ophthalmology with an interest in retinal vascular disease, retinal imaging and analysis, and ocular infection. His interest in clinical research began with the Apex expeditions to Bolivia and a project on ocular effects of high altitude. His PhD was spent in Malawi performing retinal fluorescein angiography on patients with paediatric cerebral malaria – an acute haematological parasitic disease with very strong associations between retinal and brain – and analysing associations with MRI brain. Current projects involve molecular imaging of the eye and analysis of high dimensional data. Outside work he enjoys the Scottish mountains and making pizza.

Ian Simpson is a Reader in Biological Informatics and Director of the UKRI Centre for Doctoral Training in Biomedical Artificial Intelligence in the School of Informatics at the University of Edinburgh. He holds a B.A. and an M.A. in Biochemistry (Oxford University) and a D.Phil. in Genetics (Oxford University) where he studied the epigenetic regulation of gene expression. He has spent over 20 years studying brain development and function at the molecular level and has developed novel methodologies and tools to analyse developmental gene expression data using graphical, dynamic, and evolutionary models.

His main research interests lie at the boundary between Informatics and Biomedicine and focus on jointly modelling molecular and clinical data in neurological disease to better understand the underlying molecular mechanisms and how they relate to emergent phenotypes in patients. This approach has the potential to revolutionise diagnosis, prognosis, and treatment improving outcomes for patients and helping clinicians to benefit from the promise of data driven analytics in healthcare. Ian is a strong advocate of open science and public engagement in research, is a member of the Open Bioinformatics Foundation (OBF), an alumnus of the Royal Society of Edinburgh Young Academy of Scotland, and an active STEM Ambassador.

Ian Underwood is a Professor of Electronic Displays in the School of Engineering.

An award-winning researcher, innovator, and entrepreneur for his work in electronic displays,

he has pioneered multi-disciplinary doctoral training, initially in the EPSRC Centre for

Doctoral Training in Integrative Sensing and Measurement now in the

PhD Academy of the Advanced Care Research Centre funded by Legal and General plc.

His research interests have expanded to include biomedical engineering and health and care technology.

He is Director of the EPSRC Research and Partnership Hub, MicroTex, that is headquartered at the Bailey Gifford Pandemic Science Hub.

Iona joined the team in 2023 after completing a joint honours MA in History of Art and English Literature at the University of Glasgow. During which she interned with Hannah Frank Art to run a feasibility study in to how art can survive and remain accessible during the COVID-19 pandemic.
She is currently working within the group to provide administrative assistance. With an arts background, working with the team has been an exciting change.

James is the Director of Electronics and Electrical Engineering (EEE) within the School of Engineering and Institute for Digital Communications, at the University of Edinburgh. As Director of EEE, James provides strategic leadership to further develop the international excellence of the School’s work in Electronics and Electrical Engineering, leading a team of more than 40 academics.
James research specialism is in Data Science and Machine Learning within the field of Statistical Signal Processing. His research spans a diverse range of applications, from medical imaging to audio processing in adverse acoustic environments, through to underwater imaging, multi-modal sensor-fusion, and multi-target tracking. In the life-sciences, James has developed signal processing solutions for gel-electrophoresis, spectral analysis techniques for SERS, and super-resolution for ultrasound. James is a member of Advisory Board for Firefinch, an Edinburgh based company for Bespoke Software and Data Science solutions for Life Sciences and Manufacturing.
Current research projects include Microendoscopy Imaging on EPSRC EP/S025987/1, “Next-Generation Sensing For Human In Vivo Pharmacology- Accelerating Drug Development In Inflammatory Diseases”, and EPSRC EP/S000631/1 project, “Signal Processing in the Information Age”. James is Editor-in-Chief for the IET Journal of Signal Processing.
Outside of work, James has a keen interest in outdoor activities, especially with his wife and young son.

