Gideon is an epidemiologist working in chronic disease in western Sydney. He is currently finishing his PhD at the University of Wollongong, after finishing his Bachelors and Masters of Public Health at the University of Sydney. He is also a science communicator, with a regular blog, podcast, and writes for the Guardian and other publications as a columnist.

Dr Emma Beckett is a food and nutrition scientist with multifaceted experience and qualifications including PhD (Food Science), Masters of Science Management, Graduate Diploma in Epidemiology, Graduate Certificate in Human Nutrition and Bachelor in Biomedical Science with honours in Immunology and Microbiology. She is a sought after science communicator who appears regularly on national TV and radio and in print for the likes of the ABC and BBC.

My specialist interests are in infectious diseases and sexual health. I have been involved with a number of research trials for testing new HIV drugs and treatments for sexually transmitted diseases. I also have a keen interest in clinical research design and methods to improve recruitment to research trials. I am currently studying for a PhD on Loneliness amongst women with a HIV diagnosis.

Jan is currently carrying out research on intergenerational living and the impact on health, wellbeing and levels of loneliness among older people and young adults. Her areas of expertise is student well-being, intergenerational living and loneliness.

Andrea is a leading researcher on loneliness and social isolation, specialising in the wider social determinants and implications through research, programme evaluation, and evidence based policy and practice. The key principles which guide her work are academic rigor and evidence based research which is policy driven and leads to impact and change. Many aspects of her research focus on co-production involving all key partners in the research process, including ‘experts by experience’. As Director of the Policy Evaluation Group (2002-11), Deputy and then Co-Director of CIRCLE (20112016,) Director of Care-Connect (2014-2017) and currently Director of Centre for Loneliness Studies (2017+) she has spearheaded interdisciplinary research collaboration and established strong networks in both academia and with external stakeholders in the public, private and voluntary sectors. Andrea has been awarded research funding of almost £3 million and has published over 50 books, chapters, articles, and reports, and worked on approximately 90 externally funded research projects.

The research program of the University Division of Anaesthesia has aimed to understand regional cerebral pathophysiology to advance the care of critically ill patients after brain injury, from initial ictus, through recovery from coma and rehabilitation, to final outcome. These aims have been realized through a series of MRC Program and Cooperative Group Grants, based in the Wolfson Brain Imaging Centre, which have formed a focus for productive collaboration with other departments in the Clinical School, and the broader neuroscience community in Cambridge. Substantial academic leadership for this research program has come from the Division of Anaesthesia, but key collaborations have included NHS colleagues in the Neurocritical Care Unit, the University Departments of Neurosurgery, Psychiatry and Experimental Psychology, and the MRC Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit.

PhD Clinical Neurosciences (2024), University of Cambridge. Funded by Medical Research Council.
MSc Brain Imaging (distinction, 2020), University of Nottingham.
BSc (hons) Psychology and Cognitive Neuroscience (first class, 2019), University of Nottingham. Highest graduating student & Award from British Psychological Society for academic excellence

I graduated with a BSc in Microbiology from Bristol University in 1987 and started work as a trainee Medical Laboratory Scientific Office in the Diagnostic Virology Department of the Royal Postgraduate Medical School, Hammersmith Hospital, London. I qualified for the professional register in 1988 ( that register is now the Health and Care Professions Council, HCPC). I passed the Institute of Biomedical Science Fellowship examination in 1990. I then spent 2 ½ years working in a hospital rural Zimbabwe running the diagnostic laboratory and training laboratory staff and nursing students in basic laboratory techniques. On returning to London, I did some locum work and then secured a post as an MLSO2 *** at the Royal London Hospital. I left in 1995 to study for full time for an MSc in Parasitology and Medical Entomology at the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine. Subsequently, I did locum work in Manchester and Kent and spent three months on with an emergency relief programme in Tajikistan. I returned to the UK, Liverpool John Moores University and began work on my PhD at towards the end of 1997. Alongside the research, I gained experience in lecturing and running practical classes and after passing the PhD I worked as a sessional, part-time lecturer, before moving to Sussex to take up the role as placement facilitator and lecturer for the newly created Applied Biomedical Sciences BSc in 2004. This was originally a joint appointment between the Brighton and Sussex University Hospitals and Brighton University. I gradually took on more microbiology teaching and more responsibility within the university and in 2011, I transferred to a full-time Senior Lecturer post. I have been a Principal Lecturer since 2013. My current role includes teaching and research at the university and supporting laboratory training for biomedical scientists – through overseeing professional placements in hospital laboratories for BSc Biomedical Science students and supporting their training officers in the laboratories. My current areas of research are infection control, role of point of care testing in microbiology services and development of novel antimicrobial agents from mollusc mucus. I am an active member of my professional body, the Institute of Biomedical Science. I am a regular member of panels for accreditation of degree programmes. I have been a member of the Virology Scientific Advisory Panel since 2003 and was Deputy Chief Examiner from 2004 to 14; I became Chief Examiner in January 2015.

