Further details: Sheffield Institute for Translational Neurosciences

Emma completed a PhD in Neuroscience, supervised by Professor Bandmann, at The University of Sheffield and currently works as the Academic Career Development Coordinator in the NIHR Sheffield Biomedical Research Centre (BRC). Emma's PhD focussed on using pre-clinical zebrafish models of Parkinson's disease to further understand the genetic element of sporadic Parkinson's disease, with a particular interest in the role of neuroinflammation. Following her PhD, Emma joined the NIHR Sheffield BRC and has worked across multiple roles including as a Research Administrator, Communications Coordinator and Academic Career Development Coordinator. 

Emma is committed to increasing the capacity for clinical research so that research opportunities can reach a greater number of people, irrespective of their geographical location. She supports the academic careers of pre-clinical and clinical researchers and helps bring researchers together from across the UK so that more people are able to confidently deliver research and, ultimately, more people are able to take part in studies for patient benefit.

As the UK PD-CSG Coordinator, Emma is able to combine her knowledge and genuine interest in Parkinson's disease research with the clinical research, communications and  career development skills gained from her other roles. 

Professor Tom Foltynie is Professor of Neurology in the Department of Clinical and Movement Neurosciences, UCL Institute of Neurology and Consultant Neurologist at the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery, Queen Square, London. He is responsible for Movement disorder patients, particularly Parkinson’s disease (PD) patients undergoing advanced treatments such as Deep Brain Stimulation (DBS), Apomorphine and Duodopa. He is chief investigator for a series of trials of Exenatide- a potential neurorestorative treatment for PD, and has been UCL’s PI for multi-centre trials of gene therapy and cell therapy as potential neurorestorative approaches for PD. He is the chief investigator for the Edmond J Safra Accelerating Clinical trials in PD project which will establish a platform for the testing of multiple potential neuroprotective approaches simultaneously in the UK.

Professor Foltynie has published clinical trials of DBS as a treatment for the cognitive problems associated with advanced PD/DLB, as well as successful results of a trial of Deep Brain Stimulation for the treatment of patients with severe Tourette syndrome.  He is interested in the mechanisms of action of DBS as elucidated using functional MRI, and developing ways of providing therapeutic DBS with better benefit to side effect ratios.

He trained in medicine at UCL, qualifying in 1995 then working in Addenbrooke's Hospital, in Cambridge. From 1999 to 2003, he undertook his PhD in Cambridge looking at the heterogeneity of Parkinson's disease, describing differences in cognitive abilities between patients under the influence of various genes including COMT and BDNF, and Tau. He finished his neurology training between Addenbrooke's Hospital, Cambridge and the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery in London, before taking up his consultant clinical academic position in London in 2008. He was promoted to Professor in 2016.

Further details: Camille Carroll - University of Plymouth 

Fiona is dedicated to advancing the field of Parkinson’s disease research and treatment through increased clinical trial activity across the UK.  With a background in healthcare within NHS and Private sectors and an understanding of the complexities of neurological disorders Fiona is focusing on ensuring Neuroclin’s expansion across the UK provides opportunity for many patients to understand and access clinical research if appropriate.

NeuroClin is an independent research organisation engaged in national and international clinical studies that seek to find better treatments for those with memory impairment, Alzheimer’s Disease, Parkinson’s, Dementia, Depression and other neurological conditions.  

Tom is a consultant neurologist at North West Anglia NHS Foundation Trust. He is the movement disorders lead at Peterborough City hospital where he runs a movement disorders clinic, looking after people with Parkinson's disease and other movement disorders. He also works in the Huntington's disease clinic at Addenbrooke's Hospital, Cambridge. He has been an investigator on several clinical trials, and has previously carried out disease modelling and clinical study of Parkinson's disease associated with a common genetic risk factor. 

Claire joined Parkinson’s UK in 2008 and leads the charity’s work to inspire and support people to get connected, have their say and take part in the search for better treatments and a cure. This includes raising awareness of the progress being made in Parkinson’s research and providing information to enable people living with the condition to take part in studies and trials across the UK.

Claire and her colleagues also work alongside people with Parkinson’s, their partners, families and friends to ensure that their voices are at the centre of research. Through the charity’s research involvement programme, people affected by Parkinson's work with researchers and companies to ensure that research is shaped and driven by those who need it most.

Claire has a Masters in Molecular Biology from the University of Bath and a Masters in Science Communication from Australian National University.

Follow Claire on Twitter: @Ladybale

Roger Barker is the Professor of Clinical Neuroscience at the University of Cambridge and Consultant Neurologist at Addenbrooke's Hospital. He runs the regional NHS Huntington's Disease  (HD) as well as clinics in Parkinson's Disease (PD). His research investigates the heterogeneity of these disorders and its basis which has informed work he has done on trialing new experimental therapeutics for these conditions including cell and gene therapies as well as drug repurposing. He is lead academic scientist of the ARUK funded Drug Discovery Institute in Cambridge as well as the John Van Geest Centre for Brain Repair. He is Co-editor in chief of the Journal of Neurology.