At university Jean initially studied biology, after which she began studying adult nursing. As a nurse, Jean has worked in acute medicine and critical care. She has also worked as a Clinical Research Nurse and Critical Care Research Nurse with the Edinburgh Clinical Research Facility (working alongside the Edinburgh Critical Care Research Group – ECCRG). In 2012 Jean moved to Edinburgh Clinical Trials Unit (ECTU) to take up the post of Study Manager and Follow-Up Co-ordinator, continuing to work with the ECCRG, as well as multi-centre Clinical Trial of an Investigative Medical Product across various clinical areas including Crohn’s Disease and Renal Transplantation.
She joined the team on Sept 2020 as a Clinical Project Manager. The team was involved in several Covid-19 research studies which she has assisted with, both in terms of project management and clinically.
In her spare time, Jean enjoys Pilates and weighted hula-hooping as fun ways to exercise. To relax she crochets, knits and sews and is currently trying to master the art of calligraphy.

Joanne Mair is a Senior Clinical Project Manager and has oversight of the management and delivery of translational research projects which focus on diagnosis of lung infection. She works across the delivery of clinical trials in investigational medicinal products and medical devices.
Joanne is currently undertaking a part time PhD within the Usher Institute and has previously studied pharmacology, bioinformatics and public health. She has three girls and lives in the lovely East Lothian countryside. In her spare time she enjoys getting exercise, socialising and spending time with the family.

Jonathan Millar is a Senior Clinical Research Fellow at the University of Edinburgh and an Honorary Consultant in Intensive Care Medicine at the Queen Elizabeth University Hospital, Glasgow.

His research interests include the functional genomics of ARDS, computational biology applied to the lung, and lung model systems (precision cut lung slices, ex-vivo lung perfusion, and complex large animal models).

He completed his PhD with Prof John Fraser and Prof Danny McAuley, studying the role of mesenchymal stem cells and ECMO in ARDS.

Since moving to Edinburgh in 2020, he has worked with Prof Kenneth Baillie at the Roslin Institute and the Baillie Gifford Pandemic Science Hub.

He has contributed to the Genetics of Mortality in Critical Care (GenOMICC) study and is working to develop in-silico and in-vitro platforms to better understand the functional genomics underpinning acute severe respiratory failure.

Katie graduated from Napier University with a Degree in Adult Nursing. Prior to joining the team as a Senior Research Nurse in September 2019, she spent 12 years as a Staff Nurse specialising in Respiratory Medicine.
Her role within the translational healthcare team is to support investigators to set up and undertake a range of clinical research studies whilst ensuring the safety and wellbeing of research participants.
Katie has been involved in the set-up of the urgent public health approved COVID-19 studies. Working with the clinical team and the project managers, she has been involved in study set-up, logistics and co-ordinating recruitment.

Kieran joined the team in 2024 as a Quality and Technical Support Officer, having previously supported teams in a variety of fields ranging from Health and Social care to Cybersecurity.
His academic background includes a BSc in Games Development from Edinburgh Napier and a BSc in Open Science from the Open University. In his free time, he enjoys playing chess (poorly), cooking (less poorly) and chasing his dog around

Konrad studied Mathematics and Artificial Intelligence at the University of Edinburgh, before obtaining an MSc by Research in developmental neuroscience and a PhD in machine learning. He then joined the Roslin Institute as a Core Scientist working on quantitative genetics in human. During this time, he developed and applied new statistical and computational approach to understand the genetic basis and molecular mechanisms underlying disease and other complex traits.

He has recently been awarded a Chancellor’s Fellowship, during which he will improve genotype to drug translation by developing new genetics based approaches to identify both, mechanistically homogenous sub-groups within disease populations and molecular mechanisms relevant to specific stages of disease progression.

He is also the co-founder of omecu, a spin-out company developing a platform for secure, federated, real-time interactive analysis of genomic data at scale.

Dr. Liang Zhao received the PhD degree in photogrammetry and remote sensing from the Institute of Remote Sensing and Geographic Information System, School of Earth and Space Science, Peking University, Beijing China, in January 2013. From 2012 to 2014, he was a Postdoctoral Research Fellow in the Centre for Autonomous Systems (CAS), Faculty of Engineering and Information Technology, University of Technology, Sydney (UTS), Australia. From 2014 to 2016, he worked as a Postdoctoral Research Associate in the Hamlyn Centre for Robotic Surgery, Department of Computing, Faculty of Engineering, Imperial College London, United Kingdom.
From 2016 to 2024, he was appointed as a Lecturer, then Senior Lecturer and the Director of Robotics in Health at UTS Robotics Institute (UTS:RI).

