Centre for Trophoblast Research

News and Events

January 2012

  • Warmest congratulations go to Dr Selma Boulenouar who has been awarded an EC FP7 Marie Curie (2 year) Fellowship to study the role of NK receptors in pregnancy.

  • Louise Gaynor has been awarded a BHF (3 year) PhD studentship to study how the variability of immune genes impact on reproduction. Well done to Louise.

  • Congratulations also to Christian Huber who has recently started his Wellcome Trust (3 year) PhD programme in Infection and Immunity to study NK cell memory.

  • The retirement of Professor Joan Hunt

    The CTR congratulates Professor Joan Hunt most warmly on her many distinguished achievements in the field of placental research, and wishes her a long and enjoyable retirement. Joan has been both a highly respected reproductive immunologist and an outstanding advocate for placental research. Professor Graham Burton had the honour of speaking at her festschrift meeting in Kansas last December, and is picture here with Joan, Lee Nelson and Kent Thornburg.

September 2011

  • Special congratulations to Kathy Niakan, who has received a USD$358k March of Dimes award for a project entitled:

    Derivation of human placental stem cells as models for development and disease.

    We warmly congratulate Kathy on this award!

August 2011

  • Sincere congratulations to Nisha Padmanabhan, who presented her work at the Gordon Research Conference on Epigenetics:Mechanisms, Development and Disease this month in Massachusetts, USA. The title of her talk was 'Epigenetic consequences of abnormal folate metabolism'.

July 2011

  • Special congratulations to Gordon Smith and Steve Charnock-Jones who jointly received a grant from the Medical Research Council for analysis of the POP (Pregnancy Outcome Prediction) study placental and blood samples.

    The title of the grant is "The identification of novel biomarkers for the small for gestational age human fetus" and the total grant is £416,908 over three years.  Well done to both of you!

June 2011

  • Many congratulations to Dino Giussani who has been promoted to a Professorship, as announced in the Reporter yesterday. Well done Dino!

  • ...And yet another sincere congratulations, this time to Francesco Colucci, who was promoted to a Readership in the Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology. Well done Francesco!

May 2011

  • ...And yet another hearty congratulations, this time to Erica Watson, who won the ‘Children’s Health and Reproduction Trainee Award’ at the Canadian Conference on Epigenetics, London, Ontario, Canada this month.  

    Well done Erica!

  • We are delighted to announce that Professor Graham Burton, founding director of the CTR, has today been elected to the Fellowship of the Academy of Medical Sciences. The Academy says in its citation of Graham's election: 'Professor Burton is a world-leading authority in human placentation, whose groundbreaking findings have led to a paradigm shift in our understanding of human early pregnancy, and the pathophysiology of pregnancy complications'.

    We warmly congratulate Graham on this prestigious award!

April 2011

  • Special congratulations to Francesco Colucci and Ashley Moffett who have been awarded a £1.4M Wellcome Trust 5-yr programme grant to look at variability of immune system genes and its impact on placentation. The study includes collaborations with 4 additional members of the CTR: Graham, Gordon Smith, Myriam Hemberger, and Michelle Oyen. Well done to All concerned!

March 2011

  • Special congratulations to Ionel Sandovici and Miguel Constancia who, in close cooperation with Susan Ozanne's lab, have published a paper entitled: Maternal diet and aging alter the epigenetic control of a promoter-enhancer interaction at the Hnf4a gene in rat pancreatic islets. This paper will be available from 8th March 2011.

January 2011

  • It is our pleasure to announce that Gordon Smith has accepted the role of CTR Manager, effective from 1st January 2011 – we look forward to welcoming Gordon to the Centre! Barry Keverne has stepped down from this role, having completed his 4-year term. The CTR truly appreciates the contributions that Barry has made to the Centre during his time as one of the CTR Managers.

December 2010

  • It is with great sadness that we hear Peter Kaufmann passed away on the 19th December, following his long battle against cancer. Peter was a distinguished placental morphologist who contributed much to our current understanding of placental structure and function. He was one of the leading advocates for placental research, and played a pivotal role in the formation of the European Placenta Group and then IFPA. His geniality will be sorely missed, and we extend our sympathies to his family.