Shakya completed his Neurology CCT training from Devon and Cornwall, UK. Subsequently, Shakya then completed a Movement Disorders and Deep Brain Stimulation fellowship at the Salford Royal Hospital. Currently, Shakya is a consultant neurologist and runs regular movement disorder clinics. Shakya has an interest in autonomic symptoms of Parkinson's, Parkinson's related research and publications. 

After completing the Edmond J. Safra Fellowship in Movement Disorders in Toronto, David returned to Edinburgh in 2018 to establish an integrated movement disorder service based at the Anne Rowling Regenerative Neurology Clinic that combines clinical care and research. Central to this strategy is the creation of richly phenotyped longitudinal patient cohorts that can be biologically annotated to improve our understanding of the causes and progression of these diseases. This unique resource is enabling tailored recruitment of individuals to research projects and clinical trials that are most suitable for them. 

David has diverse research interests including studying the influence of sleep and circadian disruption on brain health; studying genetic and environmental Parkinson's risk factors using large datasets; identifying better treatments for neglected non-motor symptoms in Parkinson's; and developing novel models of clinical care (including the use of wearable home-based monitoring).  

Lisa has worked as a Parkinson’s Disease Nurse Specialist since 2005, working across Neurology and Medicine for the Elderly running nurse led clinics, working in a Multidisciplinary Parkinson’s clinic, providing a home visit and telephone advice service and supporting Parkinson’s patients admitted to hospital.

Lisa is an Independent Nurse Prescriber, hold a BSc (Hons) Degree in Specialist Nursing Practice and have developed the scope of my practice to include botulinum toxin injections to treat Cervical Dystonia, blepharospasm and Sialorrhoea. Lisa sits on the UK Parkinson’s Audit Steering Group and Governance Board and am a committee member of the Parkinson’s Nurse Specialist Association.

Since 2012 Rosaria has ran a Movement Disorder and mainly Parkinson's disease (PD) clinic. Rosaria is the departmental lead and PD clinical lead locally. The team organise monthly MDT meeting to discuss PD patients. Rosaria has close relations with the therapists and community PD charity. The team have organised since last year an annual PD event that involves PD patients and professionals, to reinforce a close communication . With the team, Rosaria tries to be up to date with new developments in the PD field, by also participating to research projects. The teams goal is to make their patients feel to receive the best quality of care in the most friendly/humble way.

Eva is currently working as a Movement Disorders Advanced Clinical Training Fellow, at King's College London, following completion ofher  neurology registrar training in 2023. Eva plans to continue her career development as a consultant neurologist with a subspecialist interest in movement disorders, specifically in the management of advanced Parkinson's disease and the neuropsychiatry of movement disorders. Eva has a passion for medical education and continues to work closely with Brighton and Sussex Medical School.  

Professor K. Ray Chaudhuri is Professor of Neurology/Movement Disorders at King’s College Hospital and King’s College London and the Medical Director of the Parkinson Foundation International Centre of Excellence at King’s College. He is internationally known for pioneering modern care for people with Parkinson’s particularly advanced therapies in addition to care for restless legs syndrome. He is the founding Chairman of the International Movement Disorders Society Non-motor Study Group and member MDS-ES Education and palliative care committee and ex Chair of the MDS Membership and Public Relations committee as well as member MDS congress scientific programme committee (2013–2017). He is the founding and consulting editor and ex editor-in- chief of the Nature group Nature Parkinson’s journal as well as guest Editor for special editions of Frontiers in Neurology, Journal of Personalised Medicine, Movement Disorders in Older Adults (Geriatrics) and Journal of Parkinson’s Disease, reviewer for all mainstream Movement Disorders journals as well as JAMA, Neurology, Annals of Neurology, BMJ, Brain, Lancet and JNNP. He serves as an advisor (MHRA health technology and scientific advisor) to NICE as well as GMC, Parkinson’s UK and EPDA. Professor Chaudhuri is the author of over 500 papers (4th most published author in the world in PD 2022,Expertscape) , co-editor of five books on Parkinson’s disease and restless legs syndrome and winner of the BMA book prize commendation in 2015 and 2017. He won the Andrew Wilson Prize for services to RLS patients by RLS:UK, William Koller Memorial Fund Award by MDS, the 2018 Van Andel award in the USA for outstanding nonmotor research contribution in Parkinson, as well as NIHR/Royal College of Physicians London award for outstanding research leadership in 2017. He has been a guest lecturer worldwide including Japan, China, Taiwan, Vietnam, Thailand, Singapore, Australia, India, Africa, USA, Russia and Europe. Since 2020 he is lead for Equality Diversity charter for NIHR London South Applied Research Collaboration (ARC) and Honorary Member for the Movement Disorders Society in 2021, one of 5 from the UK. In 2022 he was awarded UK NHS Gold merit clinical impact award and is currently ranked top from the UK for publications related to Parkinson’s (Expertscape-Parkinson’s disease).

