The University of Bristol aims for international excellence in its research. The Faculty of Medical and Veterinary Sciences comprises the four Schools of Biochemistry, Cellular & Molecular Medicine, Physiology & Pharmacology, and Veterinary Science, as well as the Centre for Comparative & Clinical Anatomy. The Faculty is one of the UK’s leading biomedical science faculties, with many of our researchers being internationally recognised leaders in their research areas.
The Faculty includes world leading research groups such as the MRC Centre for Synaptic Plasticity and houses world-leading research facilities such as the Wolfson Bioimaging Centre. The Faculty research is organised into themes. Besides fundamental, ‘blue-skies’ biomedical research, we are actively engaged in translational research from ‘farm to fork’ and from ‘bench-side to bedside’, notably through our participation in SARTRE (the Severnside Alliance for Translational Research).
The Faculty’s researchers turned in an impressive performance in RAE2008. Overall, 51% of the Faculty’s submission was assessed as 4* (‘world-leading’) or 3* (‘internationally excellent’) quality and 90% was of international standard (87% of eligible staff were submitted). Staff were returned in four units of assessment (UoA): 3 (Infection and Immunology), 14b (Biomedical Sciences), 15 (Preclinical and Human Biological Sciences) and 16 (Agriculture, Veterinary and Food Science). Bristol came first in terms of research power (Grade Point Average x FTE) in UoA 15, and Biochemistry was ranked equal sixth in UoA 14b.
Professor Jeremy Tavaré obtained a BSc (Biochemistry) and PhD (Biochemistry) at Bristol. After a period as an MRC Travelling Fellow at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute in Dallas he returned to Bristol as a British Diabetic Association Senior Research Fellow and was promoted to a Chair in Biochemistry in 1999. He was Director of Bristol’s MRC Cell Imaging Facility for ten years and is currently Chair of the Bristol Proteomics Facility. In 2001 he co-founded the drug discovery company ProXara Biotechnology Ltd and was Non-executive Director of Bioganix plc between 2007 and 2009.
He became Faculty Research Director in 2010, chairs the Faculty’s Research Committee and serves on several other university groups (including University Research Committee, Faculty of Medicine and Dentistry Research Committee, SARTRE Management Committee, Institute of Advanced Studies, Alumni Foundation Committee and Bristol Cancer Research Theme Committee). Outside the university he has previously worked on research boards for DiabetesUK and the Medical Research Council(MRC), and between 2004-6 was Deputy Chairman of the MRC Physiological Systems and Clinical Sciences Board. Currently he is Chairman of the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation’s Scientific Advisory Committee, sits on the DiabetesUK research board, the EFSD/CDS/Lilly Programme panel, and is external examiner at the Universities of Cambridge and Bath.
He runs a research group investigating the mechanism of insulin action on glucose uptake and the role of protein kinases in lung cancer, with a specific interest in protein kinase B (aka Akt). His research has become increasingly translational and as a result he has forged several strong links with clinicians at UHBristol and North Bristol NHS Trust (NBT). His work is funded by grants from the MRC, DiabetesUK, the British Heart Foundation and industrial sources.
