Speaker Bio:
Simon Bamforth completed his PhD under Prof John Greenwood at the Institute of Ophthalmology (University College London) investigating the effect of cytokines on the permeability of the blood-retinal barrier. He then undertook his first post-doctoral position at the Max Planck Institute for Clinical and Physiological Research in Bad Nauheim, Germany, researching the role of the tight junction molecule Occludin on the blood-CNS barriers with Prof Werner Risau. His second post- doctoral position was at the Wellcome Trust Centre for Human Genetics (University of Oxford) working with Prof Shoumo Bhattacharya to develop and analyse the Cited2 knockout mouse which has a complex phenotype comprised of cardiovascular, neural tube, adrenal and left-right patterning defects. Simon then moved to Newcastle University after being awarded a British Heart Foundation Intermediate Basic Science Research Fellowship to investigate the roles of transcription factors, such as Pax9 and Tbx1, during cardiovascular development as well as analysing the processes underlying normal heart and great vessel morphogenesis.