Funding boost for UCL academics awarded UKRI Future Leaders Fellowships

They are among 77 early-career researchers named as Future Leaders Fellows, awarded a total of £120 million by the UKRI (UK Research and Innovation) to lead groundbreaking research.

The fellowships are awarded to the following:

Dr Angelika Zarkali

Dr Angelika Zarkali (UCL Queen Square Institute of Neurology) has been awarded £2.9 million to lead a research project on the link between Parkinson’s disease and developing dementia. Currently it is estimated that patients with Parkinson’s are six times more likely to develop dementia within their lifetime than the rest of the population. Half of all people with Parkinson’s develop dementia within 10 years of a diagnosis.

Dr Zarkali said of her project: “Over the next four years, we will use multimodal neuroimaging techniques in different populations of people with Parkinson's disease, to identify circuits responsible for Parkinson’s dementia, and apply novel non-invasive ultrasound stimulation on those circuits to improve cognition. By combining multiple sources of information from large numbers of people with Parkinson’s, we will be able to select the best target for non-invasive stimulation of these brain circuits. We will then apply ultrasound simulation to this target in 50 people with Parkinson’s disease. We will use MR imaging to assess the effect of ultrasound stimulation on brain function and neurotransmitter levels.

“Together, these experiments will establish optimal non-invasive stimulation targets to improve cognition in Parkinson’s and directly test the efficacy of ultrasound stimulation as a potential treatment. This has potential as a new treatment approach for more widespread use in people with Parkinson’s and other dementias.”

She added on receiving the prestigious fellowship: “I am delighted and honoured to have been awarded a UKRI Future Leaders Fellowship. I am really excited to start work towards this aim and for the opportunity to interact with a fantastic cohort of fellows to share knowledge and experience and make a real difference for patients.”

Dr Mathieu Bourdenx

Dr Mathieu Bourdenx (UK Dementia Research Institute at UCL) has been awarded a fellowship worth £1.79 million. He will lead a project exploring how ageing cells may affect the risk of developing dementia.

Describing the project, Dr Bourdenx said: “My research aims at understanding how ageing affects the brain while accounting for its phenomenal complexity. I will explore the novel notion that age-related loss of cellular fitness can be defined at a single-cell level using state-of-the-art methods from the field of spatial biology.

“Preliminary observations indicate that brain cell populations age at different rates, defining vulnerable populations (“fast” ageing) and resilient populations (“slow” ageing). Of interest, these vulnerable populations largely overlap with the ones known to be affected in neurodegenerative diseases. The long-term goal of this project is to understand the diversity of brain ageing to identify resilience factors and design new therapies for ageing-related brain neurodegenerative disorders.”

With regards to receiving the fellowship, he said: “I am deeply honoured to have been awarded a UKRI Future Leaders Fellowship. This funding will enable my group to tackle a fundamental question about dementia: what happens during brain ageing that makes it possible for dementia to develop? The FLF network connecting fellows throughout the country will be a unique opportunity to strengthen our work through collaboration.”

Dr Deborah Caswell

Dr Deborah Caswell (UCL Cancer Institute) has been granted £2.5 million for a project examining the potential link between APOBEC3 genes (part of our body’s natural antiviral defences) and the development of lung cancer.

Dr Caswell said: “A key focus of my laboratory is the APOBEC3 (A3) family of genes. These antiviral enzymes normally protect us by mutating viral RNA and DNA. However, they can also damage our own genome. This APOBEC3 driven damage is detectable in more than 70% of human cancers. Intriguingly, inherited APOBEC3 variants—such as the A3A/B mutation, common in East Asian, Native American, and Oceanic populations but rare in Europeans and Africans—may increase lung cancer risk by making these enzymes more active and stable.

“The precise ways in which APOBEC3 activity affects lung cancer initiation remain unknown. With the support of this Future Leaders Fellowship, my lab will define how antiviral immune responses driven by APOBEC3 contribute to lung cancer initiation and progression. Our work will generate clinically relevant insights into the earliest steps of disease, paving the way for novel strategies to prevent cancer and reduce mortality worldwide.”

She added: “I am deeply honoured to receive a UKRI Future Leaders Fellowship. Most importantly, this fellowship makes possible research that I believe will bring us closer to preventing lung cancer and ultimately saving lives.”

Frances Burstow, Director of Talent and Skills at UKRI said: "UKRI’s Future Leaders Fellowships provide researchers and innovators with long-term support and training to embark on large and complex research programmes, to address key national and global challenges.

“The programme supports the research and innovation leaders of the future to transcend disciplinary and sector boundaries, bridging the gap between academia and business.

“The fellows announced today demonstrate how UKRI supports excellence across the entire breadth of its remit, supporting early-career researchers to lessen the distance from discovery to real world impact."

UKRI Chief Executive, Professor Sir Ian Chapman, said: “UKRI’s Future Leaders Fellowships offer long-term support to outstanding researchers, helping them turn bold ideas into innovations that improve lives and livelihoods in the UK and beyond. These fellowships continue to drive excellence and accelerate the journey from discovery to public benefit. I wish them every success.”

Links:

• Dr Angelika Zarkali’s academic profile
• Dr Mathieu Bourdenx’s academic profile
• Dr Deborah Caswell’s academic profile
• UCL Queen Square Institute of Neurology
• UCL Cancer Institute
• UK Dementia Institute at UCL
• UKRI Future Leaders Fellowships

Media contact

Laura Hannam

E: l.hannam@ucl.ac.uk