Newcastle University (UK)
Newcastle University (https://ncl.ac.uk) is a member of the prestigious Russell Group, comprising 24 leading research-intensive UK universities. We’re in the top 1% of universities in the world by QS and 105 in the Leiden Ranking and 16th in the UK for research (2014 Research Excellence Framework). In 2016/17 Newcastle were awarded over £100million of competitively won research funding, and are involved in approximately 2,000 research collaborations in 62 countries. Newcastle University have one of the largest European Union research portfolios in the UK: in FP7 they were awarded 235 projects worth over €100million, in Horizon 2020 to date they have over 150 projects awarded worth approximately €75 million. Newcastle University is a signatory to the HRS4R, is a holder of the EU HR Excellence in Research award.
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Biomedicine Building at Newcastle University houses over 150 staff and postgraduate students and almost 150 NHS Northern Genetics Service NHS staff, and has access to core facilities such as single cell genomics, bioimaging and FACS, and is located at the renown International Centre for Life. CHANGE researchers at Newcastle are part of the larger Skeletal Research Group (SRG, formed in 2018) uniting 6 PIs working on skeletal development, ageing and disease in a highly collaborative setting. Moreover, there are several centres and collaborative initiatives at Newcastle, such as CIMA (Centre for Integrated for Musculoskeletal Ageing, uniting researchers from Liverpool, Sheffield and Newcastle Universities) and the cross faculty Musculoskeletal Research group. The SRG scientists are involved in several Arthritis Research UK Centres of Excellence: The Arthritis Research UK Tissue Engineering Centre, MRC-Arthritis Research UK Centre for Musculoskeletal Ageing Research, the Arthritis Research UK Rheumatoid Arthritis Pathogenesis Centre of Excellence, and the NC3Rs Phase 2 CRACK-IT challenge programme OsteoChip, as well as Rare Diseases and Bioengineering Centres of Research Excellence (NUCores). They have extensive expertise in development and deep-phenotyping of transgenic mouse models and have been working with animal models of chondrodysplasias for over 15 years.
Prof Kasia Pirog
Supervisor of DC11. Dr Pirog is a Senior Lecturer/Associate Professor in Musculoskeletal Genetics since 2012. She is lecturing and leading skeletal development to undergraduate and postgraduate students. In 2017 she was a deputy module leader for “Medical Genomics” course organised by Newcastle in collaboration with Health Education England to train junior doctors, nurses, clinical scientists and other healthcare professionals in genetics and genomic medicine. She led public engagement activities of the Institute of Genetic Medicine in 2012-2019, and the Development and Child Health research theme since 2019.
Prof Michael Briggs
Prof Briggs is a Professor of Skeletal Genetics at the Biosciences Institute at UNEW. His research is funded by the Wellcome Trust, Versus Arthritis and European Commission in the FP6, FP7 and H2020 calls, and was the main coordinator of several multinational consortia. He is co-supervising DC11.