Jade Lucas

Jade Lucas is a Clinical Brain Sciences PhD student in the laboratory of Prof. Siddharthan Chandran and Dr. Bhuvaneish Selvaraj at the University of Edinburgh. Her work focuses on trying to understand the cellular and molecular mechanisms that determine disease duration in amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), also known as motor neuron disease (MND). It is hoped that a better understanding of this will enable better care planning for patients, inform the development of novel therapeutics that will alter disease trajectory, and aid the identification of novel molecular biomarkers to predict survival, transforming clinical trial designs. One of the activities Jade enjoys the most is public engagement – interacting with members of the public to increase awareness of ALS and communicating with people living with the condition, and clinicians, to bridge the gap between the lab and the clinic, facilitating ‘Bench to Bedside’ research.

Jade graduated with a first-class MSci degree in Neuroscience from University College London (UCL). As part of her Master’s Project, Jade worked in the laboratory of Prof. Adrian Isaacs (UK Dementia Research Institute at UCL), studying the role of a recently identified ALS risk gene.