ISHG Committee Members
Current Committee Members of ISHG
The ISHG is run on a voluntary basis by a committee. The committee consists of members from the main third level, research and clinical institutions. The current committee members are below:
Ms Jacqueline Turner
President
Mater Misericordiae University Hospital.
Jacqueline has worked for over 20 years as a Genetic Counsellor. She was one of the first students to complete the Masters course in Genetic Counselling in Manchester, having completed her primary genetics degree in Trinity College Dublin. She is deeply committed to supporting patients find a diagnosis and enabling them to live as fully as possible with a genetic condition. She has been part of several national committees working to build greater awareness and build supports for people affected by genetic disease and their families. For the past 3 years she has been developing a Clinical Genetic Service for Inherited Retinal Disease patients at the Mater Hospital.
Dr Deirdre Donnelly
Chairperson
Belfast City Hospital.
Dr Deirdre Donnelly is consultant in the Northern Ireland Regional Genetics Centre, based at Belfast City Hospital. She sees general and cancer genetics patients and has a special interest in the neurocutaneous disorders, running the regional clinics for Tuberous Sclerosis and Neurofibromatosis type 1, and is Genetic lead for the Neurofibromatosis type 2 regional MDT clinic. Additionally, she is Trainee Programme Director for Clinical Genetics in Northern Ireland.
Dr Lara Cassidy
Vice Chair
Trinity College Dublin.
Lara Cassidy is an assistant professor at the Department of Genetics, Trinity College Dublin. Her past research involved applying NGS technologies to the study of Irish prehistory, which resolved longstanding questions on the genomic origins of the island’s population. She started her own ancient genomics lab in TCD in 2020. Her current interests include leveraging Ireland’s insularity and long-term genetic continuity to study the evolutionary forces that have shaped human health and disease; reconstructing prehistoric social structures and cultural practices through patterns of relatedness and inbreeding; optimising ancient DNA data processing and curation to establish best practices in the field from both a research and ethical standpoint.
Dr Tom Moore
Sponsorship Secretary
UCC.
Tom Moore trained as a veterinary surgeon in University College Dublin and obtained MSc and PhD degrees from the University of London. He did postdoctoral work at the Babraham Institute, Cambridge, UK. He currently is Director of the BSc Genetics degree at University College Cork. His research interests are predominantly in developmental genetics; specifically, in the areas of maternal – fetal interactions and the genetics of autism.
Dr Michael Salter-Townshend
Social Media Secretary
UCD.
Michael Salter-Townshend is an Assistant Professor of Statistics in University College Dublin who works on statistical genetics applications.
His current research includes population genetics methodology, admixture modelling, local ancestry methods for identification of genes under selection, methods for detecting homologous recombination enrichment and their potential association with disease via the introduction of deleterious haplotypes.
Dr Brónagh Ó hIci
Committee Member
CHI at Crumlin.
Dr Brónagh Ó hIcí is a senior clinical scientist working in the molecular genetics laboratory in the Dept of Clinical Genetics in Children’s Health Ireland at Crumlin. A graduate for the National University of Ireland, Galway. Brónagh has a special interest in imprinting disorders and prenatal diagnostic testing.
Dr Derek Morris
Committee Member
Derek Morris is a geneticist and his area of expertise is the identification of risk genes for psychiatric disorders. He is Programme Director for the BSc. in Genetics and Genomics in NUI Galway.
Dr James O’Byrne
Committee Member
Mater Misericordiae University Hospital.
Dr James O’Byrne is a consultant Metabolic Physician and Consultant Clinical Geneticist based in the Adult Metabolic Unit at the Mater Misericordiae University Hospital (MMUH) and Associate Clinical Professor in the School of Medicine, UCD.
His special interests include the organelle diseases; Lysosomal Storage and Peroxisomal Disorders and the development and application of gene specific treatments or precision medicine within this field.
Working as a Consultant Clinical Geneticist Dr O’Byrne also supports the development of genetic initiatives across a number of specialties including ophthalmology, cardiology, neurology and oncology at the Mater Hospital.He is director of the new ESHG course entitled Precision Medicine: A Focus on Clinical Utility due to start in 2022.
Dr Lisa Bradley
Committee Member
CHI at Crumlin.
Lisa Bradley is a Consultant Clinical Geneticist at Our Lady’s Children’s Hospital Crumlin, Dublin 12. She graduated with a B.A. (Mod) in Genetics from the University of Dublin, Trinity College and with a MB, BCh, BAO, LRCP & SI from the Royal College of Surgeons, Ireland. She has completed an M.Sc in Molecular Medicine and obtained her M.R.C.P.I in Paeds. She completed speciality training in Clinical Genetics at the N.Ireland Regional Genetics Service, Belfast City Hospital. She previously held a consultant post at St Georges NHS Healthcare Trust, South West Thames Regional Genetics Service, London before returning to Dublin to her present post.
Dr Lorna Lopez
Committee Member
Maynooth University.
Lorna is an Associate Professor at Maynooth University and the Principal Investigator of the Family Genomics Research Group. Since her PhD, she has worked in the field of psychiatric genetics and is advancing biological psychiatric research. Her current work has a focus on the genomic basis of psychiatric conditions and associated traits. Her research expertise range from genomic, proteomic and molecular biological approaches, in family and population-based studies.
Lorna is an awardee of a European Research Council Starting Grant, Science Foundation Ireland (SFI) Early Career Researcher of the Year 2020 and SFI Starting Investigator Grant.
Dr Therese Murphy
Committee Member
Technological University Dublin.
After completing a Health Research Board 4-Year PhD at Trinity College Dublin I was awarded a Craig-Dobbin Newman Postdoctoral Fellowship in Mental Health Research by University College Dublin. In 2013, I joined Professor Jonathan Mill’s Complex Disease Epigenetics Group at the University of Exeter as a Research Fellow. In 2015, I was appointed Lecturer in Biomedical Science at the University of Exeter Medical School and started an independent research programme examining the role of epigenetic mechanisms in Major Depression and Suicidal Behaviour. In autumn 2018, I returned to Ireland I took up the position of Lecturer at the School of Biological and Health Sciences, Technological University Dublin.
Dr Katherine Benson
Committee Member
RCSI
Dr. Katherine Benson is a lecturer in computational biology at the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland. After completing her PhD at Queen’s University Belfast, she worked as a postdoc at RCSI using next-generation sequencing technologies to improve understanding of how genomic testing can help improve diagnostics and patient outcomes. She has a particular research interest in renal disease genomics, particularly polycystic kidney disease (PKD). Dr. Benson worked as part of SFI FutureNeuro to integrate genomic sequencing data into the electronic health records for adult and paediatric epilepsy clinics in Ireland. Her current research focuses on the genetic drivers of disease severity and progression.
Dr William Duddy
Committee Member
Ulster University
Bill earned the class prize on completing his honours degree in Molecular & Cellular Biology at the University of Glasgow, and remained there to complete a PhD in Biochemistry. While at Glasgow he lost his brother to muscular dystrophy, prompting him to seek a research role in neuromuscular disease. As a post-doctoral research associate at Children’s National Medical Center in Washington DC, Bill focused on cell models of muscle disease and emerging computational techniques in functional genomics. Thanks to a research fellowship from the charity Duchenne Ireland, he moved to the Institut de Myologie, in Paris, France, affiliated to the Sorbonne Universities, where he became project leader in bioinformatics before moving to Ulster.