Translation Fund Committee

The Translation Fund Committee makes funding decisions on Translation Award proposals.

The Committee considers each application along with the detailed opinions of experts who have been consulted on the proposal.

It has a pool of independent members who have been selected to provide commercially aware advice across a broad range of life-science product areas and platform technologies.

The Committee meets twice a year.

Members

Dr Ted Bianco
Director, Technology Transfer, Wellcome Trust
Committee role: Chairman/Staff member

Professor Kay Davies
Dr Lee's Professor of Anatomy at the University of Oxford and Director of the MRC Functional Genetics Unit
Committee role: Governor member

Professor Ross Coppel
Deputy Dean and Director of Research of the Faculty of Medicine, Nursing and Health Sciences, Monash University
Committee role: Independent Member

Dr Anthony Ford-Hutchinson
Independent Consultant
Committee role: Independent Member

Mr Jan Keltsjen
Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Endosense SA
Committee role: Independent Member

Professor Molly Stevens
Professor of Biomedical Materials and Regenerative Medicine, Imperial College, London
Committee role: Independent Member

Dr Daniel Nelki
Head of Legal and Operations, Wellcome Trust
Committee role: Staff member

Dr Richard Seabrook
Head of Business Development, Wellcome Trust
Committee role: Staff member

Dr Nicola Shepherd
Business Development Manager, Wellcome Trust
Committee role: Secretary

Independent Members biographies

Professor Ross Coppel is currently Deputy Dean and Director of Research of the Faculty of Medicine, Nursing and Health Sciences at Monash University and has researched a range of areas including tropical infectious diseases such as malaria and tuberculosis, autoimmune liver disease and bioinformatics. He is director of the Victorian Bioinformatics Consortium and was a co-founder of the PlasmoDB consortium. Ross is a recipient of the Glaxo Award for Advanced Research in Infectious Diseases and was a Howard Hughes Medical Institute International Fellow. He has authored or co-authored more than 430 scientific publications, including one book and multiple book chapters. Ross has co-founded two biotech companies that developed antibiotics and had two diagnostic tests based on his discoveries marketed. He has had stints working in venture capital and bioscience consulting and has sat on the bench of the Federal Court of Australia as advisor to the judge.

Dr Anthony Ford-Hutchinson obtained his BSc in biochemistry from the University of Birmingham, a master's in molecular enzymology from the University of Warwick, and a Ph.D. in biochemistry from the University of London.Prior to coming to Merck, he performed research in the field of leukotrienes andprostaglandins at Kings College Hospital Medical School in London and was a lecturer in its Chemical Pathology Department. He joined Merck in Montreal, Canada in 1981 where he spent 17 years moving from Director toSite Head. During his time in Canada, the laboratories there developed novel drugs for the treatment of human Diseases, including Singulair®, for the treatment of asthma and allergic rhinitis, and the discovery of selective COX-2 inhibitors for the treatment of osteoarthritis and pain. In 1998, Tony moved to Pennsylvania to head worldwide basic research efforts, covering all therapeutic areas.As an Executive Vice President he became responsible for franchise strategies in multiple disease areas, including Vaccines and Infectious Diseases. After 30 years at Merck, Tony retired in February 2012 and is currently a member of several biotech boards.

Mr Jan Keltsjen currently serves as the chairman and chief executive officer of Endosense SA, as well as a select number of supervisory roles including executive chairman of Surpass Medical ltd. He previously served as president and chief executive officer of AngioDynamics Inc. (2009 – 2011) and CryoCath Technologies Inc. (TSX; CYT, 2007- until its acquisition by Medtronic in 2009). From 2000 to 2007, he served as Worldwide General Manager of Cordis Neurovascular, a Johnson & Johnson company. He joined Cordis in 1995 as Vice President and Managing Director responsible for international manufacturing and distribution operations, as well as research and development. He was promoted to Vice President of European Marketing for all Cordis divisions in 1998 and Vice President of Worldwide Strategic Marketing for Cordis Cardiology, based in Miami, in 1999. Before joining Cordis, Mr. Keltjens led research and development departments at Unilever and was Managing Director of a group of small high tech companies.

Professor Molly Stevens is currently Professor of Biomedical Materials and Regenerative Medicine and the Research Director for Biomedical Material Sciences in the Institute of Biomedical Engineering. She joined Imperial in 2004 after a Postdoctoral training in the field of tissue engineering with Professor Robert Langer in the Chemical Engineering Department at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). In 2010 she was recognised by The Times as one of the top ten scientists under the age of 40 and has received a number of Awards for her research . She has also recently been recognised by the TR100, a compilation of the top innovators, under the age of 35, who are transforming technology - and the world with their work. She has a large and extremely multidisciplinary research group of students and postdocs/fellows. Research in regenerative medicine within her group includes the directed differentiation of stem cells, the design of novel bioactive scaffolds and new approaches towards tissue regeneration and she has translated her research throughout the founding of spin-out companies.Recent efforts by the Stevens group in peptide-functionalised nanoparticles for enzyme biosensing have enabled the most sensitive facile enzyme detection to date and have a host of applications across diseases ranging from cancer to global health applications.