Dr Anna Barnard – Group Leader

Anna is a Wellcome Trust Sir Henry Dale Fellow in the Department of Chemistry and the Insitute of Chemical Biology. 

After graduating with an MChem degree from Durham University in 2008, Anna began a PhD in Chemistry with Professor David Smith at the University of York on self-assembling dendrons with applications in gene delivery which included a research visit at the University of Illinois. From 2012, she worked as a post-doctoral research associate with Professor Andy Wilson at the University of Leeds for 2 years on the development of novel inhibitors of protein-protein interactions. She then carried out a post-doc at Imperial College with Professor Ed Tate for before starting a Junior Research Fellowship at Imperial in October 2015. In 2019 she was awarded a prestigious Sir Henry Dale Fellowship by the Wellcome Trust.

Postdoctoral Research Associates

 Dr Petr Sherin - Research Fellow February 2022-Present

I completed my PhD in Novosibirsk, Russia, followed by a posdoc in Geneva, Switzerland (2010-2012). Later I returned to Novosibirsk and was promoted to a permenant group leader position in 2018. As a Marie Sklodowska-Curie Fellow, I joined the Kuimova group in November 2019.

In February 2022, I joined the Barnard and Kuimova groups as a Research Fellow, working on the visualisation of protein-protein interaction inhibition in live cells.

Dr Roshni Malde - PDRA March 2022-Present

I graduated from the University of Birmingham in 2017 with an MSci degree in Natural Sciences. I then began my PhD studies at University College London under the supervision of Prof. Jamie Baker, Prof. Helen Fielding and Prof. Vijay Chudasama. My research explored novel photochemical reactions utilising ultrafast laser spectroscopy and their application to proteins and peptides towards the development of novel phototriggers and photocleavable conjugates.

In 2022, I joined the Barnard and Kuimova groups at Imperial College as a postdoctoral research associate, working on exploiting molecular rotors to study protein-protein interactions.

Dr Sachi Sharma - PhD Student 2020 - 2024, PDRA April 2024-Present

I graduated with a BSc (Hons) in Chemistry from Queen Mary where I worked on a synthetic project focused on the development of a new palladium-catalysed allylic alkylation process.  I jointed the Fuchter group at Imperial College London as part of my MRes in Drug Discovery and Development, where I worked on developing transmission-blocking drugs as an approach to eradicate malaria.

I completed my PhD with the Barnard group in 2024, working on the target-directed synthesis of helix mimetics co-supervised by Prof Alan Armstrong. Since April 2024, I have been a postdoctoral research associate in the same groups.

Postgraduate students

Amrita Date - PhD Student 2021-Present

I graduated from the University of Mumbai (India) with a Bachelors in Pharmacy. I came to Imperial College in 2019 to do my Masters in Drug Discovery and Development (MRes), during which I worked on the design and synthesis of small molecule inhibitors of REV-ERB, under the supervision of Prof. Matthew Fuchter.

In 2021, I started my PhD with the Barnard group, working on the target profiling of hDM2 inhibitors using chemoproteomics.

Thomas Mills - PhD Student 2022-Present

I graduated from the University of Oxford in 2022 with an MChem in Chemistry. In my Master's project I worked in the Vallance group, combining mass spectrometry with machine learning to identify patients at high risk of mortality post-heart attack.

Lucy Dan - PhD Student 2023-Present

I received my BSc in Biological Sciences at Durham University. I then completed an MRes in Adam Benham's group at Durham University investigating the role of autophagy in oesophageal adenocarcinoma.

I started a CRUK Convergence Science PhD in October 2023 working with the Barnard, Greber (Institute of Cancer Research) and Barr (MRC Laboratory of Medical Sciences) groups. My PhD project investigates the potential for novel p21-disrupting peptides to prevent quiescence and cancer cell resistance to chemotherapy.

Sinead McCann - PhD Student 2023-Present

In July 2022, I graduated from Queen's University Belfast with an MChem degree in Medicinal Chemistry. I completed my Master's research project in the Knipe group where I synthesised a foldamer stabilised through dipolar repulsion.

After graduating, I worked at Pfizer Ireland before starting my PhD in October 2023 in the Barnard and Fuchter groups working on developing photoswitchable stapled peptides as PPI inhibitors.

Aristo Kong - PhD Student 2023-Present

With a bachelor’s degree in chemistry from the University of Toronto, I joined Professor Ed Tate’s group as an MRes student at the Imperial College. After two years as a synthetic chemist at Pfizer, I am back at Imperial College now as a PhD student in the Department of Clinical Sciences.

My PhD project focuses on identifying inhibitors for HORMAD1, a meiotic protein with significant implications in oncology. My research project is a collaboration between the Martinez-Perez, Fuchter, and Barnard groups.

Undergraduate Students

Alumni

Postdoctoral Research Associates

Archie Wall 2021-2024, Dennis Worm 2019-2022, Guilherme Vieira de Castro 2019-2022, Fiona Rowan 2017-2018

PhD Students

Carla Aldington (MRes) 2022-2024, Joshua Tomkins 2020-2024, Sachi Sharma 2020-2024, Rashi Kahan (MPhil) 2019-2021, Theo Flack 2015-2019

MRes Students

Yifang Chen 2022/23, Kenneth Li 2022/23, Sofya Rabinovich 2021/22, Phoebe Seltzer 2021/22, Ellie Tardo 2021/22, Simon Ng 2019/20, Shiqi Tang 2019/20, Clara Bernardi 2018/19, Muhammed Haque 2017/18, Yingchao Wang 2016/17, Dan Miles 2016/17, Huda Baldo 2015/16

Undergraduate Project Students (MSci/BSc)

AJ Martin (MSci) 2022/23, Lishen Jiang (MSci) 2020/21, Lucy Haggerty (MSci) 2019/20, Henry Wilson (MSci) 2019/20, Oana Popescu (BSc) 2019, Pete Gobbett (BSc) 2019, Ana Losada de la Lastra (MSci) 2017/18, Hannah Kiely-Collins (MSci) 2017/18, Michelle Tan (MSci) 2015/16

Erasmus/Exchange Students

Ian Warm 2021/22, Rebecca Schouten 2021/22, Raquel Garcia-Ferrer 2020/21, Oliver Fischer 2017, Femke Meijer 2016/17