Dr Alistair Church is a GP principal and consultant neurologist at the Royal Gwent Hospital.  Dr Church has an interest in movement disorder and has been involved in a number of clinical trials for patients with PD and atypical PD.  He is keen to expand the trials unit to be able to offer as many movement disorder patients as possible the opportunity to take part in clinical trials. 

Jeremy is a consultant neurologist with an interest in movement disorders. Jeremy helps to run the Parkinson's disease service in Leeds. Jeremy's role encompasses diagnosis, management, second opinions, advanced therapies and research.

Helen Dawes is a clinical academic physiotherapist and movement scientist, and Professor of Clinical Rehabilitation at the University of Exeter,  she is co-director of Intersect@Exeter, the Rehabilitation Theme NIHR Exeter BRC and HealthTechnologies@Exeter network. She holds an Associate Research Fellowship in Clinical Neurosciences, University of Oxford.  She leads/co-leads a number of National research programs including: SEISMIC NIHR/EPSRC Systems Engineering Innovation hubs for Multiple Long-term Conditions Program, the EPSRC/MRC Network ‘Neurotechnology for Pain’, EPSRC Bionics+ Network and the GW4 Alliance Fatigue Network. She is a leading expert in Health Technology for Movement Science with multiple international collaborations in this field and working with industry Nationally and Internationally. She has generated over 300 publications (eg in JNNP, BMJ Sport Medicine and JAMA; Google Scholar Citations 13011 , h-index 53, i10-index 149;  two patents and six book chapters.  https://scholar.google.co.uk/citations?user=eekzxeIAAAAJ&hl=en. She has a funding portfolio that includes EPSRC, MRC, NIHR, ERC, UKRI, Innovate, Industry and charities.

Eduardo is a consultant neurologist leading the Parkinson's disease service at Darent Valley Hospital in Kent. He also works as a Clinical Research Associate at UCL Queen Square Institute of Neurology and as an Honorary Consultant Neurologist at the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery.

Eduardo trained as a clinical neurologist in Madrid and King's College Hospital in London where he completed a clinical fellowship in general neurology. He subsequently joined the Movement Disorders Centre at Queen Square Brain Bank - UCL Institute of Neurology where he completed his PhD on the pathophysiology of non-motor symptoms in Parkinson's disease. 

He has an interest in clinical research on Parkinson’s disease using the valuable clinical and neuropathological data from the Queen Square Brain Bank and clinical trials.

Professor Dexter joined Parkinson’s UK as Associate Research Director, overseeing scientific programmes, on the 1st of March 2017. David has 37 years research experience in Parkinson’s disease, 23 years of which was spent at Imperial College London where he was Professor of Neuropharmacology and Deputy Head of The Division of Brain Sciences. He conducted his PhD at the Institute of Psychiatry, London under the supervision of Professors Peter Jenner and David Marsden. His principle research interests involved understanding the pathological mechanisms which cause Parkinson’s from which he developed novel therapeutic approaches which were tested in cellular/animal models and translated into clinical trials. He made key discoveries revealing the role on increased iron, oxidative stress and mitochondrial dysfunction in neurodegeneration in Parkinson’s and played a key role in the development of iron chelators for treating Parkinson’s. In 2002 he established the Parkinson’s UK Tissue Bank at Imperial College which supplies high quality brain, spinal cord and CSF worldwide for Parkinson’s research.

Gordon is a Consultant Physician and NHS Research Scotland Career Research Fellow. Since 2014, he has worked at the Western General Hospital in Edinburgh where he specialises in Medicine for the Elderly and Parkinson’s disease. Gordon is an Honorary Clinical Senior Lecturer, Centre for Clinical Brain Sciences at the University of Edinburgh.

Gordon has a special interest in Parkinson’s Disease and leads clinical research studies and quality improvement projects. His clinical work very much informs his research goals where he is a Principal Investigator for interventional and observational studies. Gordon is committed to involving people with Parkinson’s in research. Gordon believes that to develop better treatments we need a successful partnership between patients, NHS clinicians, academia and industry.

After qualifying from Dundee University medical School, Gordon trained as a junior doctor in Dundee, Middlesbrough, New Zealand and Newcastle. It was in in Newcastle that his interest in Parkinson’s disease developed and was appointed as Clinical Research Fellow, Newcastle University. Gordon's PhD thesis focused on the development of MRI as a potential biomarker for the evolution of cognitive impairment in Parkinson’s.

Gordon lives in Edinburgh with his wife and their daughter.

Further details: Professor Mark Edwards (kcl.ac.uk) 

Dr Ghosh and Dr Massey run a regional clinic for patients with progressive supranuclear palsy, multiple system atrophy and corticobasal syndrome. In addition as general neurologists they see a large number of patients with Parkinson's. They have already carried out phase 1, 2 and 3 trials as well as non interventional and registry trials in their regional clinic and have been Chief Investigators for some.

Their clinic is multidisciplinary, collaborating with palliative care, community therapists and other professionals. There is therefore a network of professionals who they could collaborate with for further research. 

