Our Research Teams

Kevin Blyth is Professor of Respiratory Medicine at University of Glasgow, and Honorary Consultant in Respiratory Medicine at NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde (NHSGGC). Following completion of Internal and Respiratory Medicine training and the award of an MD in Magnetic Resonance Imaging, he was appointed as a Consultant in 2009. He splits his time between the CRUK Beatson Institute/University of Glasgow and the Queen Elizabeth University Hospital, where he leads the Glasgow Pleural Disease Unit. He founded and is Director of the Macmillan Scottish Mesothelioma Network, which coordinates clinical care and access to clinical trials for Mesothelioma patients in Scotland. He is an NHS Scotland Research (NRS) Senior Research Fellow and leads a translational research program focused on pleural disease and thoracic malignancy, and has a particular interest in Mesothelioma. He is Principal Investigator of the CRUK PREDICT-Meso International Accelerator Network, and Meso-ORIGINS study site PI for the Queen Elizabeth University Hospital, NHS GGC.

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Dr Rintoul is University Reader in Thoracic Oncology in the Department of Oncology, University of Cambridge and Honorary Consultant Respiratory Physician, Royal Papworth Hospital. He trained in respiratory medicine in London and Edinburgh receiving his doctorate from the University of Edinburgh for work investigating mechanisms underlying resistance to chemotherapy in small cell lung cancer. He was appointed consultant in respiratory medicine specialising in thoracic oncology at Royal Papworth Hospital in 2005 before taking up his current post in 2017. Dr Rintoul is lead clinician for cancer at Royal Papworth Hospital and Director of the Papworth Trials Unit Collaboration. He is co-lead of the CRUK Cambridge Centre Aerodigestive Programme and co-ordinates thoracic oncology research across Cambridge. From January 2021 he has been appointed chair of the clinical advisory group of the UK Lung Cancer Coalition.

Dr Rintoul’s research is focused around clinical trials, translational research and tissue banking in malignant mesothelioma and the early detection of lung cancer. He is Chief Investigator for several clinical translational studies examining biomarkers in lung cancer. In 2012 he founded MesobanK, the UK national bioresource for malignant mesothelioma (www.mesobank.com). His work is funded by the Cambridge Biomedical Research Centre, Cancer Research UK, National Institute for Health Research and the British Lung Foundation. He is Co-Lead for PREDICT-Meso WP1 and Meso-ORIGINS study site PI for Royal Papworth Hospital.

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Cancer Clinical Trials Unit Director. The CRUK Glasgow CTU runs a comprehensive service to design, implement, run and analyse cancer clinical trials
Clinical Trial Unit Glasgow

PREDICT-Meso Co-Investigator WP1

Consultant Chest Physician at Wythenshawe Hospital, Manchester University NHS Foundation Trust.

Clinical lead for the CURE programme and Tobacco Addiction and a core member of the Specialist Lung Cancer and Pleural Teams. This role includes delivery of the CURE, RAPID and Lung Health Check programmes at Wythenshawe Hospital.

Director of the Lung Pathway Board and clinical lead for the CURE project for Greater Manchester.

Member of the British Thoracic Society Specialist Advisory Groups for Tobacco and Pleural and a member of the British Thoracic Oncology Group Steering Committee.

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As Biorepository Manager for NRS GG&C since 2019 I have a keen interest in supporting the application of human tissue in research and teaching. The Biorepository has delegated REC authority to provide surplus to diagnosis tissue to support academic, clinical and commercial research and also supports CTIMP and ATMP trials.
My interests and expertise also includes TMA construction, Digital Pathology and the development of AI in digital diagnostics.

Dr MacPherson graduated with a PhD in Immunology in 2012 before moving on to Research Manager and Project Co-ordinator roles at NHS GGC, University of Glasgow, and Oregon Health and Science University. Dr MacPherson is responsible for overall project management of the PREDICT-Meso Network, co-ordination of the work packages and ensuring the PREDICT-Meso aims are met.
Dr MacPherson is the lead contact for the Network and the clinical study Meso-ORIGINS, which she co-ordinates.

The Le Quesne group use quantitative deep phenotyping methods to ask questions about tumour biology in intact tissues from humans and from animal models. We have particular interests in the dysregulation of mRNA translation, in the complex tumour microenvironment, in morphological biomarkers, and in the development of highly multiplexed quantitative methods using machine learning methods. Mesothelioma is an area of particular interest.

www.beatson.gla.ac.uk/The-Beatson-Institute-Research-Groups/john-lequesne

Providing expertise in clinical trials, translational mesothelioma work including cell lines and drug sensitivity. Meso-ORIGINS study site PI for Manchester University NHS Foundation Trust.

Prof Papotti’s team will provide retrospective MPM pairs and provide expertise in diagnostic histo- and cyto-pathology on MPM samples as part of WP1.

Dr. Cedrés graduated in Medical Oncology in 2005 by Hospital Universitario de Canarias. Since 2005 she has been working at the thoracic tumors unit at Vall d´Hebron University hospital with attention to investigation in clinical trials in lung cancer and mesothelioma patients.
In 2014 she obtained her PhD by Universidad Autonoma de Barcelona working in expression of PD-L1 in malignant pleural mesothelioma patients. She has publications about prognostic and predictive markers of response in thoracic tumors. Currently she is specialized in the investigation of biomarkers of response to therapies in thoracic tumors and she participates in the development of new drugs for these patients.
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The Coffelt lab is a cancer immunology lab focused on immune escape and immunosuppression in mouse models of cancer. They are particularly interested in gamma delta-cells, a T-cell receptor-expressing immune cell population with innate-like characteristics.

