Intersections - Graduate Institute of International and Development

Intersections:
Social Science & Bioscience
Perspectives on Stem Cell
Technologies
Saturday 15 November 2014 – Sunday 16 November 2014
Auditorium 2, Maison de la paix, Chemin Eugène-Rigot 2, 1202 Geneva
‘Intersections’ is an interdisciplinary conference inviting comment on the burgeoning rise of stem cell technologies
around the globe.
The conference is the first major interdisciplinary initiative bringing together social science and bioscience engagement with stem cell technologies in a comparative perspective.
The core objective is to examine four interlaced themes in a range of global contexts:
> New and emerging research on the cellular form
> Current trends in bench to bedside translations
> Emerging markets and commercial opportunities
> Ethical perplexities and regulatory complexities
The conference is organized around a series of keynotes, plenaries and round table discussions involving an array
of stakeholders ranging from academic researchers, clinical scientists, industry specialists through to INGOs, patient
advocacy groups, lawmakers and policy analysts.
The conference aims to:
> Establish a unique conversation on the intersection of social science and bioscience
> Facilitate the emergence of new innovative thinking, research agendas and interdisciplinary collaborations
For further details contact:
Aditya Bharadwaj
Research Professor of Anthropology and Sociology
Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies
aditya.bharadwaj@graduateinstitute.ch
graduateinstitute.ch/anso
≥ Programme
Saturday 15 November 2014
Sunday 16 November 2014
>
9:30 – 10:00 >
10:00 – 11:00 Keynote
>
Welcome
Professor Aditya Bharadwaj,
The Graduate Institute, Geneva
Professor Sheila Jasanoff, Harvard
University
11:00 – 11:30 Coffee
Plenary I – Regenerating Ethics
Chair
Professor Ilona Kickbusch, The Graduate Institute, Geneva
>
11:30 – 12:00 Professor Clare Williams, Brunel
University
>
12:00 – 12:30 Dr Marisa Jaconi, University of Geneva
>
12:30 – 13:00 Professor Linda Hogle, University of
Wisconsin
>
13:00 – 13:30 Discussion
>
13:30 – 15:00 Lunch for speakers and chairs
Plenary II – Therapeutic Horizons
Chair
Françoise Grange Omokaro, The Graduate Institute, Geneva
>
15:00 – 15:30 Dr Geeta Shroff, Nutech Mediworld,
New Delhi
>
15:30 – 16:00 Dr Alok Sharma, Nuerogen, Mumbai
>
16:00 – 16:30 Professor Yann Barrandon, EPFL,
Lausanne
>
16.30 – 17:00 Discussion
>
17:00 – 17:30 Coffee
>
17:30 – 18:30 Keynote
>
Professor Sarah Franklin, Cambridge
University
19:30 – 21:00 Dinner for speakers and chairs
Plenary III – Patient Advocacy
Chair
Professor Shalini Randeria, The Graduate Institute, Geneva
>
10:00 – 10:30 Ripudaman Singh, Stem Cell Advocacy,
>
India
10:30 – 11:00 Christine Anne Kiefer-Hellmund,
German Lyme Borreliosis Help
> 11:00 – 11:30 Dr Petra Hopf-Seidel, Neurologist and
Psychiatrist, Germany
>
11:30 – 12:00 Dr Heather Rooke, International Society
for Stem Cell Research (ISSCR)
>
12:00 – 12:30 Discussion
>
12:30 – 14:00 Lunch for speakers and chairs
Intersections: Round Table Discussion
Chair
Professor Marcia Inhorn, Yale University
>
14:00 – 16:00 Discussants
Aditya Bharadwaj, The Graduate Institute, Geneva
Marie-Charlotte Bouësseau, WHO
Sarah Franklin, Cambridge University
Gabriela Hertig, The Graduate Institute, Geneva
Linda Hogle, University of Wisconsin
Petra Hopf-Seidel, Germany
Marisa Jaconi, University of Geneva
Sheila Jasanoff, Harvard University
Karen Jent, Cambridge University
Nicola Jones, Palgrave, London
Alan Petersen, Monash University
Shalini Randeria, The Graduate Institute, Geneva
Alok Sharma, Nuerogen, Mumbai
Nayantara Sheron, The Graduate Institute, Geneva
Geeta Shroff, Nutech Mediworld, New Delhi
Andri Tschudi, University of Zurich
Clare Williams, Brunel University
>
p. 2 — Intersections
16:00 – 16:30 Coffee
speakers and chairs
Yann Barrandon
Aditya Bharadwaj
Joint Professor of Stem Cell Dynamics, Swiss Federal Institute of
Technology Lausanne (EPFL) and Lausanne University; Head of
the Department of Experimental Surgery at the Lausanne
University Hospital (CHUV)
Research Professor, Anthropology and Sociology of
Development, the Graduate Institute, Geneva
Yann Barrandon graduated in Dermatology in Paris, where he also
