William O’Brien

William O’Brien

Team Members

William O’Brien

Team Members

Chloe Atkinson2024-02-19T16:50:32+00:00

Meet The Team

William O’Brien

MA, MBA

William is a specialist R&D tax and finance advisor.  A seasoned leader, he has worked across a wide range of industries including Biotech, Medical Devices, Formula One, Defence and Finance. William has a degree in Neurophysiology from the University of Cambridge and an MBA from Manchester Business School.  William is a natural fit for ApconiX as he began his career working as a scientist at the Babraham Institute near Cambridge, using patch clamp and fluorescence imaging to study the role of GTP binding proteins in exocytosis.

Maxine Xodo Rose

Olivia Turner

Louisa Lake

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Dr Kimberly Rockley

Dr Kimberly Rockley

Team Members

Dr Kimberly Rockley

Team Members

Chloe Atkinson2023-11-16T13:05:49+00:00

Meet The Team

Dr Kimberly Rockley

PhD

Kimberly Rockley has a background in cell-based in vitro models and joined ApconiX to develop in vitro assays for early detection seizure liability. She holds a PhD in Pharmacy from Durham University where she used novel in vitro methods to investigate anthracycline-induced cardiotoxicity and its mitigation by perturbation of angiotensin signalling. Kim is passionate about the use of in vitro techniques to improve preclinical safety and reduce animal testing.

Michael Morton

Karen Jones

Ion Channel Screening

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Ian Slater

Ian Slater

Team Members

Ian Slater

Team Members

Chloe Atkinson2022-10-21T14:27:06+01:00

Meet The Team

Ian Slater

MSc

Ian is an experienced toxicology Study Director and Study Monitor with expertise in GLP and non-GLP toxicology studies across diverse therapy areas.  He has extensive experience in working with CROs gained during his more than 20 years at AstraZeneca.  Ian was Chair of the Study Director Workshop of the British Toxicology Society from 2011-2015, providing a forum for the sharing of good practice and supporting the development of junior toxicologists.  Ian is a practical and pragmatic toxicologist who brings his wealth of experience to the design, conduct, delivery and reporting of toxicology studies.

Richard Knight

Guy Healing

Nonclinical Study Monitoring

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Björn Dahl

Björn Dahl

Team Members

Björn Dahl

Team Members

Chloe Atkinson2022-10-21T14:29:54+01:00

Meet The Team

Björn Dahl

PhD ERT

Björn is a very experienced toxicologist with  25 years of discovery and development  experience gained in AstraZeneca.  Björn has worked across multiple therapy areas and has particular experience in the Cardiovascular, Renal and Metabolism therapy areas.  He has been directly involved in bringing over 30 new candidate drugs to clinical trials and 4 to marketing approval.  Björn was co-chair of the EFPIA Preclinical Development Expert Working Group until 2018 and was EFPIA topic lead on the ICH Expert Working Group on nonclinical safety testing of paediatric medicines.  Björn brings his judgement, wisdom and problem-solving skills to the design and delivery of nonclinical strategies.

Steffen Ernst

Richard Knight

Claire Sadler

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Steffen Ernst

Steffen Ernst

Team Members

Steffen Ernst

Team Members

Chloe Atkinson2022-10-21T14:32:02+01:00

Meet The Team

Dr Steffen Ernst

MD PhD MBA DABT ERT(BTS)

Steffen is an experienced discovery toxicologist and patient safety physician with over 20 years of experience in drug safety gained with Hoechst-Schering, Boehringer-Ingelheim, AstraZeneca, Pfizer and Ipsen.  He has been directly involved in bringing over 30 new candidate drugs to clinical trials and 5 to marketing approval.  Steffen is the European Review Editor of the Journal of Applied Toxicology (Wiley). Black belt trained in Lean Sigma, Steffen recently gained an MBA from Heriot Watt University in Edinburgh.  Steffen brings his expertise from working in both nonclinical and clinical roles to offer pragmatic and strategic input to projects.

