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Emyr Lloyd-Evans   DPhil (Oxon)

Professor Emyr Lloyd-Evans

(he/him)

DPhil (Oxon)

Deputy Director, Medicines Discovery Institute

School of Biosciences

cymraeg
Welsh speaking
Users
Available for postgraduate supervision

Overview

Research overview

My group is interested in identifying and treating the mechanisms leading to cell death in the lysosomal storage disorders, which are the most common cause of childhood neurodegenerative disease. We are also interested in determining the similarities between lysosomal diseases and associated neurodegenerative diseases of ageing, including Alzheimer's, Parkinson's and Huntington's, where we believe there are possibilities to treat similar underlying disease mechanisms. We are particularly interested in lysosomal Ca2+ signalling, endocytosis, autophagy and lysosomal protein (enzymes, channels and transporters) function. Our aim is to identify key disease relevant targets that can be interrogated by robust assays in order to screen and identify novel disease modifying small molecule tool compounds. Structural biology and medicinal chemistry are then employed to generate and deliver improved small molecule medicines that are tested in novel cellular disease models. My group has a track record of going from bench to bedside, and of collaborating with industry and patient organisation partners to deliver novel therapies for these devastating diseases.

Publication

2024

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2003

Articles

Books

Conferences

Research

Our current interests

  • We are currently interrogating a number of lysosomal targets within the group and in collaboration with others at the MDI (Dr. Helen Waller-Evans & Dr. D. Heulyn Jones), this includes the utilisation of high throughput biochemical assays, medicinal chemistry, structural biology, drug metabolism and pharmacokinetics through to iPS derived neuronal and microglial cellular models of disease.

 

  • Fundamental research projects include:
    • The characterisation of novel lysosomal ion channels and the identification of novel tool compounds to modulate their function. 
    • Development of phenotypic assays for enabling high throughput compound screening both internally and externally.
    • The characterisation of lipid storage and lysosomal dysfunction in DHDDS (funded by CureDHDDS).
    • The development of AI based approaches to enable lysosomal ion channel drug discovery.

 

  • Prof. Lloyd-Evans is co-I on the MDI-Astex collaborative project.

 

For further more detailed information on projects please visit our external group websites:

Lloyd-Evans Lab website

Medicines discovery institute

 

Lloyd-Evans lab group members:

  • Dr. Sophie Cook (Research Fellow)
  • Dr. Hannah Best (Post-doc)
  • Dr. Gaia Pasqualetto (Research Assistant)
  • Ms Llinos Honeybun (PhD student)
  • Mr Iwan Williams (PhD student)
  • Mr Tom Duffy (PhD student)

 

Lloyd-Evans lab resources:

In addition to the world class facilities and truly multi-disciplinary nature of the MDI, the ELE lab also has numerous unique and cutting edge microscopes for high throughput and high speed confocal imaging alongside real time LED based Ca2+ and other ion imaging systems. We have also established a centre of excellence in automated electrophysiology and patch clamping (including the Nanion Patchliner, port-a-patch, Orbit and SURFE2R systems) and are the only centre with this automated ephys capacity across the GW4 consortium.

 

Lloyd-Evans lab funding:

We have been funded by MRC, BBSRC and ERC as well as numerous charities and companies. Current funding is from companies, MRC IAA, CureDHDDS, Action Medical Research, BBSRC SWBio DTP and the Coleg Cymraeg Cenedlaethol.

 

Joining us:

We are always interested in supporting external applications for fellowships or PhDs, please contact Prof. Lloyd-Evans to discuss.

Biography

My first degree was an undergraduate masters in Biochemistry (M.Biochem) at the University of Bath. During this degree I spent 11 months (2 successive placements) in the lab of Prof. Tony Futerman at the Weizmann Institute of Science, Rehovot, Israel. It was here that I gained an interest in lysosomal storage diseases, researching the role of altered endoplasmic reticulum Ca2+ homeostasis in Gaucher disease. Following my degree in 2002 I moved to Oxford to do my DPhil with Prof. Fran Platt at the Glycobiology Institute. Here I researched the role of the simple sphingolipid sphingosine in the pathogenesis of Niemann-Pick type C1. Upon completion of my DPhil In 2005, I moved with Fran to the Department of Pharmacology (Oxford) where, in collaboration with Prof. Antony Galione, we developed techniques to study lysosomal Ca2+ homeostasis in the lysosomal diseases. In 2010 I was appointed as an RCUK Fellow at the School of Biosciences, Cardiff University, to continue my research into lysosomal function.

Supervisions

Current supervision

Iwan Williams

Iwan Williams

Graduate Demonstrator

Llinos Honeybun

Llinos Honeybun

Graduate Demonstrator

Thomas Duffy

Thomas Duffy

Research student