IRR Seminar - Professor Neil Vargesson

Professor Neil Vargesson, Professor of Developmental Biology at the University of Aberdeen

Talk Title: Thalidomide: How did it do what it did?

Abstract: Thalidomide is notorious for being a human teratogen. Stereotypically causing severe shortening of the limbs. However, it affected many other tissues. Thalidomide has since been shown to have a huge range of actions including anti-inflammatory, anti-angiogenic and immunomodulatory. This has contributed to the reuse of Thalidomide for a range of clinical conditions today including leprosy, some cancers, vascular conditions like Hereditary Hemorrhagic Telangiectasia and also COVID-19. Yet the spectre of birth differences remains and has sadly occurred in Brazil. Here, I will discuss research using chicken and zebrafish embryos to uncover how thalidomide caused embryonic damage, how we have made ’safe’ forms of the drug and also investigated its molecular actions.

Bio: Prof of Developmental Biology at the University of Aberdeen. Research interests are limb development, vascular development and how medicines and drugs cause birth differences with the goal of understanding if teratogens have common mechanisms of action. Recently awarded the British Society for Developmental Biology ‘Lewis Wolpert’ Medal - for outstanding contributions to the communication of developmental biology in relation to my groups Thalidomide and Primodos research. Our research has also resulted in advising various Governments about the recognition and identification of previously unacknowledged Thalidomide survivors in Canada, Australia, Malta, Ireland and others.