He is currently a Reader in Robot Systems in the Institute of Perception, Action, and Behaviour, School of Informatics, The University of Edinburgh, United Kingdom since September 2024. His current research interests include Autonomous Robot Simultaneous Localisation and Mapping (SLAM), Image Guided Robotic Surgery and Computer-Assisted Interventions, SLAM in Deformable Environments, Optimisation Techniques in Mobile and Surgical Robot Navigation.

He currently serves as Associate Editor for the IEEE Transactions on Robotics (T-RO), the IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA), the IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS), and Area Chair for the International Conference on Information Processing in Computer-Assisted Interventions (IPCAI).

Lizi graduated in 2019 with an integrated MSc in Biomedical Science from the University of Sheffield, before beginning her PhD at the University of Edinburgh. There her project focused on characterising the relationships between injured neurons and the extracellular matrix that facilitate regeneration in the spinal cord of the zebrafish, and she graduated in 2024.

She joined the Baillie Gifford Pandemic Science Hub the same year as part of the Edinburgh Molecular Mechanisms Cluster; a joint MRC- and BBSRC-funded programme using tissue donated by surgery patients to interrogate the molecular reasons underpinning genetic differences in the body’s responses to disease.

Loki is a postdoctoral researcher in the experimental medicine domain of the U-Care project at Heriot Watt University. Her role is to fabricate micro-lenses using 2PP for imaging the far-field lung cavities.
This will play a crucial role to map the lung airways providing insight into accessing deeper areas of the lung that hasn’t been reached or explored before. In addition to the fabrication of lenses, she is also developing novel tissue sampling tools using advanced laser-based manufacturing processes for performing biopsy with high precision and repeatability.

Loki’s current research interests are inclined towards using laser-based manufacturing processes for precision engineering biomedical devices with focus on diagnostic and surgical applications.
Beyond her research, Loki is also a passionate STEM ambassador and mental health advocate.

Marie is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow in PSH and is focused on finding better ways to communicate important scientific discoveries, to make them accessible and impactful for a broader audience.

She joined the lab in 2019 as a PhD student under the MRC Doctoral Training Scheme in Precision Medicine. Her PhD focused on elucidating how the genetics of Covid-19 compare to that of other diseases, aiming to identify shared disease-relevant genes that could reveal opportunities for drug repurposing. She is also a contributor to the Covid-19 MAIC project. Previously she completed a BSc in Molecular Biology and an MSc in Biochemistry and Molecular Biomedical Sciences at the Graz University of Technology in Austria, followed by an MScR in Integrative Neuroscience at the University of Edinburgh. From 2018-2019 she worked as research assistant at the Duguid lab at Edinburgh University, where she was involved in a project mapping a novel motor cortical area. She also has a background in graphic design, having received her high school diploma in graphic & communication design from the Federal Higher Technical Institute Ortweinschule.

Martin Pearson currently acts as the Quality Control Manager for the HTAF Sterile Fill Unit and the Investigational Supplies Group.
His expertise lies in the development and management of GMP quality systems for the manufacture of sterile medicinal products, and in facilitating the supply of medicines to clinical investigators. Prior to joining HTAF, Martin held roles in quality assurance, quality control and analytical microbiology in a number of clinical research organizations and commercial drug manufacturing companies.

Max completed his undergraduate degree in Biochemistry at Nottingham Trent University in 2018, during which he undertook a Wellcome Trust Biomedical research placement. This led to him pursuing a PhD investigating the role of microRNAs in skin development. After his PhD, Max moved to Edinburgh to work for a biotechnology startup before joining the Edinburgh Molecular Mechanisms Cluster within the Baillie Gifford Pandemic Science Hub, which investigates the molecular consequences of genetic variation in disease.

Mohsen is a Lecturer in Robotics at the School of Informatics, University of Edinburgh. Previously he was a Post-Doctoral Researcher at the Wellcome/EPSRC Centre for Interventional and Surgical Sciences, University College London. He received his Ph.D. in Electrical and Computer Engineering from the University of Alberta, Canada in 2017, his M.Sc. in Biomechanics from the Sharif University of Technology, Iran, in 2013, and his B.Sc. in Mechanical Engineering from Shiraz University, Iran, in 2010.