Agnieszka works as a Speciality Doctor in Old Age Mental Health Team in Lancashire and South Cumbria NHS Trust.

She graduated Nicolaus Copernicus University in Bydgoszcz, Poland and underwent 5 years of formal training in Neurology. 

Currently, Agnieszka is about to complete her Msc in Neuropsychiatry at the University of Birmingham. Her main interests are neuropsychiatric consequences of Parkinson's Disease. 

Annette has worked within a specialist Parkinson’s Team in the UK for over 25 years, starting as the Research Associate before obtaining a nurse specialist post.  For 17 years she worked as a Nurse Consultant in Parkinson’s coordinating the Parkinson’s service, supporting patients and their families and managing a team of Parkinson’s specialist nurses. 

Educationally, Annette has been teaching within Higher Education since 2004. She currently teaches on several post graduate courses for the university and her interests include non-medical prescribing, Parkinson’s, clinical research, and research impact. In 2018 Annette was appointed to a national role as Clinical Lead for Nursing with the Parkinson’s Excellence Network to support services across the UK. Annette has continued an active research role and been involved with multiple research studies at a local, national, and international level and has published multiple peer reviewed articles. In 2021 Annette was appointed to Professor of Nursing – Clinical Academic, the first post of its type in the North East of England. Annette now divides her time between clinical practice, research, and education. 

Victoria is chair of the British Geriatrics Society Movement Disorder Section, having previously been vice-chair and the research representative for the committee.  She qualified from the University of Southampton in 2004 before completing the majority of her postgraduate training, including a period of research, in the East Midlands.  In 2014 she was awarded her MD from the University of Leicester for her research into cerebral autoregulation in Parkinson’s disease. 

She is now a Consultant Geriatrician and Honorary Associate Professor at University Hospitals Plymouth NHS Trust where she works within the Parkinson’s Service and the Applied Parkinson’s Research group. She has particular research interests in cerebral haemodynamics, blood pressure, vascular disease, and the interactions with cognitive decline.  

A list of her publications can be found here.

Rochelle is currently working as a Research nurse for Neurodegenerative Research at University Hospitals Dorset. Rochelle has been in her role for the past 5 years. Her main portfolio is Parkinson’s Research. Having worked on Parkinson's research for the past 5 years, Rochelle has gained knowledge on the disease and built a good rapport with the people living with Parkinson's and their carers. Rochelle participates in PD research conferences, meetings and also lots of patient engagement activities such as attending coffee mornings and PD pop in events to talk about research. 

Megan Hodgson is the research coordinator for the Progressive Supranuclear Palsy Association (PSPA). Megan has a Masters degree in Genomic Medicine from Queen Mary University of London. She has previously worked in a neurological care centre and spent 2 years as an NHS research associate at the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery in London working on projects such as the PROSPECT study and The Parkinson's Families Project.

Megan and her colleagues support people with PSP and CBD, their families and friends by providing information, running support groups and a helpline, raising awareness and both funding and promoting PSP and CBD research. Megan also runs a PPI group that meet monthly online to help researchers and pharmaceutical companies ensure their research is shaped by those with lived experience.

Cathy’s career was largely in the field of English language teaching, spending the last 10 years before retirement at the University of Surrey as a Senior Teaching Fellow and leader in Teaching English for Academic Purposes. She retired in 2019, soon noticing symptoms which led to a diagnosis of Parkinson’s in 2021. She lives in Guildford, Surrey, keeping fit to live well with Parkinson’s. She has not yet participated in a clinical trial, but would be interested in doing so, whilst recognising potential barriers from a personal perspective. As a Patient and Public Involvement Representative she hopes to contribute in a meaningful way to the furtherance of Parkinson’s clinical research.

Michele is a Consultant Neurologist at Oxford University Hospitals, and Professor of Clinical Neuroscience at the Nuffield Department of Clinical Neurosciences, University of Oxford. Her clinical work focuses on Parkinson' disease and related movement disorders. Her research within the Oxford Parkinson's Disease Centre (website link here) looks at longitudinal cohort studies and biomarkers for early and prodromal Parkinson’s disease, with particular focus on REM sleep behaviour disorder (RBD) and how sleep affects neurodegeneration. Interests include the delivery of tractable, low cost, wearable technology that has a real impact on patient’s daily lives, and imaging the human brain from prodromal to established Parkinson’s.

Pam graduated from Sunderland school of Pharmacy in 1971 and worked in retail for the next 35 years. Pam first noticed the symptoms of Parkinson's in 2010, but wasn't diagnosed until 2017. Since then, she has taken part in two Parkinson's clinical trials led by Professor Oliver Bandmann. Pam has recently become a member of the NIHR Sheffield Biomedical Research Centre Executive Committee as a patient representative.

