Lorna Harries

Lorna Harries current research focuses on the discovery of novel drug targets for age-related disease. She is evaluating novel small molecule and genetic interventions for moderation of splicing regulators and patterns of alternative splicing for efficacy as future anti-degenerative drugs. Her group were the first to report dysregulation of splicing regulators in association with ageing and longevity in human populations (PMID 21668623), in human models of cellular ageing (PMID 23747814) and in animal models (PMID 27363602). They were also the first group to show that cellular senescence was reversible in these systems by targeting splicing regulation in multiple cell types (PMIDs 29041897, 30088951 and 30026406). Lorna`s team take an interdisciplinary approach which ranges from molecular epidemiology in human populations, to detailed molecular dissection of specific pathways in cellular models. Their discoveries pinpoint dysregulation of alternative splicing as a new ‘hallmark of ageing’; and a novel driver of cellular ageing.