Frances Ashcroft

Last updated

Dame

Frances Ashcroft

DBE FRS FMedSci
Born
Frances Mary Ashcroft

(1952-02-15) 15 February 1952 (age 71) [1]
NationalityBritish
Education Talbot Heath School
Alma mater University of Cambridge (BA, PhD)
Awards UNESCO award (2012)
Croonian Lecture (2013)
Scientific career
Fields Physiology [2]
Institutions
Thesis Calcium electrogenesis in insect muscle  (1978)
Frances Ashcroft's voice
from the BBC programme The Life Scientific , 15 May 2012. [3]
Website www.dpag.ox.ac.uk/team/group-leaders/frances-ashcroft

Dame Frances Mary Ashcroft DBE FRS FMedSci (born 1952) is a British ion channel physiologist. [4] [2] [5] She is Royal Society GlaxoSmithKline Research Professor at the University Laboratory of Physiology at the University of Oxford. She is a fellow of Trinity College, Oxford, and is a director of the Oxford Centre for Gene Function. Her research group has an international reputation for work on insulin secretion, type II diabetes and neonatal diabetes. [6] [7] Her work with Andrew Hattersley has helped enable children born with diabetes to switch from insulin injections to tablet therapy. [8] [9] [4] [10]

Contents

Education

Ashcroft was educated at Talbot Heath School and the University of Cambridge where she was awarded a degree in Natural Sciences followed by a PhD in zoology in 1978. [11] [12]

Career and research

Ashcroft then did postdoctoral research at the University of Leicester and the University of California at Los Angeles. [13] Ashcroft is a director of Oxion: Ion Channels and Disease Initiative, a research and training programme on integrative ion channel research, funded by the Wellcome Trust. [14]

Ashcroft's research focuses on ATP-sensitive potassium (KATP)channels and their role in insulin secretion. Ashcroft is working towards explaining how a rise in the blood glucose concentration stimulates the release of insulin from the pancreatic beta-cells, what goes wrong with this process in type 2 diabetes, and how drugs used to treat this condition exert their beneficial effects. [15] Ashcroft has authored a few science and popular science books based on ion channel physiology:

Her work has helped people with neonatal diabetes, a very rare disease, switch from insulin injections to oral drug therapy. [2]

Honours and awards

Ashcroft was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1999. [19] In 2007 Ashcroft was awarded the Walter B. Cannon Award, the highest honour bestowed by the American Physiological Society. [20] She was one of five 2012 winners of the L'Oreal-UNESCO Award for Women in Science. [21]

Ashcroft was awarded an honorary degrees of Doctor of the University from the Open University in 2003 and Doctor of Science from the University of Leicester on 13 July 2007. [12]

Ashcroft was awarded the Croonian Lecture by the Royal Society in 2013. [22]

In the 2015 Birthday Honours, she was appointed a Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire (DBE) 'for services to Medical Science and the Public Understanding of Science'. [23] She was elected a Fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences (FMedSci) in 1999. [24]

A. S. Byatt's novel A Whistling Woman is half dedicated to Ashcroft. [25]

Personal life

Ashcroft appeared (as a diner) on MasterChef during the 2011 series,[ citation needed ] along with several other Fellows of the Royal Society.

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Insulin</span> Peptide hormone

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Beta cells (β-cells) are a type of cell found in pancreatic islets that synthesize and secrete insulin and amylin. Beta cells make up 50–70% of the cells in human islets. In patients with Type 1 diabetes, beta-cell mass and function are diminished, leading to insufficient insulin secretion and hyperglycemia.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Alpha cell</span>

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In molecular biology, the sulfonylurea receptors (SUR) are membrane proteins which are the molecular targets of the sulfonylurea class of antidiabetic drugs whose mechanism of action is to promote insulin release from pancreatic beta cells. More specifically, SUR proteins are subunits of the inward-rectifier potassium ion channels Kir6.x. The association of four Kir6.x and four SUR subunits form an ion conducting channel commonly referred to as the KATP channel.

