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:
Dr Deirdre Donnelly
President
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
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 Lorna Lopez
Treasurer
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 Edmund Gilbert
Media and Comms
RCSI
Dr Gilbert is a researcher in population genetics and genomics. Dr Gilbert studied his undergraduate and Masters in Biochemistory and Genetics at the University of Nottingham in the UK before moving to RCSI in 2015 where he completed his PhD in population genetics and genomics. Dr Gilbert is currently a Lecture in the School of Pharmacy and Biomolecular Sciences, and is also a member of the RCSI FutureNeuro SFI Research Centre.
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 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 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 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.
Dr Aisling Coughlan
Committee Member
Aisling Coughlan is an assistant professor at University College Dublin School of Medicine. She began her scientific career at Trinity College Dublin, where she completed her undergraduate degree in genetics in 2013. She carried out her PhD research in Prof. Ken Wolfe’s lab in University College Dublin, working on yeast molecular genetics and chromatin biology. Aisling’s post-doctoral career includes fellowships with Dr. Tríona Ní Chonghaile at the Royal College of Surgeons Ireland, and Prof. Giuseppe Testa at the European Institute of Oncology (IEO), Milan. Aisling’s research focus switched to cancer research during this period, working on epigenetic dysregulation of ovarian cancer and multiple myeloma. In 2024, Aisling set up her own research group in UCD, focusing on epigenetic dysregulation in cancer. Her lab is focused on leveraging epigenomic and functional genomics methods to find new therapeutic avenues in difficult-to-treat cancers. With a particular focus on haematological malignancies, the Coughlan lab use CRISPR-Cas9 screening to uncover therapy resistance mechanisms, and to identify novel sensitizing drug targets.
Dr Aodán Laighneach
Committee Member
Aodán is a postdoctoral researcher in the School of Biological and Chemical Sciences at the University of Galway. His PhD examined how environmental risk factors for neuropsychiatric disorders influence brain gene expression in animal models and how these findings relate to human genetic risk variation. His current research interests include modelling gene-environment interactions between stressors (deprivation, childhood trauma) and outcomes in neuropsychiatric disorders, including psychosocial, cognitive and brain imaging phenotypes.
Dr Tara Clark
Committee Member
Tara is a Genetic Counsellor with 16 year experience. She graduated from Trinity College Dublin where she specialized in genetics. She completed her studies at Manchester University completing an MSc in Genetic Counselling graduating in 2009. Then she working in Belfast City Hospital for 7 years in the Department of clinical genetics where she achieved professional registration. Then in 2016 moved to the Dept of Clinical Genetics at Children’s Health Ireland at Crumlin. In 2024 she joined The Mater Misericordiae University Hospital to working in a mainstream role in the Family Heart Screening Clinic as an Inherited Cardiac Conditions Genetic Counsellor. She joined the ISHG committee in 2025 as the Genetic Counsellor representative.