UCL Faculty of Life Sciences New Year Lecture

The UCL Life Sciences 2020 lecture was given by Stephanie Schorge, Professor of Translational Neuroscience from the Research Department of Pharmacology (UCL School of Pharmacy), who revealed how basic 'blue sky' research into the behaviour of neurons has led to funding for a clinical trial to treat patients with severe epilepsy.

Building on UCL’s neuroscience tradition, Stephanie has explored how mutations in human genes that cause neurological disease such as epilepsy, cause the behaviours of neurons to change.

Stephanie talked about how the first study of gene therapy in a rat model of epilepsy was able to stop seizures. Since this first study, Stephanie and her collaborators have developed a portfolio of new possible ways to stop seizure activity in different models.