Edward Jones is a Consultant Geriatrician with an interest in movement disorders based in Scarborough Hospital. Edward does 3 movement disorder clinics per week. Edward is local PI (Scarborough) for TOPHAT Study, PD-Frontline Study and the Parkinson's Families Project. He has previously been local PI for the Vision in PD study and Pain in PD adopted subsidy. Edward is a member of the SHARC collaborative (Scarborough Hospital And community Research Collaborative) - this is a collaborative of research interested clinicians with a focus on trials of frailty and multi-morbidity. Edward has an interest in medical education and specifically Geriatrics registrar movement disorder teaching.

Ashwani Jha is an Academic Neurologist interested in digital technology and complex computational modelling of patient outcomes in movement disorders and other neurological conditions. 

I have been working in the field of healthcare since 1996, and I qualified as a Mental Health Nurse in 2000 from the University of Paisley. In 2002, I completed further studies in a BSc in Nursing Studies Gerontology, and in June 2022, I completed my Master of Science in Global Issues of Gerontology and Ageing.

Since qualifying, I have worked in Elderly Mental Health in various areas, such as an Admission/Assessment Unit for Organic Disorders and Community Psychiatric Nursing in Elderly Mental Health. In 2006, I moved into the field of Alzheimer’s Disease Research, and over the past 17 years, my research portfolio has expanded into disease areas such as Parkinson’s Disease, Huntington’s Disease, and Motor Neurone Disease.

I joined the network as a Senior Clinical Studies Officer in July 2015 and am currently working on clinical research projects in Lothian. I started my new role as the Neuroprogressive and Dementia Network Manager in September 2023. 

Christopher Kobylecki is a Consultant Neurologist at Manchester Centre for Clinical Neurosciences, Salford Royal NHS Foundation Trust and Honorary Senior Lecturer in Neuroscience at the University of Manchester. He completed a PhD focused on mechanisms of L-DOPA-induced abnormal involuntary movements in Parkinson’s disease (PD) whilst undertaking higher clinical training in Neurology, including clinical trials in PD. He undertook postdoctoral research focused on the use of positron emission tomography (PET) and MR imaging in parkinsonian syndromes such as multiple system atrophy and neurodegenerative dementias.

Chris jointly runs the Movement Disorder service at MCCN. He runs a regional specialist clinic for atypical parkinsonian syndromes as well as being a lead for medical advanced therapies i.e. apomorphine and Duodopa. His research interests include motor complications of PD, cognitive and non-motor disorders in PD and atypical parkinsonism, and dystonia. He regularly delivers educational lectures on movement disorders, including two recent invited presentations at the Association of British Neurologists (ABN) Annual meeting. He is a member of the ABN advisory group on movement disorders, and the Movement Disorder Society, and a trustee and chair of the scientific advisory panel of the Multiple System Atrophy Trust.

Further information: Professor Vincenzo Libri : University College London Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust (uclh.nhs.uk) 

Bradley is a Clinical Research Fellow at Imperial College, supervised by Dr Yen Tai, and an ST4 trainee in Geriatrics at Ealing Hospital. Bradley finished Internal Medical Training (IMT) in 2022 in North West London and gained MRCP membership in 2021. Bradley completed Foundation training in Lancaster and qualified from Imperial College in 2017.  Bradley has been involved in various PD studies as rater and sub-investigator and hopes to gain more experience in clinical trials. Bradley hopes to go on to further research training and a career as an academic geriatrician in movement disorders. 

Further details: Antonella Macerollo - Institute of Systems, Molecular and Integrative Biology - University of Liverpool 

Angus Macleod is a neurologist with a clinical interest in Parkinson’s disease and other movement disorders and an epidemiologist with a research interest in the epidemiology of Parkinson's disease and other neurological conditions. His main research interests are the prognosis of Parkinson's, developing prognostic models (tools to predict future health outcomes), nutrition in Parkinson's and combining data from previous observational studies in Parkinson’s. He trained in medicine in Aberdeen, in Neurology in Glasgow and Aberdeen, and did his PhD developing prognostic models in Parkinson’s with Carl Counsell in Aberdeen.

Dr Keith Martin has been an executive & non-executive director of several biotech companies.  He has a PhD from Bath and held a neuroscience research fellowship in Nottingham and visiting fellowship to Princeton. His discovery and early clinical development experience has brought a number compounds to clinical stage with further products that he worked on, being approved in US and Europe. He built a biotech company from scratch to operations in UK & Belgium.  He has also served as a Visiting Professor in Neuroscience at the University of Sunderland.

Since his diagnosis in 2021, he has been focusing his attention on understanding the aetiology and development of therapies to halt progression.

During training in London, Dr Massey did a clinical research fellowship at UCL Institute of Neurology in Movement Disorders including Parkinson’s Disease and Atypical Parkinsonism. Dr Massey has been a consultant Neurologist in Dorset since 2015 and Clinical Lead since 2018. He runs Parkinson’s Disease clinics in Dorset, and a twice monthly Atypical Parkinsonism clinic in Southampton, where they have been involved in clinical studies and drug trials. He has aspirations to add to the research portfolio for PD in Wessex.