obtained his PhD. He moved to the USA and worked as a post-doctoral fellow (1982–1990) at Stanford Medical School and at Harvard
Medical School (HMS). While at HMS, he worked with Pr Howard
Green, a pioneer in cell therapy, and participated in the first transplantations of autologous cultured epidermal stem cells on extensively burned patients. Yann Barrandon moved back to France in
1990 as Director of Research at the INSERM and Head of Laboratory
at the Ecole Normale Supérieure (Paris). His research in Paris was
devoted to stem cells in the skin and he demonstrated the presence
of multipotent clonogenic stem cells in hair follicles and successfully
brought epidermal stem cells from bench to bedside. Since 2002,
Yann Barrandon works in Lausanne where he investigates the
potency of various tissue stem cells, among which that of the cornea
and the thymus. He has been a partner in several European stem cell
consortia: FP6-projects Therapeuskin and EuroStemCell; FP7-projects Optistem, EuroSystem and BetacellTherapy. Yann Barrandon
has been nominated twice best teacher in Life Sciences by the EPFL
students (2006, 2009) and was awarded an EPFL diploma for professorial excellence in 2013. He was president of the RESAL (Réseau
des Animaleries de l’ARC Lémanique) from 2007–2013 and a member
of the Ethics Committee of the Canton Vaud (2010–2013). He is a
member of the EMBO, of the Academia Europaea, a member of the
Committee for Academic Promotion at the School of Life Sciences
EPFL, of the Research Commission at EPFL and of the EPFL Human
Research Ethics Committee. Yann Barrandon has also contributed to
the success of the skin cell therapy unit at the Singapore General
Hospital and is now Initiative Director of the Joint Doctoral Program
between Singapore-A*Star and the EPFL, and a consultant for the
Institute of Medical Biology A*Star, Biopolis. He received the 2008
Medtech Award from the Swiss Commission for Technology and
Innovation (CTI) and was nominated among the 20 most creative
people in Swiss Lemanic by the Journal Bilan (2011). He co-founded
the start-up gymetrics (2011), a biotechnology company that was
awarded a CTI grant in 2012 and a Eureka grant in 2013.
p. 3 — Intersections
Professor Bharadwaj joined the Graduate Institute as Research
Professor of Anthropology and Sociology in January 2013. He
completed doctoral research at the University of Bristol and
post-doctoral fellowship at Cardiff University before joining University of Edinburgh where he taught and researched for over seven
years. His research uncovers the local and global dimensions
underscoring the production, utilisation and circulation of biomedicine and biotechnologies. In particular his research examines: (a)
global politics of biotechnologies (b) emerging bioeconomies (c)
cultural production of knowledge (d) subject formation (e) ethical
and moral governance (f) transnational therapeutic mobility. He is
currently supervising diverse PhD topics ranging from pregnancy
loss in Mexico, assisted reproductive technologies in Columbia to
genetic patient organisations in Scotland. In particular his
academic and research interests are focused on the burgeoning
rise of bioscience and biotechnologies in India. His current
research covers two major contemporary developments in the
domain of bioscience in India, namely: assisted reproductive technologies and human embryonic stem cells. Through this work he is
examining the emerging face of India’s tryst with biotechnologies
in a globalised research system. This principally entails: (a)
mapping transnational connections linking patients, research laboratories and clinics (b) understanding national/local scientific
contexts (c) interrogating moral and ethical debates cross culturally (d) explaining global governance and local regulation of new
biotechnologies. Aditya has recently been awarded European
Research Council (ERC) Consolidator Grant for a project examining
the emergence of stem cell biotechnologies in India. The project
will explain the agential and structural processes authoring
unprecedented new developments in stem cell research and therapeutics in India. The research seeks to understand how stem cell
biotechnologies straddle multiple interlaced domains ranging from
public health, governance, ethics, markets to therapeutic application.
