Professor Kay Davies CBE, professor of genetics (1995-98) and Dr Lee's professor of anatomy (since 1998) at the University of Oxford, out of whose recent work there is promise of a cure for Duchenne muscular dystrophy, discusses a Midlands upbringing, family and school influences, including the impact of nearby Welsh countryside, and a decision to study chemistry. The influence of undergraduate years at Oxford is then reviewed, particularly the attractions of biochemistry which led to a first research project, then DPhil studies on the structure of chromatin.Research fellowships in Oxford and Paris follow, providing the fundamental experience of molecular genetics that was to develop into major studies of the genetics of Duchenne muscular dystrophy with Dr Bob Williamson at St. Mary's Hospital, London, in the 1980s. This involved innovative chromosome manipulation and gene cloning exercises and the development of a gene reference bank against which the characterisation of the DMD gene could be undertaken. A decision to bring the work to the new Institute of Molecular Medicine in Oxford in 1985 is then reviewed, as is a later move in 1992 to direct the first two years of the Medical Research Council's new Clinical Sciences Centre at the Royal Postgraduate Medical School, Hammersmith, where research interests included the genetics of spinal muscular atrophy.At this point in the interview attention turns to Professor Davies's return to Oxford as professor in 1995 and recent research showing the capacity of the protein utrophin to substitute for dystrophin, the protein deficient in the muscles of DMD sufferers. It is an advance revealing how pharmacological research might progress towards a solution to DMD disability, through upregulation of the utrophin gene. The interview concludes with reflection on the contributions of marriage and motherhood to personal fulfilment, and the swings and roundabouts of being a woman in science.
Genetic disease, Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD), the DMD gene, dystrophin, utrophin, fragile-X disease, new possibilities of a cure for DMD, Dr Bob Williamson, Dr Brian Young
Genetics, Physiology,
vid-058, MSVA_147
Permanent link to this resource: https://doi.org/10.24384/000173
Davies, KayBlythe, Max
Learning Resources
Original artefact: 1996 RADAR resource: 2017
Oxford, UK
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