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School of Veterinary Medicine and Science
   
   
  
 

Bob Robinson

Lecturer in Reproductive Physiology and Pharmacology, Faculty of Medicine & Health Sciences

Contact

  • workRoom A59 Veterinary Academic building
    Sutton Bonington Campus
    Sutton Bonington
    Leicestershire
    LE12 5RD
    UK
  • work0115 951 6452
  • fax0115 951 6440

Biography

Bob Robinson graduated from University of Bath in 1996 with a BSc (Hons) in Biochemistry. During his undergraduate degree, Bob undertook two six-month placement one at the Institute of Food Research, Reading and the other at the University of Texas Medical Branch, Galveston, USA. He went on to completed his PhD in 2000 under the supervision of Professor Claire Wathes at the Royal Veterinary College, London where he studied the mechanisms involved in the establishment of early pregnancy in the dairy cow and was in 1997 awarded the SRF student poster prize in 1997. From there, Bob worked as a post-doctoral scientist at Pfizer Animal Health (Sandwich, Kent) on various drug discovery programmes for 2 years. In 2002, he joined the University of Nottingham as a post-doctoral researcher on 2 BBSRC grants alongside Professor Morag Hunter, Dr George Mann and Professor Bob Webb. These were (1) Regulation of luteinisation and progesterone secretion in the bovine corpus luteum and (2) Identification of novel oocyte secreted proteins. In 2006, he was awarded the SRF New Investigator award for his research work. He joined the Nottingham Vet school in August 2006, as a foundation Lecturer in Reproductive Physiology.

Expertise Summary

I am a Lecturer in Animal Reproduction Physiology and Pharmacology. I played a key role in the development of the Reproduction (Year 2) and Principles of Veterinary Sciences (Year 3). Currently, I am module convenor for the integrated basic pharmacology course (Years 1-3) and co-convenor of the Veterinary Reproduction 1 module. I also play an important role in basic adult cattle handling during the first 2 years.

I also teach on the preliminary year course, cardiorespiratory system, gastrointestinal and AHW1/2 modules

Research Summary

My research focuses on understanding the mechanism behind infertility in dairy cows. Worldwide, conception rates are declining with current rates well below 40% in the UK. which is at a level that is… read more

Recent Publications

Current Research

My research focuses on understanding the mechanism behind infertility in dairy cows. Worldwide, conception rates are declining with current rates well below 40% in the UK. which is at a level that is unsustainable over the long-term. Since, up to 40% of embryos are lost during the first 3 weeks of pregnancy and the major contributor of this being inadequate secretion of progesterone from corpus luteum (CL), my research is focusing on understanding how the CL is found and develops. This has involved a long-standing colloboration with Professor Morag Hunter and Dr George Mann (School of Biosciences). This work was funded by BBSRC and Pfizer.

The ovary is an extremely dynamic organs in the female adult. One key phase is ovulation when the oocyte (egg) is released for fertilisation. The CL then forms from the remnants of the ovulated follicle and grows extremely rapid (from 0.5g to 5g in a few days). A rate that equals the fastest growing tumour. An crucial component of this is angiogenesis (formation of new blood vessels) and my primary focus of mine is to elucidate the precise mechanisms regulating this process. Recently, we have developed an in vitro model of luteal angiogenesis utilising primary cells from the ovary in which tubule-like structures develop and resembles an capillary bed. This system has enabled us to demonostrate that fibroblast growth factor (FGF) receptor signalling is essential for these networks to form. Further work show that the key step that was most sensitive to FGF blockade was the initiation of endothelial sprouting and branching. Our work has also shown that PDGF signalling and pericyte play important roles in the formation of these networks.

​In collaboration with School of Mathematical Sciences we are developing in silico models of (1) how the CL grows and the influence of endothelial cells and FGF2 and (2) pericyte-endothelial cell interactions during the formation of the endothelial cell networks in vitro. [PhD Student, Sotiris Propokiou]

Recently, I was awarded a Society for Reproduction and Fertility (SRF) academic grant to investigate the effects of electrical cues and influences of beta-adrenoreceptor on the formation of the CL. This involves a colloboration with Dr Christine Pullar in the University of Leicester.

I have established a colloboration with University of Naples (Prof Marco Russo) to study the degree of vascularisation of the CL in relationship to CL development and embryo mortality in the buffalo

Past Research

Past PhD Students

Mhairi Laird completed her PhD studies with me in 2010, which focused on the determining the roles of the different cell types (in particular pericytes) in regulating luteal angiogenesis. In her initial studies, she showed pericytes migrates ahead of endothelial cells during CL formation and pericyte area increased radidly in the early stages of angiogenesis. In her later studies, she developed a novel serum-free angiogenesis culture system to study endothelial cell networks during luteinisation. Using this system, she demonstrated that luteal endothelial cells were more sensitive to FGF rather than VEGFA inhibition. Moreover, FGF2, but not VEGFA, was able to induce the earlier and more extensive formation of endothelial cell sprouting.

In 2011, Chitra Joseph completed her PhD studies with me (in conjunction with Biosciences) where she investigated the regulation and function of secreted protein acidic, rich in cysteine (SPARC) in the ovary. She found that SPARC was differentially regulated during folliculogenesis but interesting was massively up-regulated in the collapsed follicle following ovulation. Further studies showed that TGFB and fibronectin, but not LH were likely candidate regulator of this. Interestingly, in the absence of low FGF2 and VEGFA a proteolytic fragment of SPARC stimulated both luteal angiogenesis and progesterone production in vitro.

Past research highlights:

Following ovulation there is a dramatic in FGF2 concentrations in the developing CL, which appear to be regulated by LH

We developed an in vivo model in which a delayed rise in post-ovulatory progesterone could be induced. This involved the manipulation of the pre-ovulatory such that is naturally ovulated a smaller follicle

We demonstrated that supra-basal progesterone concentrations during the follicular phase are associated with the development of ovarian cysts

During my PhD, we showed that endometrial oxytocin receptor was up-regulated before oestrogen receptors in the cow. Thus enhancing our knowledge of the initiation of the luteolytic mechanism. Moreover, pregnancy suppressed oxytocin receptor up-regulation but only affected oestrogen receptors after maternal recognition of pregnancy

Feeding dairy cows high levels of n-6 polyunsaturated fatty acids decreased endometrial production of prostaglandins in vitro

School of Veterinary Medicine and Science

University of Nottingham
Sutton Bonington Campus
Leicestershire, LE12 5RD

telephone: +44 (0)115 951 6116
fax: +44 (0)115 951 6415
email: veterinary-enquiries@nottingham.ac.uk