Scientific Advisors

David Scopes - Chief Advisor
David obtained his BSc, MSc and Ph.D. in Chemistry from the University of Manchester. This was followed by periods of postdoctoral research at Syntex Corporation in Palo Alto and at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. David joined Glaxo in 1976 and became a Research Manager in the UK, focussing on central nervous system disorders, before running a department of chemists as Head of Medicinal Chemistry at GlaxoWellcome in France. David joined Oxford GlycoSciences in 1996 as Director of Chemistry, later becoming Vice-President of Drug Discovery and joined Senexis as its Chief Scientific Officer in 2004. He then became an advisor to the Company in 2012.

Professor Andrew Doig - University of Manchester
Andrew graduated in Chemistry from the University of Cambridge, where he stayed to complete his PhD on protein folding and peptide binding with Professor Dudley Williams, FRS, in 1991. He then carried out post-doctoral research in the Biochemistry Department at Stanford with Professor Robert Baldwin before joining UMIST in 1994. He is now a Professor of Biochemistry in the Faculty of Life Sciences at the University of Manchester. In addition to being an expert on protein structure, Andrew was a founder of Senexis with and continues to collaborate with Senexis.

Professor Dominic Walsh - University College Dublin
Dominic obtained his Ph.D. in Veterinary Science from the Queen's University Belfast, where he stayed as a postdoctoral research fellow before leaving for Harvard in 1995 to work with Prof. Dennis Selkoe. In 2003, Dominic became a Wellcome Trust Senior Research Lecturer at University College Dublin, where he has now been an Associate Professor of Biochemistry since 2006. His research has recently focused on demonstrating the key finding that the toxic forms of beta-amyloid are stable, soluble oligomers.

Dr Ann Hayes - Director of The Ann Hayes Consultancy Ltd
Ann worked for 22 years for GlaxoWellcome, initially in research, with particular expertise in the areas of CNS and pain. Before the GSK merger, she was a Director in Drug Discovery, and was involved in determining long-term Discovery strategy, in portfolio management and in discovery project management. Ann left GSK in 2001 and set up a business as an independent pharmaceutical consultant. In this capacity she has co-founded three companies, Ionix Pharmaceuticals which has been bought by Vernalis, Therasci which has been bought by CeNeS, and Theradeas. Ann is a non-executive director for Curidium Medica plc and Plethora Solutions plc, and a member of the advisory boards for CeNeS, Bionomics and Lectus. She has also held NED positions at Therasci, Ionix and Sirus (which was sold to Arakis). She currently consults regularly for CeNes and Shire, as well as doing ad hoc consulting for a number of small companies and VCs. In addition, to advising Senexis directly, Ann also acts as the independent consultant on the Research Steering Group of the research programme currently funded by the Wellcome Trust.

Dr Eugene O'Hare - Queen's University Belfast
Eugene obtained his B.Sc. and Ph.D. degrees in Northern Ireland, before becoming a Postdoctoral Research Associate in Behavioral Neurophysiology at the Institute for Disability Studies of the University of Minnesota. From there, through nationally competitive programmes within the U.S.A., Eugene was awarded consecutive National Research Service Postdoctoral Fellowships at the Departments of Medicine, Psychiatry, and Pharmacology of the University of Minnesota. He was then appointed Research Health Science Specialist at the Department of Veterans Affairs Hospital, Minneapolis and then joined the staff of the School of Psychology at Queens University in 2006. Eugene’s main scientific interest is the development of effects on interactions between the biology and chemistry of the brain on consequent behavioural outcomes. A major application of this research over the past 20 years has been the neurobiology and neurochemistry of brain disorders, including Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s diseases.