Justin’s track record as a clinician scientist has led to more than 650 peer-reviewed papers, more than 50 of which have appeared in journals with an impact factor exceeding 10, the vast majority as first or last author (current H-score on Google Scholar = 84).

He originally studied medicine at Trinity College, Oxford, gaining a first class degree before moving to The Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, USA then returning to complete training at the Royal Marsden and St Barts Hospitals. In 2007 he was appointed a Senior Lecturer at Imperial College, London and a Consultant Oncologist at Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust, then a Professor of Cancer Medicine and Oncology in 2009 (he is now a Visiting Professor there).

The nature of Justin’s scientific contributions and international leadership in translational research were recognised by being awarded the NIHR’s first research translational professorship, becoming Editor-in-Chief of Oncogene – Springer Nature’s cancer journal – and elected a member of the American Society for Clinical Investigation.

He was also Chair of the Irish Cancer Society and a national charity, Action Against Cancer, was set up to support his research.

I completed a BSc in Biology, as an undergraduate student I explored the effect of antifungal drug combinations on biofilm formation of Candida parapsilosis. I completed an MSc in Molecular Biology at the University of Debrecen, Hungary, where I examined the role of protein dynamics in synaptic plasticity and learned basic molecular biology methods.

I wanted to gain extensive knowledge in neuroscience and understand the process of memory formation; therefore, I applied for an Erasmus+ scholarship. As an exchange student in the joint laboratory of Prof Peter Somogyi and Dr Tim Viney in the Department of Pharmacology, Oxford, I investigated the distribution of pathological tau proteins in the brains of a mouse tauopathy model, and tested how these proteins affected spatial memory processes and in vivo neuronal activity. I also carried out collaborative research at the Institue of Experimental Medicine, Hungary, where I investigated neuronal subpopulations containing tau tangles in the human brain. As an Erasmus+ student, I learned several methods such as immunohistochemistry, electrophysiological recordings and labelling in awake mice, fluorescent and confocal microscopy, and performing behaviour studies. Besides, I gained theoretical knowledge in neuroanatomy, electrophysiology, and data analysis.

I am currently carrying out a DPhil funded by Alzheimer’s Society, UK.

My DPhil project investigates the role of the limbic thalamus in spatial memory and Alzheimer’s disease (AD), the most prevalent form of dementia. The hallmarks of AD are abnormally folded amyloid-beta and tau proteins. While the cerebral cortex remains a major focus of AD research, the role of the thalamus has received less attention. Evidence of its importance is highlighted by pathological tau inclusions in specific limbic nuclei of the thalamus. These proteins might disrupt thalamic neuronal activity, leading to cognitive deficits. My aim is to define human thalamic cell types that are most vulnerable in AD and relate these to in vivo neuronal activity of corresponding mouse cell types in order to make predictions about how these pathological changes affect cognitive processes. I am carrying out extracellular recordings and juxtacellular labelling in order to define thalamic neurons in behaving animals. To analyse pathological neurons, I am using fluorescent, confocal and electron microscopy.

I am a neuroscientist in the Department of Pharmacology at the University of Oxford. My expertise is in neuroanatomy and neurophysiology. My main research interests include understanding how memories are formed and updated in response to changing inputs from the body and environment, and establishing how to detect and slow down/prevent the degradation of memory pathways in relation to Alzheimer’s disease.

My research group investigates an area of the brain known as the thalamus in humans and rodents. The part of the thalamus we study is important for memory, cognition, and emotion, and it is affected early on in the development of Alzheimer’s disease. We define different types of brain cells by examining their molecular profiles, neuronal activity, and connectivity with other brain cells.

I previously worked on the basal forebrain and the hippocampus, brain regions important for memory. These areas contain cells that are rhythmically active. Brain rhythms support memory by helping to coordinate activity within and across different areas of the brain.

Before moving to Oxford I carried out my PhD at the Friedrich Miescher Institute in Basel, Switzerland, where I investigated neural circuits of the mammilian retina.

I am a postdoctoral researcher at the Karolinska Institute, Sweden and my research aims to characterise immune responses to virus infections in multiple sclerosis, and how these may influence disease development or progression. Our team’s work investigates how adaptive immune responses to common viruses or autoantigens can damage the central nervous system in neurological autoimmune diseases. By using a variety of molecular and immunological techniques, we aim to characterise autoreactive responses in depth, with the aim to provide better understanding of how disease occurs and ultimately provide targets for development of future therapies.