Prof. Stephen Downes
University of Ulster, School of Biomed Sciences, Coleraine BT52 1SA, UK
1971-1975 D Phil Biochemistry, Oxford
1967-1971 BA Biochemistry, Oxford
Work experience
2005- Director, Biomedical Sciences Research Institute, University of Ulster
2001- Director, Centre for Functional Genomics, University of Ulster
2001-2005 Co-Director, Centre for Molecular Bioscience, University of Ulster
1995- Head of Cancer and Ageing Research Group, University of Ulster
1995 - Professor of Cancer Biology, School of Biomedical Science, University of Ulster,
Coleraine
1982-1995 Senior Research Associate, CRC Mammalian Cell DNA Repair Group, Cambridge
1980-1981 Research Associate, CRC Mammalian Cell DNA Repair Group, Cambridge
1975-1979 Research Associate, Department of Zoology, Cambridge
OBE for services to biomedical science, 2005.
Research Interests
DNA damage and repair
Gene/nutrient interactions
Cell cycle controla
Current funding
2000-2007 HPSS project grant "Late cell cycle checkpoints in cancer" £ 175,000
2002-2006 FSA project grant “Novel DNA biomarkers for folate deficiency in surrogate tissues and colonic mucosa” £389,194,.
2003-2007.ESF Centre of Excellence grant “Functional Genomics” £2,001,870,
2004-2009 CEC FW6 Network grant “NUGO – Linking genomics, nutrition and health research £15,536
2004-2010 Research Councils UK “Academic Fellowship in Biomedical Sciences”, £500,000.
2005-2008 SRIF3 award “Centre for Metabolomics” £3,510,857, 2005-2008
2005-2008 SRIF3 award “FEI Phillips Centre for Advanced Bioimaging” £1,457, 340, 2005-2008
List of Publications
Fuß H, Dubitzky W, Downes CS and Kurth MJ. (2006) Bistable switching and excitable behaviour in the activation of Src at mitosis. Bioinformatics, in press, 2006
Gilbert D, Fuß H, Gu X, Orton R, Robinson S, Vyshemirsky V Kurth MJ, Downes CS, Dubitzky W (2006) Computational methodologies for modelling, analysis and simulation of signalling networks. Briefings in Bioinformatics doi: 10.1093/bib/bbl043
Wasson GR, McGlynn AP, O’Reilly SR, McNulty H, McKelvey-Martin VJ, McKerr G, Strain JJ, Scott J and Downes CS (2006) Global DNA and p53 region-specific hypomethylation in human colonic cells is induced by folate depletion and reversed by folate supplementation. J. Nutr 135:
2748-2753
Berrar D, Sturgeon B, Bradbury I, Downes CS and Dubitzky W (2005) Survival trees for analyzing clinical outcome in lung adenocarcinomas based on gene expression profile; identification of neogenin and diacyclglycerol kinase alpha expression as critical factors. J. Computational Biol 12: 534-544.
Sanderson P, Johnson IT, Mathers JC, Powers HJ, Downes CS, McGlynn AP, Dare R, Kampman E, Pool-Zobel BL, Bingham SA and Rafter JJ (2004) Emerging diet-related surrogate end points for colorectal cancer: UK Food Standards Agency diet and colonic health workshop report. Brit. J Nutrition, 91, 315–322
Doherty SC,, McKeown SR , McKelvey-Martin VJ, Downes CS, Atala A, Yoo JJ, Simpson DA and Kaufmann WK (2003) Defective cell cycle checkpoint function in bladder cancer. J. Natl. Cancer Inst., 95: 1859-1868
McGlynn AP, Wasson GR, O’Reilly S, McKelvey-Martin VJ, McNulty H, Strain JJ, McKerr G, Mullan F, Mahmud N, Scott J, Weir DG and Downes CS (2003) Detection of replicative integrity in small colonic biopsies using the BrdUrd Comet assay. Brit. J. Cancer: 88, 895-901.
Deming P, Flores K, Downes CS, Paules R and Kaufmann WK (2002) ATR enforces the topoisomerase II-dependent G2 checkpoint through inhibition of Plk1 kinase. J. Biol. Chem., 277: 36832-36838.
Mórocz, M., Kálmán, J., Juhász, A., Sinkó, I., McGlynn, A.P. Downes, C.S., Janka, Z. and Raskó, I. (2002) Elevated levels of oxidative DNA damage in lymphocytes from patients with Alzheimer’s disease . Neurobiol. Ageing 23: 47-53.
Deming PB, Cistulli CA, Zhao H, Graves PR, Piwnica-Worms H, Paules RS, Downes CS and Kaufmann WK (2001) The human decatenation checkpoint. Proc Natl.Acad. Sci USA 98: 12044-12049