Contact
Biography
I am a Principal Research Fellow (Associate Prof.) within the Centre for Respiratory Research/ Nottingham BRC in Translational Medical Sciences. My research is focused upon understanding the underlying mechanisms driving tissue remodelling in chronic lung diseases (including idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis, asthma, COPD) and viral infections (such as influenza, SARS-CoV-2). My expertise span in vitro, ex vivo and in vivo models of respiratory disease.
During my post-doctoral years I spent two periods of research working in the USA at UCSF and Harvard Medical School, which were funded by a Royal Society Travel Fellowship (UCSF) and an NC3Rs David Sainsbury Fellowship (Harvard). During these periods of research I perfected techniques not currently employed within Nottingham including isolation of Type II alveolar epithelial cells from human lung, and the use of precision cut lung slices. Following the completion of the NC3Rs Fellowship in 2015 I was awarded a subsequent mid-career fellowship funded jointly by Asthma UK and the Medical Resaerch Foundation.
Ongoing work within my lab group is focused upon:
- understanding the role that matrix cross linking and stiffness plays in promoting tissue remodelling in chronic lung diseases
- investigating how biomechanical cues from breathing may influence pro-remodelling pathways to promote disease
- identifying potential pathways to be exploited to enhance alveolar repair in the lung
I have been actively involved in the British Association for Lung Research (www.balr.co.uk) since 2010: from 2017-2021 I served as Secretary and am currently the BALR Treasurer. I am also a member of the Early Career Working Group of the Respiratory Cell and Molecular Biology Assembly of the American Thoracic Society and sit on the Scientific Committee of the International Colloquium for Lung and Airways Fibrosis.
I am an Associate Editor for Pharmacology and Therapeutics and a Review Editor for Frontiers in Allergy.
Expertise Summary
In vivo and ex vivo models of respiratory diseases including development of novel models to impact the 3Rs;
Molecular biology including chromatin immunoprecipitation and investigating regulation of gene expression;
Functional assays to assess activation of TGF<beta> in vitro and in vivo;
Isolation, culture and characterisation of a variety of primary cells from human and animal tissue;
Flow cytometry;
Immunohistochemistry, immunocytochemistry, immunofluorescence and histological staining
Western blotting and electrophoresis
DNA cloning and mutagenesis
Transfections including plasmids and siRNA constructs
Research Summary
* Developing a novel "breathing" lung slice model by imposing cyclic stretch on precision cut lung slices
* Investigating the role of bronchoconstriction on TGFbeta activation and the developement of asthmatic airway remodelling
* Delineating the role of Elk1 as a master regulator of fibrogenesis
Recent Publications
JENKINS RG, MOORE BB, CHAMBERS RC, EICKELBERG O, KÖNIGSHOFF M, KOLB M, LAURENT GJ, NANTHAKUMAR CB, OLMAN MA, PARDO A, SELMAN M, SHEPPARD D, SIME PJ, TAGER AM, TATLER AL, THANNICKAL VJ, WHITE ES and , 2017. An Official American Thoracic Society Workshop Report: Use of Animal Models for the Preclinical Assessment of Potential Therapies for Pulmonary Fibrosis. American journal of respiratory cell and molecular biology. 56(5), 667-679 JOHN AE, PORTE J, JENKINS G and TATLER AL, 2017. Methods for the Assessment of Active Transforming Growth Factor-β in Cells and Tissues. Methods in molecular biology (Clifton, N.J.). 1627, 351-365 TATLER, AMANDA L., HABGOOD, ANTHONY, PORTE, JOANNE, JOHN, ALISON E., STAVROU, ANASTASIOS, HODGE, EMILY, KERAMA-LIKOKO, CHERYL, VIOLETTE, SHELIA M., WEINREB, PAUL H., KNOX, ALAN J., LAURENT, GEOFFREY, PARFREY, HELEN, WOLTERS, PAUL JOHN, WALLACE, WILLIAM, ALBERTI, SIEGFRIED, NORDHEIM, ALFRED and JENKINS, GISLI, 2016. Reduced Ets Domain-containing Protein Elk1 Promotes Pulmonary Fibrosis via Increased Integrin alpha v beta 6 Expression JOURNAL OF BIOLOGICAL CHEMISTRY. 291(18), 9540-9553 HABGOOD AN, TATLER AL, PORTE J, WAHL SM, LAURENT GJ, JOHN AE, JOHNSON SR and JENKINS G, 2016. Secretory leukocyte protease inhibitor gene deletion alters bleomycin-induced lung injury, but not development of pulmonary fibrosis. Laboratory investigation; a journal of technical methods and pathology. 96(6), 623-31
Joan Bending, Evelyn Bending, Mervyn Stephens and Olive Stephens Memorial Fellowship - Oct 2015 - Mar 2019 (£300k)
NC3Rs David Sainsbury Fellowship - Oct 2012 to Sept 2015 (£195k)
Royal Society Travel Fellowship - Jan 2011 to Apr 2011 (£4k)
MRF Project Grant (PI) - Oct 2016 to Sept 2019 (£240k)
MRC Project Grant (Co-I) - Oct 2014 to Sept 2018 (£640k)