Helen Matthews has been involved with the charity since its inception and worked alongside the late charity co-founder Tom Isaacs since 2002. Helen specialises in PR, marketing, event planning and administration. Helen oversees the charity’s current research and patient initiative projects as well as the day to day operations of the charity. Helen sits on Cure Parkinson’s International Linked Clinical Trials (iLCT) and Research Committees. 

After graduation from Sheffield University in 1970, Chris enjoyed a career in marketing and project management in what has become the IT industry. Since his diagnosis in 2011 Chris has pursued his curiosity about the Parkinson’s condition, how research into it is done, and how the research function relates to the healthcare industry.

Under the Parkinson’s UK umbrella he has been a Lay Grant Assessor and a Branch Treasurer. His participation in research began in 2013 with PRO-DeNDRoN and includes Phase 2 and Phase 3 clinical trials. Since 2017 he has been involved with Facebook’s pre-eminent Parkinson’s Research Interest Group. He recently enrolled on the Home Based Care pathway. Currently much of his time goes to penprig.org.uk which promotes participation in research in South West England.

Huw Morris is Professor of Clinical Neuroscience at UCL Institute of Neurology, and Honorary Consultant Neurologist at the Royal Free Hospital and the National Hospital, Queen Square.  His clinical and research training took place at the National Hospital, the Mayo Clinic and the Western Pacific island of Guam.   He began research in PSP and related disorders as a PSP Association and MRC Clinical Research Fellow in 1997.  His main interests are Neurogenetics, Movement Disorders and Dementia.   He leads a UK-wide research network in PSP, Corticobasal syndrome and MSA (PROSPECT), a UK-wide research project in genetic Parkinson’s (Parkinson’s Families Project). He leads the cohort group of the Global Parkinson’s Genetics Program (gp2.org).  He also studies genetic determinants of progression and variation in Parkinsonian disorders to help to define new treatments. 

Miratul is Professor of Experimental Neurology and Aligning Science Across Parkinson’s (ASAP) Co-Investigator at the MRC Protein Phosphorylation and Ubiquitylation Unit at the University of Dundee. He received his medical degree from the University of Edinburgh and completed his general medical training on the Hammersmith hospitals rotation. He studied neurobiology at Harvard University on a Kennedy Scholarship before completing a PhD at UCL where he made a major contribution to the discovery of PINK1 mutations to Parkinson’s disease. He completed his neurology training at the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery, King’s College Hospital, Homerton and the Royal London Hospital and Hurstwood Park Neurosciences Centre in Sussex. He maintains an active clinical role in Parkinson’s disease and related Movement Disorders as well as general neurology.

He directs a research group interested in mitochondrial mechanisms of Parkinson’s disease making contributions to the regulation and function of the PINK1 and Parkin genes. He has received several research awards including the Queen Square Prize in 2006; an EMBO Young Investigator Award in 2017; and the Francis Crick Medal of the Royal Society in 2018. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh in 2020 and Fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences in 2023.

A Specialist Research Practitioner currently managing a large Clinical Trial Portfolio in Degenerative Neurology. Managing a number of staff to deliver these studies. Experience with PI and CI studies. Experienced Rater for PD trials approved by both Commercial and Non-Commercial Sponsors. 

Dr Tom Payne completed his PhD in 2022 titled ‘Mitochondrial dysfunction as a therapeutic target in Parkinson’s disease’. This focused on the development of novel imaging biomarkers using 31Phosphorus magnetic resonance spectroscopy to investigate brain bioenergetics in vivo and early phase clinical trial design by completing a Phase II clinical trial investigating Ursodeoxycholic acid in Parkinson’s disease, much of this work having now been published in high impact journals. Tom's main interest is to develop effective tools to mechanistically stratify Parkinson’s for precision medicine trials. Tom has a particular research expertise in neuroimaging and clinical trial endpoint design, particularly having utilised sensor-based quantification of gait in several projects. Tom is also part of the Participation Steering Group Committee for Parkinson’s UK, which seeks to improve ongoing engagement with research, recently developing the Staying Connected Toolkit (https://www.parkinsons.org.uk/research/staying-connected-your-participants) which was developed with both REC and the HRA. Tom's current studies focus on further disease stratification utilising the combined PET-MRI to further investigate brain bioenergetics in neurodegenerative conditions. Tom is also developing new machine learning approaches to identify novel risk factors for Parkinson’s to develop effective predictive models of Parkinson’s disease using large open-source datasets and machine learning methods. 

We run the young-onset Parkinson’s clinic in Cardiff, interlinking with a number of multi-disciplinary professionals and our colleagues in gerontology. We routinely recruit patients to longitudinal phenotyping studies with the aim of making available to them the opportunity to participate in larger scale clinical trials, should they wish. We look forward to working with colleagues throughout the UK to increase opportunity and participation in Parkinson’s focused research. 

Dr Catherine Pennington is a cognitive neurologist working across Edinburgh and Forth Valley. Catherine works in the NHS Lothian memory service for older adults, and in general neurology in Forth Valley. 

