Dr Adrian Higginbottom

I obtained my PhD from the University of Sheffield in 1996, characterising receptor activation of the high affinity IgE receptor in allergy, after receiving a first class honours in Biochemistry from the same institute.

I was then a postdoctoral researcher for 12 years working initially on the family of tetraspanin molecules that led me through diverse disciplines from fertility to hepatitis C infection. I then returned to my roots of immune response when I joined neuroscience in 2000. By 2002 I was funded by the MNDA, working on motor neuron disease models and have never deviated since. I was appointed as a Senior Experimental Officer in 2008, applying my breadth of molecular and cellular biology to neurodegeneration diseases, supporting the Neuroscience clinical and pure scientists.

I was invited onto the Project Executive Group in 2009 to help design the Sheffield Institute for Translational Neuroscience (SITraN). SITraN opened in 2010, with the real ambition to translate our academic findings through small molecules and gene therapy. A key element of SITraN which we designed is the drug screening facility which I have developed, grown and managed from inception to the busy facility it is today. With the development and expansion of the drug screening facility, my supporting role has led to the wider Faculty and University, and greater engagement with industrial collaborators.

My other roles, outside of the running the drug screening facility, as a senior experimental officer are many fold including faculty work on the technical advisory group and the school research meeting committee, teaching on the Masters courses, recruitment, public engagement & philanthropy, grant capture, publications, Health and Safety and general smooth running of the institute.