Professor to lead research into lung disease

UNIVERSITY of Dundee respiratory researcher James Chalmers has been awarded the title of professor and a £422,440 grant to conduct groundbreaking research into a common but neglected lung disease.

The prestigious award was granted by the British Lung Foundation and jointly funded by GSK and the university, which will become a leading centre in tackling bronchiectasis, a common lung disease that can develop when the airways become damaged.

Bronchiectasis causes a cough and a build-up of mucus which leads to frequent chest infections. It is a longterm condition affecting more than 200,000 people in the UK alone — and those numbers are rising. Over the past 10 years, the number of people with bronchiectasis has increased by 40 per cent. Despite this, bronchiectasis has been described as one of the most neglected diseases in respiratory medicine, with few treatments that have been proven to work.

Dundee will now become the home of world-leading research, through a team led by Professor Chalmers working to tackle the problem by developing tests that will help find the right treatment for the right patient, known as personalised medicine.

The five-year project will see the team using state-of-the-art laboratory techniques to understand the different patterns of lung inflammation and infection in bronchiectasis patients.

The team will work closely with other world-leading researchers in the EMBARC European Bronchiectasis Registry, a pan-European network committed to promoting clinical research and education in bronchiectasis.

The study will be the largest and most detailed of its kind in bronchiectasis and will make a major contribution to improving our understanding of the disease and ultimately lead to better treatments for patients.

Professor Chalmers