Catherine's particular areas of research interest are around changes to symptom awareness in neurodegeneration and functional cognitive disorders. She is currently funded by the Chief Scientist Office for work developing a novel insight assessment tool. She has  extensive clinical trials experience and work closely with the Edinburgh Clinical Research Facility and the Scottish Neurodegenerative and Dementia Network. 

Emma has a BSc in Adult Nursing, working within the areas of neurology, orthopaedic, cardio-thoracic, endoscopy, gynaecology, urology, colorectal and general surgery. In 2007 she commenced a research nurse with the South East Stroke Research Network (SESRN) at St George’s in London, recruiting patients to academic and commercial clinical trials and research studies. She became Lead Nurse of the SESRN in 2009, working to integrate Stroke Research into clinical stroke services at 36 hospital sites across South London, Surrey, Sussex, Kent, Hampshire and the Isle of Wight. In 2012 Emma moved to Guys and St. Thomas’ NHS Trust as Lead Nurse for Dementia and Neuro-Degenerative Diseases (DeNDRoN) Research Network, later becoming Assistant Research Delivery Manager. During this time, she gained a MRes in Clinical Research from the University of Southampton. She then took up a Parkinson Nurse Specialist role, before moving to the Multiple System Atrophy Trust, where she is a MSA Nurse Specialist, with an interest in research into MSA. 

Further details: Anthony Schapira | UCL Queen Square Institute of Neurology - UCL – University College London 

Dr William Scotton completed a PhD at UCL Queen Square Institute of Neurology under the supervision of Professor Sir John Hardy investigating genetic risk factors and disease progression in the primary tauopathies (PiD, PSP and CBD). He gained clinical experience during the PhD in both cognitive neurology with Professor Jonathan Rohrer and  movement disorders with Professor Huw Morris.

Dr Scotton has a particular interest in the genetics of PD and the atypical parkinsonian disorders, as well as the application of unsupervised machine learning to biomarker data to better understand disease progression.

Dr Scotton was previously the trainee representative on the ABN Movement Disorders Advisory Group, and has recently completed his final year of training in Birmingham.

Professor Silverdale is a Consultant Neurologist at Salford Royal NHS Foundation Trust and a Professor of Neurology at Manchester University. He jointly runs the Salford Royal Advanced Parkinson’s disease and Movement Disorders service and is lead Neurologist on the Greater Manchester Deep Brain Stimulation Programme. His research interests include pain in Parkinson’s disease, biomarkers in Parkinson’s disease, motor control and Deep Brain Stimulation. He is Chief Investigator of the largest ever study of pain in Parkinson’s disease. He is also clinical lead for the highly-publicised Parkinson’s disease smell study and a member of the European Deep Brain Stimulation Research network. Professor Silverdale is Neurodegeneration lead for Greater Manchester. He is also Co-Chair of the World Parkinson and Movement Disorders Evidence Based Medicine Committee. This committee performs evidence based medicine reviews and produces guidelines for best-practice management of Parkinson’s disease and Movement Disorders.

Sammy is a current geriatric registrar trainee working in the West Yorkshire region. As part of the new curriculum the team have to take several months participating with a themed for service role and Sammy will be undertaking it within movement disorders. Sammy really enjoys learning about Parkinson's disease and other movement disorders and is hoping to subspecialise within this role once she completes her training and becomes a consultant. By joining the UK PD-CSG, Sammy is hoping to gain more knowledge about the disease and keep up to date with current research. 

Simon leads on fostering promising new lines of research, promoting beneficial worldwide scientific and clinical collaborations across the community. Simon plays  a leading role in the ongoing growth of Cure Parkinson’s International Linked Clinical Trials (iLCT) programme, working alongside the iLCT Committee to ensure the most promising drugs are prioritised for clinical trial in Parkinson’s. 

Yen is an academic neurologist with a research background in using functional imaging to develop markers of disease progression, especially in the context of neuro-protective/-restorative therapies in Parkinson's and Huntington's diseases. More recently, Yen has also been interested in using technology and neuromodulation, including deep brain stimulation (DBS), to improve the treatment of movement disorders. Yen leads the Parkinson's Clinical Trials Unit and tertiary DBS service at Imperial Academic Health Science Centre.

Emma Thorman graduated from GKT medical school in 2014. She has a particular interest in healthcare for care home residents and in movement disorders.

George Tofaris is a Professor of Neurology & Translational Neuroscience at the University of Oxford and Honorary Consultant Neurologist at the John Radcliffe Hospital. He graduated from the MB/PhD programme of Cambridge University and trained in Internal Medicine and Neurology at London and Oxford University hospitals. He is currently an MRC Senior Clinical Fellow and previously held a Lefler Fellowship in Cell Biology at Harvard Medical School and a Wellcome Trust-Beit Intermediate Fellowship at Oxford where he established his research group. The group employs a multifaceted approach including genetic screens, biochemical approaches and disease modelling in patient-derived induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSC) as well as the study of biosamples from clinical cohorts with a view to deciphering molecular mechanisms that could inform the development of therapeutics or biomarkers in Parkinson’s disease and related conditions.

