Inaugural Lecture of Professor Neil Hotchin

Location
Biosciences 301
Dates
Thursday 20 October 2022 (16:30-18:00)
Contact

Contact Caroline Durbin - c.durbin@bham.ac.uk

Dr Neil Hotchin
Professor Neil Hotchin

This is an in-person event in Room 301, School of Biosciences, University of Birmingham.

The lecture will also be streamed live via Zoom Webinar. Registration for the webinar is here. 

ROCK and Rho: should I stay or should I go?

The human epidermis is comprised of multiple layers of specialised epithelial cells known as keratinocytes. As cells are lost from the outermost layers of the epidermis they are replaced by a process of terminal differentiation, in which keratinocytes of the basal layer cease proliferation and migrate upwards eventually reaching the outermost protective layers of the epidermis. Normal homeostasis of the epidermis requires that the balance between proliferation and differentiation be tightly regulated. This lecture will discuss the role played by Rho family GTPases in the regulation of keratinocyte proliferation and differentiation.

Neil Hotchin was born in the hilly bit of Lincolnshire and his first degree was in Biology from the University of York. His PhD at the Royal Postgraduate Medical School was on the role of Epstein Barr Virus in the development of Burkitt’s Lymphoma. After his PhD he worked as a postdoctoral Research Fellow at the Imperial Research Cancer Research Fund where he first became interested in how cell adhesion to extracellular matrix regulates cell function. He continued this work in the MRC Laboratory for Molecular Cell Biology at University College London before moving to Birmingham to set up his own research group with the help of a MRC Career Establishment Award in 1996. Since moving to Birmingham he has continued to work on understanding how cell adhesion to extracellular matrix regulates cell function, focussing on the role played by Rho family GTPases in regulating cell adhesion and function in the human epidermis.