Sarah Franklin
Chair of Sociology at Cambridge
Sarah Franklin worked at Lancaster and the LSE before being
elected to the Chair of Sociology at Cambridge in 2011. Since
moving to Cambridge she has secured over £2M from the ERC,
ESRC, Wellcome Trust, and British Academy to establish the Reproductive Sociology Research Group (ReproSoc). Working closely
with Nick Hopwood and Martin Johnson, she has also established
the IVF Histories and Culture Project at Cambridge – an interdisciplinary initiative exploring both the history of UK IVF and the
culture of mammalian development biology out of which it
emerged. Her most recent book is entitled Biological Relatives: IVF,
stem cells and the future of kinship (Duke 2013).
researching changing concepts of ‘risk’ and ‘privacy’ in data mining
and sharing of information from iPS cell donors. She has served as
an advisor to several international research consortia focusing on
stem cells and tissue engineering. Her volume “Regenerative Medicine Ethics: Governing Research & Knowledge Practices” (Springer
2014) aims to provide practicing scientists and engineers with a
more contextualized understanding of the challenges of regenerative medicine governance, especially whose which are less visible in
most of the ethics literature on the subject. A recent paper,
“Informed Consent: the Politics of Intent and Practice in Medical
Research Ethics” (with Klaus Hoeyer, 2014) critiques assumptions
underlying existing informed consent practices.
Petra Hopf-Seidel
Neurologist and psychiatrist
Françoise Grange Omokaro
Lecturer, Anthropology and Sociology
of Development, the Graduate Institute, Geneva
Given her multidisciplinary background (psychology, anthropology
and development studies), Françoise Grange Omokaro initial
research topics addressed questions of the anthropology of the
body, disease and health. More specifically, she worked on medical
and religious pluralism in Indonesia and the development of predictive medicine in Switzerland. Her most recent research focuses on
the sexual-economic exchange and the building of gender expertise in Africa (Mali).
In 1970, I finished the humanistic gymnasium in Bamberg and
started my professional training as a scientific librarian. I finished
in 1973 and then worked in the Bavarian state library in Munich.
1974, I started studying medicine in Würzburg and Berlin and
graduated in 1979 from the Free University of Berlin (FU Berlin).
After having finished my thesis (with magna cum laude), I started
to work as a surgical assistant doctor. One year later, my family and
I left to live in Malaysia for 3 1/2 years. Following this, I began my
postgraduate studies in a psychiatric hospital and trained to
become a specialist in family medicine, in neurology and psychiatry. After finishing my postgraduate studies, I worked for two more
years in a mental hospital before I worked as a specialist in neurology and psychiatry in a practice. Since 2003, I have a private practice as a specialist in neurology and psychiatry, predominantly
treating chronically ill patients, most of whom suffer from Lyme
disease.
Within this context, I was introduced to the human embryonic
stem cell (hESC) therapy in the Nutech clinic in New Delhi, India.
Since 2012, I have visited the clinic several times with chronically
ill patients, all looking desperately for help. So far, they benefitted
a great deal from this form of therapy.
Linda F. Hogle
Professor of Medical Social Sciences, School of Medicine &
Public Health, University of Wisconsin-Madison;
Fellow, Wisconsin Institutes for Discovery; Member of the
Bionano­composite Tissue Engineering Scaffolds (BIONATES)
research group
The research of Linda F. Hogle includes analyses of social, ethical,
and regulatory issues in emerging cell-based and biomedical engineering technologies. In particular, she is interested in the way
efforts to standardize emerging technologies affect and are affected
by organizational and oversight arrangements. Currently she is
p. 4 — Intersections
Marcia C. Inhorn
William K. Lanman Jr. Professor
of Anthropology and International Affairs, Department of
Anthropology and The Whitney and Betty MacMillan Center for
International and Area Studies, Yale University
Marcia C. Inhorn is a specialist on Middle Eastern gender, religion,
and health, she has conducted research on the social impact
of infertility and assisted reproductive technologies in Egypt, Leba-
non, the United Arab Emirates, and Arab America over the past 25
years. She is the author of four books on the subject, including The
New Arab Man: Emergent Masculinities, Technologies, and Islam in
the Middle East (Princeton U Press, 2012), Local Babies, Global
Science: Gender, Religion, and In Vitro Fertilization in Egypt (Routledge, 2003), Infertility and Patriarchy: The Cultural Politics of Gender
and Family Life in Egypt (U Pennsylvania Press, 1996) and Quest for
Conception: Gender, Infertility, and Egyptian Medical Traditions (U
Pennsylvania Press, 1994), which have won the AAA’s Eileen
Basker Prize and the Diana Forsythe Prize for outstanding feminist
