Nuffield Council on Bioethics / Home

Albert Weale is ESRC Professorial Fellow & Professor of Political Theory and Public Policy at University College London. He is Chairman of the British Academy Research Committee and a co-editor of the British Journal of Political Science.

Steve Brown is Director of the Medical Research Council Mammalian Genetics Unit in Harwell, Oxfordshire. He is Editor of Mammalian Genome and was a member of the Council’s Working Party on the ethics of animal research. He specialises in mouse and mammalian genetics, with a particular interest in the genetic bases of hearing loss.

Roger Brownsword is Director of the Centre for Technology, Ethics & Law in Society (TELOS), School of Law, King’s College London and Honorary Professor in Law at the University of Sheffield. Research interests include legal theory, bioethics and the regulation of technology.

Amanda Burls is Director of Postgraduate Programmes in Evidence-Based Health Care, and a Senior Fellow of the Centre for Evidence-Based Medicine, at the University of Oxford. She works on the International Network for Knowledge about Wellbeing (ThinkWell). She was Director of the West Midlands Health Technology Assessment Collaboration until 2007.

Robin Gill is Michael Ramsey Chair of Modern Theology and Founding Chair of the Research Ethics and Governance Committee at the University of Kent. He was Chair of the Archbishop of Canterbury’s Medical Ethics Advisory Committee 1993-2006. He has published a number of books on theological aspects of bioethics including Christian ethics and values, health care and genetics.

Professor of Cardiac Pharmacology at the National Heart And Lung Institute, a Division of the Faculty of Medicine, Imperial College London. Member of the Central Ethical Review Committee for Animal Studies and a Designated Person for administration of the Human Tissue Act. Scientific interests include gene and cell therapy for heart disease.

Peter Harper is University Research Professor in Human Genetics, Cardiff University. He has had a long-standing research interest in inherited neurological disorders, especially Huntington's disease and myotonic dystrophy. He has been extensively involved in the practice and development of genetic counselling, and is author of Practical Genetic Counselling. He was a member of the Council's first Working Party on Genetic Screening: ethical issues.

Ray Hill was Head of Licensing and External Research for Europe at Merck, Sharp and Dohme until his retirement in May 2008. He is a pharmacologist with a special interest in pain and headache research and is a Visiting Professor at Imperial College London and Bristol, Surrey and Strathclyde Universities. He is a non-executive Director of several biotech companies and Honorary Biomedical Business Development Advisor at Imperial College London. He is President-Elect of the British Pharmacological Society.

Søren Holm is Professor of Bioethics at the University of Manchester and part-time Professor of Medical Ethics at the University of Oslo, Norway. He is a medical doctor and philosopher and a former member of the Danish Council of Ethics. He is President of the European Society for Philosophy of Medicine and Health Care and joint Editor in Chief of the Journal of Medical Ethics.

Christopher Hood is Gladstone Professor of Government and Fellow of All Souls College, University of Oxford. He is also Director of the Economic and Social Research Council’s Public Services Research Programme. Christopher Hood specialises in the study of executive government, regulation and public-sector reform and he is a co-opted member of Council while he chairs the Working Party on personalising healthcare.

Rhona Knight has a portfolio career in medicine. She works as a General Practitioner in Leicester, and is Senior Clinical Educator at the University of Leicester. She has an interest in making bioethical issues accessible and understandable to non-specialist audiences, and is Chair of the Council's Reaching Out to Young People Advisory Group.

Graeme Laurie is Professor of Medical Jurisprudence at the University of Edinburgh and Director of the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) Research Centre for Studies in Intellectual Property and Technology Law. His research interests include the role of law in promoting and regulating science, medicine and technology. He was a member of the Council’s Working Party on the Forensic use of bioinformation: ethical issues.

Tim Lewens is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of History and Philosophy of Science and Fellow of Clare College, University of Cambridge. He has been Co-Chair of the Cambridge Bioethics Forum since 2002. His primary research interests are the philosophy of biology, philosophy of science and bioethics.

Ottoline Leyser is Professor of Plant Developmental Genetics and Chair of the Biology Department Research Committee at the University of York. She is a Member of Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC) Strategy Advisory Board and Chair of the BBSRC Bioscience Skills and Careers Strategy Panel. In 2009 she was awarded a CBE for services to plant science.

Anneke Lucassen is Professor of Clinical Genetics and Honorary Consultant Clinical Geneticist, University of Southampton Cancer Sciences Division and The Wessex Clinical Genetics Service. Her main clinical and research interests are cancer genetics, cardiogenetics and primary care genetics including social, ethical and legal aspects. She is co-chair of the Southampton University Hospitals NHS Trust Clinical Ethics Committee and cofounder of the UK Genethics Club.

Professor of Reproductive Medicine, Consultant Gynaecologist and Head of the NHS Newcastle Fertility Centre at Life. Currently involved in setting clinical standards, embryo research, stem cell derivation and the associated practical, political and ethical issues.

Reader in Geography at Queen Mary, University of London. Bronwyn is an economic and cultural geographer interested in the way human-environment relations are being recast by technological, economic and regulatory changes. Research topics include the political economy of the life sciences industry, the commodification and patenting of life forms, bioethics, and the creation and use of human tissue banks. She has acted as consultant to the UK government and the UN.

Hugh Perry is Professor of Experimental Neuropathology at the University of Southampton. His research interests include interactions between the immune system and nervous system in health and disease and neurodegenerative disease.

James Martin White Professor of Sociology at the London School of Economics and Political Science, and Director of the LSE's BIOS Centre for the Study of Bioscience, Biomedicine, Biotechnology and Society. Initially trained as a biologist and psychologist. His current research is on the social and political implications of the new sciences of the brain.

Joyce Tait is Scientific Adviser to the Innogen Centre (ESRC Centre for Social and Economic Research on Innovation in Genomics) at Edinburgh University. Joyce has an interdisciplinary background in natural and social sciences including risk assessment and regulation, policy analysis, technology management, strategic and operational decision making in companies and public bodies. She is a co-opted member of Council while she chairs the Working Party on new approaches to biofuels.

Marilyn Strathern was Mistress of Girton College Cambridge until 2009 and was the William Wyse Professor of Social Anthropology at Cambridge from 1993 to 2008. Her most recent research interests include intellectual and cultural property issues; the implications of interdisciplinary as an explicit form of good practice; and obligations in relationships. In 2008, she was elected lifetime President of the Association of Social Anthropologists of the UK and Commonwealth. She is a co-opted member of Council while she chairs the Working Party on human bodies in medicine and research.

Geoff Watts spent five years in research before becoming a science and medical writer and broadcaster. He presented BBC Radio 4’s Medicine Now and, more recently, its science programme Leading Edge. He was a founder member of, and served for six years on, the Human Genetics Commission. He is currently a member of the government’s Committee on Ethical Aspects of Pandemic Influenza.

Jonathan Wolff is Head of the Department of Philosophy at University College London. His research interests include political philosophy, Marx and ethics. He was a member of the Council’s Working Party on the ethics of animal research.