Richard Knight

Björn Dahl

Claire Sadler

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Phumzile Sikakana

Phumzile Sikakana

Team Members

Phumzile Sikakana

Team Members

Chloe Atkinson2022-10-21T14:43:46+01:00

Meet The Team

Phumzile Sikakana

MSc

Phum studied Biomedical Sciences at Cardiff University before completing her Master’s degree at Sheffield University in 2018 where she received a distinction.   A keen sports woman, Phum swam for Yorkshire until she was 16 and played rugby at Cardiff.  Phum was a recent recipient of a EUROTOX travel fellowship to attend the 2019 Gordon Conference where her talk was selected for platform presentation.  As an internet native, Phum brings a fresh approach to the ApconiX team and is focusing on learning all about molecular toxicology, target safety assessments and discovery toxicology.

Ruth Roberts

James Sidaway

Target Safety Assessments

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Karen Jones

Karen Jones

Team Members

Karen Jones

Team Members

Chloe Atkinson2023-04-24T12:04:40+01:00

Meet The Team

Dr Karen Jones

PhD

Karen is a Senior Research Scientist with over 10 years experience in the pharmaceutical industry within the early drug discovery setting. Karen’s area of expertise is in the development of Ion Channel and GPCR assays which are used for compound screening in various formats from small scale bespoke experiments up to large scale fully automated screens.  Karen is skilled at problem solving and has a proven track record of delivery with difficult targets leading to publications in peer reviewed journals.

Michael Morton

Kim Rockley

Ion Channel Screening

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Guy Healing

Guy Healing

Team Members

Guy Healing

Team Members

Chloe Atkinson2022-10-21T15:01:37+01:00

Meet The Team

Dr Guy Healing

PhD, ERT, FBTS

Guy is an experienced senior toxicologist with expertise in general toxicology and the safety assessment of pharmaceuticals.  As a manager of pre-clinical Study Monitors and Study Directors, he is  an expert in study design, conduct and reporting. He has excellent interim management skills developed over 20 years in managing teams in a complex global environment. He has served on the BTS Executive Committee for 10 years, is a member of the Panel for the UK Register of Toxicologists and has over 40 publications in peer reviewed journals.   Guy brings a pragmatic and collaborative approach to designing and delivering nonclinical studies to time, quality and cost.

Ian Slater

Richard Knight

Nonclinical Study Monitoring

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Claire Sadler

Claire Sadler

Team Members

Claire Sadler

Team Members

Chloe Atkinson2023-10-19T16:09:09+01:00

Meet The Team

Dr Claire Sadler

PhD

Claire is an experienced project toxicologist and former Director of Discovery Safety within AstraZeneca.  Claire specialises in early project safety assessment, identifying and mitigating risks from target identification through to early clinical trials.  She has worked across multiple therapy areas including oncology, infection, immune and cardiovascular, and on many drug platforms including small molecules, proteins and novel platforms.  She has been directly involved in bringing many candidate drugs to clinical trial, submitted through different territory regulatory agencies.  She has a proven track record in problem solving and in investigational cellular and molecular toxicology.  She is expert in designing and implementing bespoke safety packages and in developing strategies to drive compound design and selection.

Jane Barber

Phumzile Sikakana

Target Safety Assessments

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Michael Morton

Michael Morton

Team Members

Michael Morton

Team Members

Chloe Atkinson2022-10-21T15:04:49+01:00

Meet The Team

Dr Michael Morton

PhD

A co-founder of ApconiX, Mike is an expert electrophysiologist and ion channel biologist with extensive experience gained in academia and industry.  Mike’s career has spanned pure research, ion channel assay development and large-scale screening of all manner of ligand- and voltage-gated ion channels.  Mike learned his craft as a postdoctoral fellow first at Leeds (with Malcolm Hunter) then at Yale (with Fred Sigworth) before joining the global ion channel initiative at AstraZeneca where his skills were applied to drug projects.  Mike has a serious passion for ion channels and enjoys working with collaborators and clients alike to ensure the highest quality data are used to support better decision-making.

Ruth Roberts

Richard Knight

Ion Channel Screening

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