anthropological research in the areas of gender, health, science,
technology, and biomedicine. Her newest book, Cosmopolitan
Conceptions: IVF Sojourns in Global Dubai, is forthcoming from Duke
University Press. She is also the editor or co-editor of nine books,
including Medical Anthropology at the Intersections: Histories, Activisms, and Futures (Duke U Press, 2012), Islam and Assisted Reproductive Technologies: Sunni and Shia Perspectives (Berghahn, 2012),
Anthropology and Public Health: Bridging Differences in Culture and
Society (Oxford U Press, 2009), and Infertility around the Globe: New
Thinking on Childlessness, Gender, and Reproductive Technologies (U
California Press, 2002). She has been a visiting faculty member at
the American University of Beirut, Lebanon, and the American
University of Sharjah, United Arab Emirates, where she has
conducted studies on “Middle Eastern Masculinities in the Age of
New Reproductive Technologies” and “Globalization and Reproductive Tourism in the Arab World.” In Fall 2010, she was the first
Diane Middlebrook and Carl Djerassi Visiting Professor at the
Centre for Gender Studies at the University of Cambridge. Inhorn is
also the current and founding editor of the Journal of Middle East
Women’s Studies (JMEWS) of the Association of Middle East
Women’s Studies, and co-editor of the Berghahn Book series on
“Fertility, Reproduction, and Sexuality.” She has served on the
Board of Directors of the Middle East Studies Association, is the
former chair of Yale’s Council on Middle East Studies, and was
named the 2013 Middle East Distinguished Scholar by the American Anthropological Association’s Middle East Section. Before
coming to Yale in 2008, Inhorn was a professor of medical anthropology at the University of Michigan and was president of the Society for Medical Anthropology of the American Anthropological
Association.
Marisa Jaconi
Biologist, Department of Pathology and Immunology, University
of Geneva
Her research examines mechanisms of cardiac cell differentiation
(genetic control and plasticity potential) in human pluripotent
stem cells, both embryonic (ES) and induced pluripotent stem
(iPS) cells.
Her long term goal is translational, i.e. the set-up of
muscle regeneration strategies that are easily transferrable to
the clinical setting. Dr Jaconi has published extensively in peer
reviewed journals and is the founder member and vice-director
and executive board representative of the Swiss Institute of Cell
Therapies (SiCt).
p. 5 — Intersections
Sheila Jasanoff
Pforzheimer Professor of Science and Technology Studies,
Harvard Kennedy School
A pioneer in her field, she has authored more than 100 articles and
chapters and is author or editor of a dozen books, including
Controlling Chemicals, The Fifth Branch, Science at the Bar, and
Designs on Nature. Her work explores the role of science and technology in the law, politics, and policy of modern democracies, with
particular attention to the nature of public reason. She was founding chair of the STS Department at Cornell University and has held
distinguished visiting appointments in the US, Europe, and Japan.
Jasanoff served on the Board of Directors of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and as President of the Society for Social Studies of Science. She has received a Guggenheim
Fellowship, the Sarton Chair of the University of Ghent, and an
Ehrenkreuz from the Government of Austria. She holds AB, JD, and
PhD degrees from Harvard, and an honorary doctorate from the
University of Twente.
Ilona Kickbusch
Adjunct Professor, the Graduate Institute, Geneva
Professor Ilona Kickbusch is recognized throughout the world for
her contribution to health promotion and global health. She is
currently adjunct professor at the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies, Geneva and director of the Global
Health Programme. She advises organisations, government agencies and the private sector on policies and strategies to promote
health at the national, European and international level. She has
published widely and is a member of a number of advisory boards
in both the academic and the health policy arena. Professor Kickbusch has received many awards and served as the Adelaide
Thinker in Residence at the invitation of the Premier of South
Australia. She has launched a think-tank initiative “Global Health
Europe: A Platform for European Engagement in Global Health”
and the “Consortium for Global Health Diplomacy”. Her key areas
of interest are global health governance, global health diplomacy,
health in all policies, the health society and health literacy. She
has had a distinguished career with the World Health Organization, at both the regional and global level, where she initiated the
Ottawa Charter for Health Promotion and a range of “settings
projects” including Healthy Cities. From 1998 – 2003 she joined
Yale University as the head of the global health division, where she
contributed to shaping the field of global health and headed a
major Fulbright programme. She is a political scientist with a PhD
from the University of Konstanz, Germany.