His research interests are in surgical robotics and image-guided therapies. His research typically focuses on the clinical problem first, and then working with surgeon collaborators to determine the best devices and theoretical approaches to solve it.

In his spare time, he enjoys playing and watching football. He is also a self-proclaimed home chef.

Mohsen is leading the pulmonary robotics team in the PSH.

Natalie began her career in cardiovascular research at the University of Edinburgh before moving on to become the project manager of an EPSRC funded project
Having carried out a PhD in cardiovascular biology, focusing on the role of the kidneys in blood pressure regulation, Natalie undertook a postdoc position looking at in vivo renal sodium handling, both at the University of Edinburgh. Moving away from the lab, she is now the Project Manager for the U-Care project, coordinating research between the group at The University of Edinburgh, Heriot Watt University, and Bath University as well as leading the public engagement and comms of the project.

Neil Carragher graduated from the University of Aberdeen, Scotland in 1992 with a BSc Honours degree in the subject of “Cell and Immunobiology”.  He then took up a position within industry at the Yamanouchi Research Institute, Oxford, England where he also gained his PhD. He then held consecutive postdoctoral positions within the Department of Pathology, University of Washington, Seattle, USA and at the Beatson Institute for Cancer Research, Glasgow, Scotland. In 2004 Neil returned to the pharmaceutical industry as Principal Scientist with the Advanced Science and Technology Laboratory at AstraZeneca where he pioneered early multiparametric high-content phenotypic screening approaches. In 2010 he once again made the career switch from industry to academia and took up the post of Principal Investigator at the University of Edinburgh where he leads a research group and is currently Science Director of Edinburgh Cancer Research and Professor of Drug Discovery. He is also Associated Director of the CRUK Scotland Centre. His primary research interests include advancing cell based assay screening technologies and high-content analysis.
His research has contributed to the discovery and translation of several agents into clinical trials including NXP900 currently in phase 1 oncology trials: https://www.clinicaltrials.gov/study/NCT05873686 and drug repurposing clinical trials in motor neuron disease: https://www.clinicaltrials.gov/study/NCT04302870. Neil is a founding member of the European Cell Based Assay Interest group https://www.eucai.org and former President of the Society of Biomolecular Imaging and Informatics https://sbi2.org/. He is also co-founder of the spin out company: PhenoTherapeutics Ltd. an early stage drug discovery company: https://www.phenotherapeutics.com/

Nik Hirani is a consultant respiratory physician the Royal Infirmary Edinburgh and PI in the Centre for Inflammation Research, IRR, Edinburgh. He leads a regional lung fibrosis service and his research interests include early phase lung fibrosis clinical trials, exploratory biomarkers and macrophage biology in lung inflammation and repair. Nik has led dozens of experimental medicine and early phase trials in idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) and other chronic respiratory disease, employing novel devices and tools. He is a Co-I in the LifeArc UK Rare Respiratory Disease Centre, has chaired impactful clinical guideline committees and consortia and held senior managements roles in the NHS. Nik has generated the ELFMEN study, one of the largest longitudinal cohorts and biobanks for lung fibrosis globally.
https://inflammation-research.ed.ac.uk/research/research-groups/dr-nik-hirani

My name is Nikos, and I am a final year PhD student at the One Health Models of Diseases Programme in the University of Edinburgh. I completed my undergraduate studies on Molecular Biology and Genetics in the Democritus University of Thrace, in Greece, which was followed by a Research Internship in the University of Barcelona. Since my undergraduate dissertation, I have been working on completely computation research projects. In 2019, I moved to Edinburgh where I completed my Master’s in Quantitative Genetics and Genome Analysis and following year, I joined the One Health Models of Disease PhD programme. For my PhD project I am working under the supervision of Professor Kenny Baillie. In my PhD project, I am applying machine- learning methods to identify clinically distinct subgroup of critically ill COVID-19 patients. Those clinically identified subgroups are then being compared genetically for the identification of group-specific genomic differences. The final aim of my project is to study this genomic differences for the discovery of genetic loci that could be used for the development of novel therapeutic interventions.