Richard was diagnosed with Parkinson’s Disease in 2018, the result of a period of investigation into movement problems brought on during running exercise. Prior to this, Richard had co-founded a software company in the late 1990’s working with audit teams around the world…the business was sold three weeks before his Parkinson’s diagnosis.

He has since become an active participant in a number of Parkinson’s research trials, and spends as much time that will allow using exercise in an attempt to slow the progression of the condition. Cycling is a particular passion, with a focus on preparing to get back to participating in competitive events.

Richard Walker is a Consultant and previous Director of R & D at North Tyneside General Hospital, and Honorary Professor of Ageing and International Health at Newcastle University. He is the Clinical Lead for the Northumbria Parkinson’s disease (PD) service. His research interests in PD include epidemiology, psychiatric symptoms, palliative care, respiratory symptoms, exercise and sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). He was on the UK PD NICE Guidelines 2017 Development Group and the PD Quality Standard Advisory Committee for NICE. He is clinical director for the UK Parkinson’s Excellence Network. He has a research interest in other non-communicable diseases in SSA including stroke, epilepsy, hypertension, dementia, fluorosis and frailty. He was Associate Global Director for SSA for the Royal College of Physicians, London (2016 – 2020) and is the Clinical Lead for the Northumbria/Kilimanjaro Christian Medical Centre health link which started in 1999. He is immediate past Chair of the Movement Disorders Society African Task Force.

Professor Rimona Weil is an Honorary Consultant Neurologist at the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery and Professor of Neurology at the UCL Dementia Research Centre. She leads a clinical service managing patients with Parkinson’s disease dementia and dementia with Lewy bodies. Alongside this, she leads a Wellcome-funded research programme investigating dementia and hallucinations in Parkinson’s disease using neuroimaging and plasma markers.

Professor Weil studied medicine at Downing College, Cambridge, followed by clinical training at University College London. She trained in Neurology at the Royal Free Hospital and the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery. Her PhD research was at the Wellcome Centre for Neuroimaging, UCL, where she examined the integration of visual signals in the healthy and damaged brain. She was awarded a post-doctoral UCL Excellence Fellowship to study visual changes in Parkinson’s disease, followed by a Wellcome Clinical Research Career Development Fellowship.

Her ultimate aim is to develop treatments to slow the progression of dementia in Parkinson’s disease and in dementia with Lewy bodies.

Dr Ben Wright's specialist interest is in dystonia, Parkinson's disease and other movement disorders.

Caroline Williams-Gray is a Principal Research Associate in the Department of Clinical Neurosciences, University of Cambridge, and an honorary consultant neurologist specializing in Parkinson’s disease and movement disorders. She leads a translational research group investigating the clinical and biological heterogeneity of PD, with the ultimate goal of developing more targeted therapies for different Parkinson’s subtypes. Her recent work has focused on the theory that the immune system is a significant player in mediating the heterogeneity of PD and its progression. Her lab is investigating this using blood and CSF-based immune markers, PET neuroimaging and neuropathology in stratified PD cohorts; and she is leading the first randomized controlled trial repurposing a peripheral immunosuppressive drug (azathioprine) to slow the progression of PD.

Dr Paul Worth is a Consultant Neurologist at Cambridge University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust and is dedicated to contributing to the development of salient research ideas and protocols, from an early stage.  Paul has been an active member of many groups and held numerous leadership roles, including:

• Clinical Director for Neurosciences, CUH, 2021 -present

• Director of Parkinson’s Disease Research for Dementia and Neurodegenerative Diseases Research Network (DeNDRoN) East Anglia, 2010 – 2014

• Specialty Lead for Neurology and Neurodegeneration in CRN Eastern 2014-19

• Clinical co-director of the Norwich Clinical Research and Trials Unit (CRTU), 2008-10

• PI and CI for numerous clinical trials in PD, tremor and dystonia, 2004 – present

• Member of DeNDRoN Portfolio Management Group (PMG) for Parkinson’s Disease 2010 - 2014 

• Parkinson’s UK Excellence Network Eastern Lead 2015-2019

• Hon Secretary, ABN Movement Disorder SIG 2015 - 2019 

Dr Richard Wyse is Director of Clinical Development at Cure Parkinson’s where the International Linked Clinical Trials (iLCT) programme is one of his specialties. Richard also sits on Cure Parkinson’s Research Committee. 

Dr Alison Yarnall completed her PhD in 2013 at Newcastle University looking at biomarkers of cognitive impairment in Parkinson’s disease. She is now an NIHR BRC Intermediate Clinical Fellow at the Translational and Clinical Research Institute, Newcastle University; Deputy Director of the Clinical Ageing Research Unit; and Honorary Consultant in Older People’s Medicine at Newcastle upon Tyne Hospitals (NuTH) NHS Foundation Trust. She has a particular interest in cognitive decline, gait and falls in people with Parkinson’s and other neurodegenerative diseases and has published more than 60 articles in this topic area.  She runs a specialist clinic for older adults with Parkinson’s and complex health needs in NuTH, in addition to a general medical memory clinic.