Christine Anne Kiefer-Hellmund
Biologist
As daughter of a pharmacist and a teacher she was born in Southwest Germany 1973.
She went to the Staatliches Gymnasium in Dillingen/Saar and later
she visited the Private Boarding School Kurpfalz-Internat in Heidelberg.
In 1990 she started her career as biological scientific medical
beautician. Afterwards she spent a few years in the United States
studying Managment and Marketing. Christine founded her own
business in the year 1998 at age 25 in Germany. She collaborated
with beauticans and dermatologists in Europe.
In 2004, shortly after she gave birth to her second son, she startet
to get very ill. The mysterious disease was late stage severe neurologic Lyme disease and multiple tick-borne coinfections. Due to the
late diagnosis in 2007, her whole organism was seriously infected.
She is completely medically retired since 2005 until today.
After 6 years of being bedridden and meanwhile severly handicapped, still fighting with many persisting tick-borne infections,
some progressively deadly autoimmune diseases came on board.
Over 3 years all kind of Western therapies had failed. She decided
in summer 2010 to travel to India to receive human embryonic stem
cells (hESC) as last resort to survive.
Amazing, positive results are the reason to found to found a
non-profit organisation – Deutsche Lyme Borreliose Hilfe Initiative
– to help and inform others. In 2012 she organized an interdisciplinary symposium in Germany, on the topics of Lyme and coinfections, where her pioneering case in late neurologic Lyme disease
with hESC therapy in India was presented by Dr Geeta Shroff
(Director Nutech Mediworld/ New Delhi).
She is a mentor and motivational speaker for many patients with
chronic illness, she is living with her three children in Southwest
Germany.
Shalini randeria
Professor, Anthropology and Sociology
of Development, The Graduate Institute, Geneva; Visiting
Professor, Social Science Research Centre Berlin (WZB)
Shalini Randeria is a former member of the Senate of the German
Research Council (DFG), President of the European Association of
Social Anthropologists (EASA) and a Fellow of the Institute of
Advanced Studies, Berlin. She was Max Weber Professor for Sociology at the University of Munich, Professor of Social Anthropology at the University of Zurich as well as Professor and Chair of the
Department of Sociology and Social Anthropology of the Central
European University Budapest. She currently serves on the advip. 6 — Intersections
sory board of the Wenner-Gren Foundation, New York and on the
editorial board of Annual Review of Anthropology. She has
published widely on the anthropology of globalisation, law, the
state and social movements. Her empirical research on India also
addresses issues of post-coloniality and multiple modernities. Her
most recent publications include the edited volumes: Anthropology,
Now and Next: Diversity, Connections, Confrontations, Reflexivity, (in
press); Border Crossings: Grenzverschiebungen und Grenzüberschreitungen in einer globalisierten Welt, Zurich (in press); Vom Imperialismus zum Empire: Nicht-westliche Perspektiven auf Globalisierung,
Frankfurt/M. (2009);Worlds on the Move: Globalisation, Migration
and Cultural Security (2004); Jenseits des Eurozentrismus: Postkoloniale Perspektiven in den Geschichts- und Kulturwissenschaften,
Frankfurt/M. (2002) and Unraveling Ties: From Social Cohesion to
New Practices of Connectedness, Frankfurt/M. (2002).
Heather Rooke
Scientific Director for the International Society for Stem Cell
Research (ISSCR)
Heather Rooke works closely with the society’s leadership,
committees, task forces and staff to disseminate information and
ideas relating to stem cell research to both the research community and the public. She directs the ISSCR’s scientific, educational
and communication programs, including the ISSCR websites,
online educational platforms, newsletter and media relations. She
oversees the ISSCR’s publishing relationships and activities and
drives the operations of the society’s open access journal Stem
Cell Reports.
Dr Rooke first joined the ISSCR as Science Editor in October 2005.
She played an instrumental role in the development of the ISSCR’s
“Guidelines for the Conduct of Human Embryonic Stem Cell
Research” (2006), “Guidelines for the Clinical Translation of Stem
Cells” (2008) and “Patient Handbook on Stem Cell Therapies”
(2008). In 2010, she worked with the ISSCR’s Task Force on
Unproven Stem Cell Treatments and in the development of the
ISSCR’s web-resource, “A Closer Look at Stem Cell Treatments,”
that communicates information on stem cell treatments to
patients, their families and care-providers.