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References

  1. ↑ "Ashcroft, Prof. Frances Mary" . Who's Who (online Oxford University Press  ed.). A & C Black. 2014. doi:10.1093/ww/9780199540884.013.U5819.(Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
  2. 1 2 3 "Women in Physiology" (PDF). Static.physoc.org. Retrieved 21 June 2019.
  3. ↑ "Frances Ashcroft". The Life Scientific. 15 May 2012. BBC Radio 4 . Retrieved 18 January 2014.
  4. 1 2 Wray, Susan; Tansey, Elizabeth, eds. (2015). Women physiologists : centenary celebrations and beyond (PDF). London: The Physiological Society. ISBN   9780993341007. OCLC   922032986.
  5. ↑ Frances Ashcroft publications indexed by the Scopus bibliographic database. (subscription required)
  6. ↑ Ashcroft, F. M.; Harrison, D. E.; Ashcroft, S. J. H. (1984). "Glucose induces closure of single potassium channels in isolated rat pancreatic β-cells". Nature. 312 (5993): 446–448. Bibcode:1984Natur.312..446A. doi:10.1038/312446a0. PMID   6095103. S2CID   4340710.
  7. ↑ Ashcroft, F. M.; Rorsman, P. (1989). "Electrophysiology of the pancreatic β-cell". Progress in Biophysics and Molecular Biology. 54 (2): 87–143. doi: 10.1016/0079-6107(89)90013-8 . PMID   2484976.
  8. ↑ Ashcroft, F. M. (1988). "Adenosine 5'-Triphosphate-Sensitive Potassium Channels". Annual Review of Neuroscience. 11: 97–118. doi:10.1146/annurev.ne.11.030188.000525. PMID   2452599.
  9. ↑ "Frances Ashcroft talks to ReAgent about career advice for scientists". reagent.co.uk. 11 June 2014.
  10. ↑ Ashcroft, Frances M.; Harrison, Donna E.; Ashcroft, Stephen J. H. (1984). "Glucose induces closure of single potassium channels in isolated rat pancreatic β-cells". Nature. 312 (5993): 446–448. Bibcode:1984Natur.312..446A. doi:10.1038/312446a0. ISSN   0028-0836. PMID   6095103. S2CID   4340710. Closed Access logo transparent.svg
  11. ↑ Ashcroft, Frances Mary (1978). Calcium electrogenesis in insect muscle. copac.jisc.ac.uk (PhD thesis). University of Cambridge. OCLC   500372918. EThOS   uk.bl.ethos.448200.
  12. 1 2 "Oration for Professor Frances Ashcroft by Professor Gordon Campbell. On the occasion of being awarded Doctor of Science summer 2007". le.ac.uk. University of Leicester. Retrieved 25 June 2012.
  13. ↑ "Frances Ashcroft, Professorial Fellow in Physiology". Trinity College, University of Oxford. 2014. Retrieved 21 April 2015.
  14. ↑ "Welcome to Oxion". Oxion: Ion Channels and Disease Initiative, Universities of Oxford, Cambridge, London and MRC Hartwell. Retrieved 21 April 2015.
  15. ↑ "Frances Ashcroft — GLAXOSMITHKLINE Royal Society Professor". Department of Physiology, Anatomy and Genetics, Medical Sciences Division, University of Oxford. 2015. Retrieved 21 April 2015.
  16. ↑ 1999, Academic Press, ISBN   0120653109
  17. ↑ 2000, HarperCollins, ISBN   0141046538
  18. ↑ 2012, W. W. Norton and Company, ISBN   0006551254
  19. ↑ Anon (1999). "Dame Frances Ashcroft DBE FMedSci FRS". royalsociety.org. London: The Royal Society. Retrieved 6 July 2012. One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from the royalsociety.org website where:
    “All text published under the heading 'Biography' on Fellow profile pages is available under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.” --Royal Society Terms, conditions and policies at the Wayback Machine (archived 2016-11-11)
  20. ↑ "Oxford physiology professor earns APS' Walter B. Cannon Award" (Press release). American Physiological Society. 27 April 2007. Retrieved 22 March 2015– via EurekAlert!.
  21. ↑ "Ashcroft receives L'oreal-UNESCO Award for Women in Science". ox.ac.uk. 8 November 2011. Archived from the original on 8 November 2011. Retrieved 24 October 2017.
  22. ↑ "Croonian Lecture—List of lecturers: 21st century". Royal Society. Archived from the original on 14 July 2012. Retrieved 24 October 2017.
  23. ↑ "No. 61256". The London Gazette (Supplement). 13 June 2015. p. B8.
  24. ↑ "Professor Dame Frances Ashcroft - The Academy of Medical Sciences". Acmedsci.ac.uk. Retrieved 21 June 2019.
  25. ↑ Newman, Jenny; Friel, James (2003). "An interview with A. S. Byatt". Cerles Review. Retrieved 11 September 2010. I remember sitting at high table with my friend, Professor Frances Ashcroft, to whom A Whistling Woman is half dedicated.

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