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Professor Biankin is a surgeon-scientist and Director of the Wolfson Wohl Cancer Research Centre at the University of Glasgow, where he established the Glasgow Precision Oncology Laboratory in 2016. Professor Biankin is also Chair of the UK-wide Precision-Panc programme of clinical trials for patients with pancreatic cancer. Professor Biankin is the Executive Director of the International Cancer Genome Consortium, Accelerating Research in Genomic Oncology (ICGC ARGO) project.
www.gpol.org

Prof. MacFarlane co-leads the ‘Mechanisms of Fibre Toxicity’ Programme at the MRC Toxicology Unit. The MRC team have characterised asbestos-induced mesothelioma development in vivo via longitudinal analysis of candidate tumour suppressor gene status throughout disease development in the pleura (Chernova et al, Curr Biol 2017). In addition, the team have successfully established low-passage patient-derived mesothelioma cell lines (PDCLs) from surgical resections, and have shown these recapitulate human disease (Chernova et al, Cell Death Differ 2016). The team will contribute to PREDICT-Meso by 1) establishing well-characterised PDCLs from pleural effusions, obtained at both pre-MPM and MPM stage (WP3), 2) in collaboration with the Bianchi team (Milan), establish 3D organotypic models for initial in vitro validation of drug screen candidates/target-drug validation (WP3&4), and 3) with the Murphy Lab (Glasgow), help establish and subsequently employ immunocompetent GEM models of asbestos-induced pleural mesothelioma for target-drug validation in vivo (WP4).

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Sam won an MRC Training Fellowship to perform a PhD and then a post-doctoral period working in the CRUK Lincoln’s Inn Fields Institute with Fiona Watt working on stem cell biology. He then moved as an MRC Clinician Scientist to UCL leading a group interested in the role of stem cells in lung cancer pathogenesis and treatment of lung disease using cell therapies. He was awarded a Wellcome Trust Senior Clinical Fellowship in October 2010 to work on novel cell therapies for lung cancers resulting in a DPFS first-in-man award and in 2015 won his Wellcome Senior Fellowship renewal to study the genetic and cellular changes lung cancer pathogenesis. He is the lead of four academic randomised clinical trials and most notably recently launched the SUMMIT study, a 25,000 participant London based study examining CT and blood screening for lung and other cancers.
He works as a respiratory consultant at UCLH with a particular interest in lung cancer, mesothelioma, interventional and diagnostic bronchoscopy and early lung cancer detection. He is Head of Respiratory Research Department at UCL, Vice-Chair of the National ‘Clinical Expert Group’ on Lung Cancer.

Professor Anne Willis OBE is Director of the MRC Toxicology Unit and with research programmes on Post-transcriptional control of gene expression following toxic injury and Fibre Toxicity Programme (a cross Unit programme with Marion MacFarlane), which complements PREDICT-Meso proposed work, with a focus on engineered carbon nanotubes. Prof Willis is a global leader in in vitro MPM models, and the biology underlying MPM evolution alongside Prof Marion MacFarlane who also has extensive expertise in in vivo models. Their pivotal observation that genomic events pre-date MPM evolution in mice provides the compelling pre-clinical rationale for the PREDICT-Meso programme. Prof Willis will be involved in the generation and profiling of patient derived cell lines and the validation of primary organoid models.

Professor in Pulmonology at Antwerp University and chair of the Pulmonology Department of its academic hospital (UZA). His translational scientific interests include the molecular diagnosis of lung cancer, the management of mesothelioma and the evaluation of volatile biomarkers of asbestos exposure. Together with Kevin Lamote, he is the founder of the breathomics lab within the Laboratory of experimental medicine and pediatrics (LEMP) at University of Antwerp. Member of European Reference Network for rare/ low prelavent diseases (ERN-Lung); Senior consultant thoracic oncology; Honorary professor of pulmonology

Dr Anna Bibby was appointed in 2018, having completed her speciality training in respiratory medicine and general internal medicine in the Severn Deanery in 2015. As well as a brief period working for Medicins sans Frontieres (MSF) in Mozambique, she spent three years working towards a PhD in mesothelioma at the University of Bristol. She maintains an active interest in clinical research, and holds a personal NIHR research fellowship with the University that allows her to run several mesothelioma trails alongside her clinical commitments. She is co-lead for Lung Cancer Services at North Bristol NHS Trust, and sits on the steering committee for the British Lung Foundation Mesothelioma Research Network. She ran the European Respiratory Society Taskforce on Malignant Pleural Effusions and is a member of the 2018 British Thoracic Society Pleural Disease Guideline group. She sits on the faculty for the British Thoracic Society thoracic ultrasound training course and the European Respiratory Society ultrasound and pleural procedure courses.. Research interests: Clinical trials; Observational data; Patients who decline/ are not suitable for systemic therapy; Immunotherapy; Pleural interventions; Pragmatic trials/ novel methodologies
Meso-ORIGINS study site PI for North Bristol NHS Trust
CI for ASSESS-Meso study which supports PREDICT-Meso WP5 activities.

Research Interests: Lung Cancer Imaging, COPD Diffuse Interstitial Lung Diseases, Imaging Quantification, Medical Education

Adjunct Professor of Diagnostic Imaging at PUCRS and Medical Coordinator of the HSL / PUCRS Image Center and the Molecular Image Center at InsCer-PUCRS. His main line of research is Functional and Molecular Image of the Body, with special interest in thoracic pathologies is Coordinator of the EXPER Research Group – Diagnosis and Research of Excellence.
Research areas of interest: Lung cancer; Malignancy; Magnetic resonance

Full Professor and Chairman of Radiology (University of Heidelberg), Medical Director of Diagnostic and Interventional Radiology at the University Hospital Heidelberg, Acting head of the Department of Translational Pneumology. Research Interests: Imaging, CT, MRI; Functional imaging; Quantitative imaging biomarkers; Staging, response assessment, prognostication