Núria Fàbrega holds an MSc in Bioinformatics from Universitat Pompeu Fabra and a BSc in Chemistry from the University of Barcelona. During her master’s, she developed a text-mining tool to extract transcription factor-gene interactions from literature. Currently, as part of the AI CDT in Biomedical Innovation (AI4BI) programme, her PhD focuses on developing methods to transform unstructured biological information from scientific articles into structured and accessible data. She is supervised by Prof Kenneth Baillie, Prof Ian Simpson, and Prof Mirella Lapata.

Nur holds a BSc in Statistics from Hasanuddin University, Indonesia, and a Master’s degree in Applied Statistics from IPB University, Indonesia. During her Master’s program, she participated in bioinformatics research group, her master’s project focused on quantifying synergistic effects of medicinal plant compounds related to type 2 diabetes, integrating drug chemical and pharmacogenomics space through network analysis. Following the completion of her master’s, she gained substantial experience working as a research assistant and teaching fellow at several universities in Indonesia. Her research during this period focused on early-stage drug discovery, where she applied machine-learning approaches to screen potential antibiotic compounds and drug targets from marine biota. In 2024, she joined the DTP Precision Medicine programme at the University of Edinburgh. Her PhD project, supervised by Dr. Konrad Rawlik and Professor Kenny Baillie, aims to identify shared genetic mechanisms across diseases to discover new drug targets of shared disease and optimize therapeutic strategies. By utilizing genetic colocalization analysis, the project seeks to accelerate drug repurposing and improve patient stratification based on genetic predispositions and co-morbidities, ultimately contributing to the development of more personalized and effective treatment approaches.

After a BSc (Hons.) and an MSc (Hons.) in Telecommunications Engineering at the University of Cantabria (Spain), he was awarded with the best BSc and MSc theses in his field in Spain. As a result of his studies, he also received the 2nd prize in the National Award for Excellence in Academic Performance.
He completed his PhD thesis in September 2023 at the Photonics Engineering Group (University of Cantabria). His PhD was primarily concerned with the ultrafast laser microfabrication of optofluidic devices for sensing and imaging applications, as well as the discovery of a femtosecond laser regime that causes polarisation-independent etching.
Pablo’s current fellowship will develop and translate a multifunctional catheter to exploit experimental medicine in the distal lung. To achieve this, ultrafast lasers are used on superelastic materials to create a catheter with millimeter-scale dimensions capable of accessing peripheral regions of the lung. Special fibers and various imaging techniques are also employed to ensure accurate guidance of the device.

In his free time, Pablo enjoys various sports, but especially cycling and ultra trail running.

Paul carried out his PhD in Pharmacology at the University of Oxford. Following his PhD, Paul helped to establish and run an Oxford-based biotech focused on developing therapies, predicated on small-molecule modulation of lysosomal function, for a range of rare and common diseases. Here he gained expertise in research and project management, intellectual property, and regulatory pathways. Paul’s experience in the rare disease field, during which he worked closely with patient groups and with clinicians, reinforced his desire to help translate academic research into real-world impact.
He currently acts as the Healthcare Technology Portfolio Project and Development Manager for the Healthcare Technology Accelerator Facility, helping to drive a number of promising medical technologies towards translation, commercialisation and adoption. He enjoys running and reading, but has so far had limited success in combining the two.

Philip completed his undergraduate in Biomedical Science at Northumbria University in 2012, subsequently working as a research technician for 2 years at Newcastle University. Philip then completed a PhD at the University of Edinburgh, based in the Centre for Inflammation Research, investigating the role of cellular senescence in acute lung injury and fibrosis. Specifically, testing the pharmacological depletion of type II alveolar epithelial cells using a class of drugs known as senolytics.

After completing his PhD Philip joined the medical research charity LifeArc, working on the commercial development of a diagnosis and monitoring kit for pulmonary TB infection under an ISO13485 quality management system. Philip now joins the Pandemic Science Hub as a member of the laboratory team with interests in biology of the lung parenchyma and expertise in robust assay development of complex in-vitro and ex-vivo models of acute lung injury.

Outside of work Philip enjoys attempting DIY home improvements (with varying levels of success) and Newcastle United.