November 2010

  • Congratulations to Amanda Sferruzzi-Perri, who presented her work at the Mouse Development, Genetics & Genomics Meeting, held in Cold Spring Habour, NY last month.
  • This time it's congratulations to Gordon Smith, who was given the International Stillbirth Alliance (ISA) "Distinguished Researcher" award at the joint meeting of the ISA and the International Society for the Study and Prevention of Infant Death in Sydney, Australia.
  • Congratulations to Norah Fogarty and Amanda Sferruzzi-Perri (again!) who both presented posters which were short-listed for the final of the poster competition at the IFPA meeting in Santiago, Chile last month.
  • Sincere congratuations to Professor Robert Pijnenborg as he becomed Emeritus Professor this month. Robert is a member of the CTR's Scientific Advisory Board and Graham Burton had the pleasure of travelling to Leuven to be present at a symposium in honour of Robert.
  • A warm welcome (belated!) to Jens Kieckbusch who joined the CTR last month as a Graduate Student. Jens works with Francesco Colucci at Addenbrooke's, and he is exploring how killer cells contribute to reproductive success.

August 2010

  • Congratulations to Andrew Murray; he is the recipient of a £162K three-year project grant from Action Medical Research to study placental mitochondrial dysfunction in the pathogenesis of complications of pregnancy. The ultimate aim of the work is to identify early maternal biomarkers of placental dysfunction, and to identify possible therapeutic targets to restore mitochondrial energy metabolism. Well done, Andrew!

June 2010

  • Yet another warm welcome, this time to Nisha Padmanabhan, who joins the CTR as a Graduate Student. Nisha was already working with the CTR as a Research Assistant; she will continue to work with Erica Watson and Anne Ferguson-Smith.
  • Sincere congratulations to Gordon Smith who is to be admitted as a Fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences (FMedSci) this month, based on exceptional contributions to the medical sciences.
  • Another hearty congratulations, this time to Magda Zernicka-Goetz, who was awarded a personal Professorship.
  • Many congratulations to Azim Surani upon his receipt of a Royal Medal, in recognition of his pivotal contributions to the understanding of early mammalian development

May 2010

  • Congratulations to Wolf Reik, Professor at Babraham Institute and member of the CTR Board of Managers. Wolf has been elected a Fellow of the Royal Society – well done Wolf!

April 2010

  • Another warm welcome! This time to Nuala Daw, who joined the CTR in April. Nuala is already a familiar face around the CTR lab, which she will now manage.
  • A warm welcome to Elisabeth Ritter, who joins the CTR as a Graduate Student. Elisabeth's studies will focus on the history of science and medicine, specialising in placentology. She will be working with Martin Johnson and Nick Hopwood.

October 2009

  • Congratulations to Nick Hopwood! The Wellcome Trust has awarded a grant of £785,058 for research assistance, expenses and equipment, for his 60-month study entitled "From Generation to Reproduction".
  • Congratulations to Billy Yung! Billy won the best poster presentation award at the International Society for the Study of Hypertension in Pregnancy (ISSHP) conference, which was held in Oxford iin September.
  • A warm welcome to Sathya Reddy, who has joined the CTR for 6 months as a Commonwealth Scholar.
  • Another warm welcome to Norah Fogarty, who has secured a PhD Studentship from the ASGBI and will be supervised by Graham Burton.

April 2009

  • A warm (and belated!) welcome to Dr Kathy Niakan who joined the Centre on 1st April 2009. Kathy has secured one of our Next Generation Fellowships and the long-term goal of her research is to generate extraembryonic cell types that can be used not only to model early human development, but also to generate therapeutically relevant cells for disease modelling and ultimately for potential uses in cell-based therapies.

March 2009

  • Congratulations to Emilio Herrera! Emilio received one of the Lang-Pardi Italy Foundation President's Presenter Awards. These awards were given for the first time this year, at the 2009 SGI Annual Meeting. The two awards recognise the two best abstracts in the field of fetal medicine and placenta presented by a senior research member and by a junior research member still in training. His winning abstract was entitled "Antioxidants increase umbilical blood flow via nitric oxide dependent and independent pathways" by EA Herrera, AS Thakor, JA Hansell, AD Kane, and DA Giussani.

