Hugh Christian Watkins

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Hugh Watkins

Hugh Watkins Royal Society.jpg
Hugh Watkins at the Royal Society admissions day in London, July 2017
Born
Hugh Christian Watkins

(1959-06-07) 7 June 1959 (age 64)
Education Gresham's School
Alma mater St Bartholomew's Hospital Medical College
University of London
Scientific career
Institutions University of Oxford
Harvard Medical School
Thesis Demonstration that cardiac troponin T mutations cause hypertrophic cardiomyopathy  (1996)
Notable students Bongani Mayosi
Website www.rdm.ox.ac.uk/principal-investigators/researcher/hugh-watkins

Hugh Christian Watkins FRS FRCP FMedSci (born 7 June 1959) is a British cardiologist. He is a Fellow of Merton College, Oxford, an associate editor of Circulation Research , and was Field Marshal Alexander Professor of Cardiovascular Medicine in the University of Oxford between 1996 and 2013.

Contents

Early life and education

The son of Dr David Watkins, a Norfolk physician, and his wife Gillian Mary, Watkins was educated at Gresham's School, Holt, Norfolk and the St Bartholomew's Hospital Medical College, graduating in 1983 with both Bachelor of Science and Bachelor of Medicine, Bachelor of Surgery degrees. In 1984 he gained the Brackenbury & Bourne Prize in General Medicine. [1] He was awarded a PhD from the University of London in 1995. [1]

Career and Research

Watkins was a house physician in the Professorial Medical Unit at St Bartholomew's Hospital in 1984–1985, then a senior house officer in Medicine at the John Radcliffe Hospital, Oxford, from 1985 to 1987. He was then briefly a senior house officer in Neurology at St Bartholomew's, before two years as a Registrar in Medicine and Cardiology at St Thomas's Hospital, London, from 1987 to 1989. His next posts were as a lecturer in Cardiological Sciences at St George's Hospital, London, and as Resident Fellow in Medicine at the Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women's Hospital, Boston. In 1995 he was appointed an assistant professor of medicine at the Harvard Medical School and as associate physician at the Brigham & Women's Hospital, and in 1996 as Field Marshal Alexander Professor of Cardiovascular Medicine in the University of Oxford. [1] [2]

Watkins was elected to Membership of the Royal College of Physicians (MRCP) in 1987, graduated MD and PhD from the University of London in 1995, and was appointed a Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians (FRCP) in 1997. [1]

At Oxford, Watkins is the Director of the British Heart Foundation's Molecular Cardiology Laboratory in the Wellcome Trust Centre for Human Genetics and of its Centre of Research Excellence, one of six similar programmes in the United Kingdom. He is also an associate editor of the academic journal Circulation Research. [3]

Watkins's main specialism is in molecular genetic analysis of cardiovascular disease, and his most notable work is on the inheritance of heart disease, especially on hypertrophic cardiomyopathy and the genetic causes of "sudden cardiac death". He is chairman of an international group which investigates genetic susceptibility to coronary artery disease, which has funding from the European Commission. [3]

Honours and awards

Publications

Personal life

In 1987, Watkins married Elizabeth Bridget Hewett, and they have one son and one daughter. In Who's Who his recreations are stated as "photography and Oriental porcelain". [1]

Related Research Articles

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Hypertrophic cardiomyopathy is a condition in which muscle tissues of the heart become thickened without an obvious cause. The parts of the heart most commonly affected are the interventricular septum and the ventricles. This results in the heart being less able to pump blood effectively and also may cause electrical conduction problems. Specifically, within the bundle branches that conduct impulses through the interventricular septum and into the Purkinje fibers, as these are responsible for the depolarization of contractile cells of both ventricles.

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Cardiomegaly is a medical condition in which the heart becomes enlarged. It is more commonly referred to simply as "having an enlarged heart". It is usually the result of underlying conditions that make the heart work harder, such as obesity, heart valve disease, high blood pressure (hypertension), and coronary artery disease. Cardiomyopathy is also associated with cardiomegaly.

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Alcohol septal ablation (ASA) is a minimally invasive heart procedure to treat hypertrophic cardiomyopathy (HCM).

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Cardiac muscle troponin T (cTnT) is a protein that in humans is encoded by the TNNT2 gene. Cardiac TnT is the tropomyosin-binding subunit of the troponin complex, which is located on the thin filament of striated muscles and regulates muscle contraction in response to alterations in intracellular calcium ion concentration.

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References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 Anon (2017). "Watkins, Prof. Hugh Christian" . Who's Who (online Oxford University Press  ed.). Oxford: A & C Black. doi:10.1093/ww/9780199540884.013.39014.(Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
  2. Commonwealth Universities Yearbook, vol. 2 (2006), p. 2006
  3. 1 2 3 4 "Hugh WatkinsMD, PhD, FRCP, FMedSci". cardiov.ox.ac.uk. Archived from the original on 28 April 2012., accessed 28 April 2012
  4. Anon (2017). "Hugh Watkins FRS". royalsociety.org. Royal Society. Archived from the original on 5 May 2017. Retrieved 5 May 2017.
  5. Clarke, Robert; Peden, John F.; Hopewell, Jemma C.; Kyriakou, Theodosios; Goel, Anuj; Heath, Simon C.; Parish, Sarah; Barlera, Simona; Franzosi, Maria Grazia; Rust, Stephan; Bennett, Derrick (2009-12-24). "Genetic variants associated with Lp(a) lipoprotein level and coronary disease" (PDF). The New England Journal of Medicine. 361 (26): 2518–2528. doi:10.1056/NEJMoa0902604. ISSN   1533-4406. PMID   20032323.
  6. Thierfelder, L.; Watkins, H.; MacRae, C.; Lamas, R.; McKenna, W.; Vosberg, H. P.; Seidman, J. G.; Seidman, C. E. (1994-06-03). "Alpha-tropomyosin and cardiac troponin T mutations cause familial hypertrophic cardiomyopathy: a disease of the sarcomere". Cell. 77 (5): 701–712. doi:10.1016/0092-8674(94)90054-x. ISSN   0092-8674. PMID   8205619. S2CID   205021038.
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  8. Nikpay, Majid; Goel, Anuj; Won, Hong-Hee; Hall, Leanne M.; Willenborg, Christina; Kanoni, Stavroula; Saleheen, Danish; Kyriakou, Theodosios; Nelson, Christopher P.; Hopewell, Jemma C.; Webb, Thomas R. (October 2015). "A comprehensive 1,000 Genomes-based genome-wide association meta-analysis of coronary artery disease". Nature Genetics. 47 (10): 1121–1130. doi:10.1038/ng.3396. ISSN   1546-1718. PMC   4589895 . PMID   26343387.