Subramanian (Ram) Ramamoorthy is Professor of Robot Learning and Autonomy in the School of Informatics at the University of Edinburgh, where he holds a UKRI Turing AI World-Leading Researcher Fellowship.

His research focus is on robotics and machine learning, with particular emphasis on AI for assistive autonomy. This work has attracted funding from a variety of sources including UKRI, EC, DARPA, DSTL and the Royal Academy of Engineering, and been recognised with best paper awards at international conferences including ICRA, IROS, CoRL, ICDL and EACL.

In addition to his academic roles, he has been involved in Five AI, a UK based technology company developing autonomous vehicles technology, acquired by Bosch GmbH in 2022.

Rashan trained in medicine at the University of Colombo and subsequently completed training as a critical care physician and anaesthetist in the UK.

Rashan was awarded a PhD scholarship by the University of Oxford, where his doctoral work was on developing methods for continuous healthcare evaluation in resource-limited settings. During this time he co-founded NICS-MORU, a not-for-profit research unit based in Sri Lanka that develops and curates digital registries to strengthen research capacity and facilitate data-driven service improvement in Asia and Africa. NICS-MORU also functions as the data coordinating centre for multinational observational and interventional research projects. He has also completed an MSc in Clinical Trials at London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.

Rashan works clinically as a consultant in intensive care medicine at the General Sir John Kotelawala Defence University Hospital, Sri Lanka and at University College Hospitals London.

Rob is Professor of Photonics at Heriot Watt University. He is interested in the applications of light in areas such as clinical and biomedical photonics, laser manufacturing and advanced optical instrumentation. Specific current interests include the development of new fibre-optic technologies for the minimally invasive imaging of tissues with unprecedented resolution, new light-based therapies for treating infection and resecting tissues with extreme precision, and new photonic approaches to interrogating tissues in a label free manner with the aim of guiding clinical decisions. Robert collaborates closely with industry, and co-founded Optoscribe Ltd. Outside of work, Robert enjoys walking, reading, and spending time with the family and friends.

Sara runs a range of activities in the lab, and is forging an independent research programme using genomics and genome editing to understand the mechanisms underlying bronchopulmonary dysplasia, a devastating lung problem in pre-term infants.
Sara graduated from Trinity College Dublin after which she completed a PhD studying determinants of cytoskeletal function in Drosophila at the Wellcome Trust Centre for Cell Biology, Edinburgh. She joined the Baillie lab in 2014 as a Postdoctoral Research Fellow.
She has a long track record using cutting-edge techniques to understand host-pathogen interactions.
Previously, she has focused on the interaction between influenza A virus and human macrophages. More recently, Sara is focusing on how CRISPR technology can alter gene expression in lung tissue to see how it might change the response of the cells to pathogens.

Sohan is the Lead Data Scientist at University of Edinburgh’s School of Informatics, and runs the Data Science Unit at the School of Informatics. He has a background in Machine Learning and Data Science, and has extensive experience in dealing with a variety of data types including image, text, genome, spectra, spike trains and graphs. His research focuses primarily on building interpretable models for extracting information from scientific data. He is interested in the application of machine learning tools to solve problems in science, health, people and environment. He is a co-lead of the Advanced Care Research Centre, and as part of the Group he is developing machine learning models for analysing spectroscopy and endomicroscopy measurements. In his spare time, he enjoys watching sci-fi thrillers, playing racket sports, cooking for his family and a bit of gardening.

Tarek is a biomedical engineer, a PhD researcher and an engineering teaching assistant at the School of Engineering, University of Edinburgh. He joined Edinburgh in January 2020, completing a joint MSc in Sensor and Imaging Systems between the University of Glasgow and the University of Edinburgh, before starting his PhD.

His current research project is undertaken in partnership with GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) and the National Physical Laboratory (NPL) and will focus on developing machine learning techniques for evaluating disease and drug effectiveness in fibre-bundle endomicroscopy systems.
In spare time, Tarek enjoys reading, swimming and playing video games.