January 2009

  • Congratulations to Amanda Sferruzzi-Perri! Her abstract "Igf2 Deficiency Modifies Placental Adaptation to Maternal Undernutrition during Mouse Pregnancy" was selected by the 2009 Scientific Program Committee to receive one of the 25 SGI President's Presenter Awards. The purpose of this award is to recognise the 25 most meritorious abstracts submitted by individuals still in training.
  • A warm welcome to Dr Erica Watson who joined the Centre on 13th January 2009. Erica has secured one of our Next Generation Fellowships, is sponsored by Anne Ferguson-Smith and will pursue research into the effects of folate availability on methylation patterns in trophoblast and germ cell lineages.
  • Research Horizons: the latest version of Research Horizons (January 2009, Issue 8) features a 10 page report on reproductive health, with many contributions from the CTR team
  • Welcome to Elizabeth Harrington who also joined the Centre this month as Administrator. Elizabeth will be responsible for organisational arrangements and financial management.
  • Keystone Symposia: Miguel Constancia and Magdalena Zernicka-Goetz will present their work at the Frontiers in Reproductive Biology and Regulation of Fertility Symposium, to be held in Santa Fe, New Mexico, 1-6 February 2009.
  • Tereza Cindrova-Davis (Burton Lab) will present the following "Soluble VEGF receptor 1 and TNF-alpha act in synergy to activate endothelial cells" on 26th January 2009 as part of the 'Chalk Talks'. 1.15pm Hodgkin Huxley Seminar Room
  • Congratulations to Emilio Herrera! His abstract "Chronic Hypoxia during Pregnancy Alters the Anatomy and Function of the Fetal Aorta at the End of Gestation" was selected by the 2009 Scientific Program Committee to receive one of the 25 SGI President's Presenter Awards. The purpose of this award is to recognize the 25 most meritorious abstracts submitted by individuals still in training.
  • Mitsu Ito (Ferguson-Smith Lab) will present the following "Rtl1 and associated microRNAs in placental and embryonic growth" on 2nd March 2009 as part of the 'Chalk Talks'. 1.15pm Hodgkin Huxley Seminar Room
  • Trinity College intends to hold an election of Junior Research Fellows on 5 October 2009. Completed application forms and supporting documents must reach the College by 4.00pm on Monday 2nd March 2009.
  • Congratulations to Magdalena Zernicka-Goetz! Magdalena was recently awarded EMBO membership. In addition, she was also a recipient of the International Society of Differentiation Award (Anne McLaren Memorial Lecture)

2008

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  • Sept. 08 40 New Investigators received Loke Travel Awards funded by the CTR to attend the IFPA meeting held in Seggau, Austria September 10-13, 2008. Some of the delighted recipients are pictured here at the Gala Dinner (click to enlarge).
  • July 08 Congratulations to Professor Abby Fowden on her Joan Mott Prize Lecture, entitled "Hormones as epigenetic signals in developmental programming". Her lecture was presented during the Physiological Society's meeting in Cambridge on 13-16 July.
  • July 08 PhD Studentships awarded! We are delighted to announce that Arjun Jain and Owen Vaughan will be joining the Centre in October 08 for 3 years under our PhD Studentship scheme.
  • July 08 We look forward to welcoming Katherine Leitch who will be joining us from Michigan State University on a Churchill Scholarship in October 08.
  • July 08 CTR launched! The official launch of the Centre took place on 9 July 2008 at the Centre for Mathematical Sciences in Cambridge. The event was well attended and enjoyed by international and UK delegates.
  • May 08 Personal promotions! Our warmest congratulations to Ashley Moffett and Anne Ferguson-Smith on their promotion to personal Chairs. These prestigious positions reflect their original and highly influential contributions to the fields of reproductive immunology and epigenetics respectively.
  • May 08 Next Generation Fellowships awarded! We are delighted to announce that Ray Ng (Babraham Institute) and Erica Watson (University of Calgary) have been appointed to NGFs starting in 2008. Ray is sponsored by Wolf Reik and will work on the role of methylation in early trophoblast differentiation. Erica is sponsored by Anne Ferguson-Smith and will pursue research into the effects of folate availability on methylation patterns in trophoblast and germ cell lineages.
  • May 08 Administrator appointed! We welcome Elizabeth Harrington, who has been appointed as Administrator to the Centre. Sarah joins us from the University's Research Services Division, and will be responsible for organisational arrangements and financial management.
  • May 08 We are delighted to welcome Dr Amanda Sferruzzi-Perri who joins us on a CJ Martin Fellowship for 2 years. Amanda studied for her PhD at the University of Adelaide, and will be investigating the role of the Akt/mTOR pathway in regulating placental growth.