Department of Biochemical Sciences
Researchers within the Department of Biochemical Sciences study biological processes in animals and man at the behavioural, physiological, biochemical and molecular levels.
About us
Our Department contributes to the teaching of undergraduate degree programmes in biochemistry, biomedical science, and biological sciences, and to postgraduate taught programmes.
Our research covers four sections: chronobiology, cardiovascular sciences, and immunology. Research within these sections uses state-of-the-art techniques and facilities to investigate problems related to human health and wellbeing.
Head of Department
Professor Deborah Dunn-Walters
Professor of Immunology, Head of Biochemistry and Physiology
Biography
Deborah Dunn-Walters is Professor of Immunology in the School of Bioscience and Medicine, part of the Faculty of Health and Medical Sciences. Her group studies B cell development in Health and Disease, taking a systems immunology approach to elucidate changes in humoral immunity with age. Her lab develops improved tools to study immune repertoires, including novel methods for single cell analysis at a large scale and particularly as applied to elucidating the immunological responses to SARS-CoV-2 and other respiratory infections. She has collaborated with many different laboratories worldwide, and has chaired several international B cell conferences.
Deborah encourages interdisciplinary ways of working and is particularly keen to support discovery research into the biology of ageing, she is Chair-elect for the Dunhill Medical Trust. She is also a Trustee for the British Society for Immunology and chairs the BSI Taskforce. Deborah sits on various UKRI Strategy and funding panels. She is also Visiting Professor of Immunobiology at King's College London.
Deborah has over 100 publications and her work has been funded by programme awards from the MRC, the Human Frontiers Science Program and currently UKRI BBSRC. In addition she is extremely grateful to the Dunhill Medical Trust, Research into Ageing and the Rosetrees Trust charities for supporting her research.