Tom completed a PhD in biophotonics and lung inflammation in 2017, winning the research gold medal from the Intensive Care Society for his work. He became a Consultant in Critical Care at the Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh in 2019 and a National Research Scotland Fellow in 2020. His research examines novel optical strategies for diagnosis, stratification, and treatment of critical respiratory illness such as ventilator-associated pneumonia and acute respiratory distress syndrome. He is a programme director for the MSc in Critical Care, a course organiser for the BMedSci in Anaesthesia, Critical Care, and Pain Medicine, and an Honorary Senior Clinical Lecturer.

Tim is a Professor of Physics at the University of Bath. He is interested in how light travels along optical fibres, and in designing and making fibres so that the light travels in new and unusual ways. Examples include fibres that change along their lengths (eg tapered fibres), split and combine to form new waveguides (eg photonic lanterns), or incorporate patterns of air holes and other material variations across their structures (eg photonic crystal fibres and multi-core fibres). We gain understanding of these things by theory and simulations, and also by the use of our experimental facilities for fabricating fibres and post-processing them. This leads to benefits for applications such optical telecommunication, medical sensing and imaging, and astronomical instrumentation.

Tom is a Clinical Research Fellow and a Specialist Registrar in Respiratory Medicine. He graduated with MB BCh BAO (2011) from Queen’s University Belfast before moving to Edinburgh. His PhD project is centred around the immune response to SARS-CoV-2 infection. He has a particular interest in interventional pulmonology and bronchoscopic techniques for visualising lung pathology. He is the PI on a microdosing study
Outside of work Tom enjoys reading, hiking and travelling with his wife. He can speak some Spanish and has a dog.

Jen primarily provides project management for the Centre for Tropical Livestock Genetics and Health (CLTGH) based within the Roslin Institute Building on Easter Bush Campus.
She also provides project management to PSH and the Baillie lab.

She trained as an Agricultural Secretary at Elmwood College (now SRUC) and started her career working as Office Manager at The Roslin Institute’s Blythbank Farm in 1990.
In 2003, she set up a private business and became self-employed focusing on farm financial management and supporting livestock farmers in Scotland.

In her spare time, Jen loves being out on the hills with her dogs and watching rugby.

Olivier holds a Master of Science in Big Data and Machine Learning from école central de Lyon. After graduation, he worked as a machine learning engineer in various Paris-based startups, gaining practical experience in developing and deploying innovative models and algorithms to solve real-world challenges.

With the goal of enhancing our understanding of the intricacies of human health, he later joined the Biomedical AI CDT program in Edinburgh. There, his PhD research focused on identifying genetic variants and mechanisms responsible for human diseases, combining semi-parametric statistical theory with functional genomics methodologies.

Now, as a postdoctoral statistical geneticist, he is particularly interested in leveraging novel machine learning and causal inference methods to uncover the biological pathways driving disease. His work aims to bridge the gap between data science and medical research, ultimately contributing to advancements in precision medicine and human health.

Rich is an immunologist interested in the regulation of T cell responses under conditions of chronic inflammation and the balance between effective immunity and inflammatory pathology.

His interest was kindled during a PhD at the University of Glasgow, studying the tropical disease lymphatic filariasis. It was subsequently strengthened during a fellowship, awarded by the National Multiple Sclerosis Society of America, undertaken at New York’s Trudeau Institute. At the UoE, he developed models to track the fate and function of auto-aggressive and regulatory T cell populations.

He now studies the interactions between stromal cells and T cells and within the wider team, contributes to efforts to characterise T cell sub-populations in the lung and develop assays and test probes to describe their functionality. Rich will be joing the PSH to lead the biology teams that will lead optimise genetic hits to tractable therapies.

Outside of work he enjoys playing the guitar, drawing and painting.

Steven started out as a physicist, completing a PhD and then a postdoc working on quantum gravity.

After that, he did a second PhD, mainly on game theory and economics. From there he worked in the private sector doing data science and software development. In late 2020, Steven joined the Usher institute as part of the EAVE-II project, doing research primarily on COVID-19 vaccine effectiveness and safety.

Steven is interested in secure multi-party computation and federated analytics. These are technologies that enable combined analysis of multiple private datasets, stored securely in different locations, with zero information sharing. This will allow us to unlock insights that are currently hidden away in the multitude of routinely-collected, confidential health datasets around the world, improving evidence-based medical care and patient outcomes.

Steven is working towards building a software product that will allow health data researchers to use these transformative approaches in their own work.