Professor David Shepherd

Name:

Position:

Pro-Vice Chancellor (Research and Enterprise)

Email:

d.shepherd@bangor.ac.uk

Location:

Bangor University

Phone:

Professor David Shepherd was appointed as Pro Vice-Chancellor (Research and Enterprise) in September 2010. He came to Bangor University in October 2009 to take up a Personal Chair as Professor of Developmental Neurobiology in the School of Biological Sciences. He is a graduate of Manchester University and obtained his PhD at UMIST. After completing his PhD he spent 7 years working as a postdoctoral researcher in the United States and at Cambridge. He was appointed as a lecturer at the University of Southampton in 1991. In 2003 became the Head of the School of Biological Sciences at Southampton and managed the School through a major transformation of its research and teaching and played a major role in the design and construction of a new building for the School.

For most of his career his research interests have focused on the cellular and molecular mechanism of nervous system development and disease. In recent years he has used the fruit fly Drosophila as a model genetic organism to understand to address problems with direct relevance to human health. He was a pioneer in showing that Drosophila can be a powerful experimental system for studying the molecular mechanisms that cause the onset and progression of neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s disease. He has collaborations with researchers in the UK, Europe and the USA. He is also a visiting scientist at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute at Janelia Farm in the USA.

His personal interests include: music, fly-fishing, sailing and a passion for underdog football teams that he hopes will undermine the inexorable wealth driven success of English football.