Dr Rooke completed her Ph.D. in Molecular Medicine at the University of Auckland, New Zealand, with scholarships from the Cancer
Society of New Zealand and the Matamata Leukemia Research
Trust. She received her postdoctoral training as a research fellow
with Dr Stuart Orkin at Boston Children’s Hospital, MA USA, where
her research interests included transcription factor control of
normal and aberrant hematopoiesis. During this time, Dr Rooke
participated in work that identified a component critical for
hematopoietic stem cell renewal. A fascination with stem cell
research and an interest in the development of scientific forums for
professional and public communication and education drew her to
her position with the ISSCR.
Alok Sharma
Ripudaman Singh
Director, NeuroGen Brain and Spine Institute, Mumbai
Stem Cell Advocacy, India
Dr Alok Sharma is a world renowned Neurosurgeon, Neuroscientist
and Professor who bring with him extensive surgical expertise and
experience in the areas of Neurosurgery, Neuroscience and Stem
cells.
I have been working in the banking and financial field for more than
18 years. I hold a degree in Bachelor of commerce and a Master’s
degree in Personnel Management from Pune University, India. I have
had a very successful professional work experience in various leadership roles during my work life.
My involvement happened with stem cells, after my son who is presently 13 years old, got diagnosed with Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy in the year 2005. Since there is currently no cure / treatment for
this condition, stem cells according to me are the closest to deal with
and subsequently the quickest treatment expected for this condition. Everything else seems to be moving at their own pace wherein,
time is the biggest factor for me to consider for my son. I have been
following stem cell research very closely now for more than 9 years
besides being in touch with various other research activities as well.
Over the years, I have been an advocate for stem cell research and
its huge potential, if done and practised in the right way. I would
continue to do whatever best I can do as a parent to take things
forward for the benefit of all children.
Geeta Shroff
Founder and Director, Nutech Mediworld
New Delhi, India
Dr Geeta Shroff has developed the technology to isolate human
embryonic stem cells (hESC), culture them, prepare them for clinical
application, and store them in ready-to-use form with a shelf life of
six months. Further, this technology is being used clinically to treat
patients. Since 2002, more than 1300 patients suffering from various
conditions-Spinal cord injury, Diabetes, Multiple sclerosis, Parkinson’s disease, Cardiac conditions, Cerebral palsy - all presently categorized as incurable, have been treated by Dr Shroff and the number
is steadily growing. A graduate in medicine from the University of
Delhi, Dr Shroff did her post graduation in Gynecology & Obstetrics.
She further specialized in treating infertility, and is a trained embryologist and a qualified IVF practitioner. After gaining 8 years of valuable clinical experience at Safdarjung Hospital & Batra Hospital,
both large multi-specialty hospitals in Delhi, Dr Shroff set up her own
IVF practice in 1996. She began research on human embryonic stem
cells in 1999, and pioneered human embryonic stem cell therapy.
She has presented her work at various national and international
forums. Dr Shroff envisions making hESC therapy available globally
so that it becomes the first line of treatment for many of mankind’s
worst afflictions.
p. 7 — Intersections
Clare Williams
Professor of Medical Sociology
Dept of Sociology & Communications
Brunel University London
Having previously worked as a nurse and health visitor for 22 years, I
was awarded my PhD in Sociology in 1998. Following 10 years at
King’s College London, I joined the Department of Sociology &
Communications at Brunel in 2011. Having completed two years as
Head of Research for the School of Social Sciences, I have just been
appointed to the cross-University role of Dean of Research. In 2007,
whilst at King’s, I helped establish and became the Director of the
Centre for Biomedicine & Society (CBAS). Although my interests are
diverse, I am essentially a qualitative medical sociologist. My
research focuses on four inter-related areas: the sociology of
biomedical ethics; gendered experiences of chronic illness; the sociology of medical/scientific professions; and the development of new
medical technologies. My current research (funded by a 5 year Wellcome Trust Strategic Award) explores the social, medical, scientific
and ethical aspects of innovations in biomedicine, particularly the
interface between the lab and the clinic in the fields of pre-implantation genetic diagnosis, stem cell research, embryo donation and
experimental neuroscience. I am currently UK representative on the
International Stem Cell Ethics Forum.