 | ||
 | ||
|
Prof Sam Moore
Prof SW Moore has been the head of the Paediatric Surgery Division at the University of Stellenbosch since his appointment in 1991. He has a long standing interest in a number of research fields, more particularly in Hirschsprungs disease (congenital Aganglionosis), as well as the MEN2 syndromes and congenital cancers and tumours.
Following qualification as a Medical practitioner at the University of Cape Town and a stint of training in the UK, he returned to Durban in KZN to complete his surgical studies. A period of rural medicine in Lesotho followed where he was one of only 2 qualified surgeons in that country, eventually serving on the Medical and Dental council and chairman of the private Health Association of Lesotho. His return to Cape Town necessitated a period at the Red Cross children’s hospital, as well as Doctoral studies before transferring to the University of Stellenbosch Medical faculty at Tygerberg in 1991. He has published widely in these and other areas being the author of more than 150 publications, the majority of which are as first or senior author. Among many other things he was chairman of the “thinktank” into restructuring the genetic services at Tygerberg and the subsequent establishment of GENRED (the centre for Genetic Research and Education) His interest and involvement in clinical and laboratory genetics started during his Doctoral studies at the University of Cape Town, due to the observed familial nature of certain patients with Hirschsprungs disease. Professor Moore has had a long fruitful working relationship with Prof M Zaahl in the areas of Hirschsprungs disease and the MEN2 syndromes. His initial project documented familial associations and collected DNA samples from known patients followed up all around the country. This material was then available when the link to the RET proto-oncogene was identified in 1992 and formed more than a third of the samples initially studied by Romeo et al. The association of RET with the MEN2 syndromes started about the same time. Other gene profiles investigated include the Endothelin B receptor, the CD18 gene and SOD-1 genes etc. He also has a long standing association with the molecular biology of the acetylcholinesterase molecule where he has collaborated with Dr Glynnis Johnson over many years. Dr. Kathryn Robson
Kathryn Robson graduated from University College London in 1976 with an honours degree in Biochemistry. She obtained her PhD from University College London in 1979 entitled “The molecular basis of antigenic variation of foot-and-mouth disease virus” under the supervision of Professor Fred Brown FRS. This led to postdoctoral work at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston with Professor Savio Woo, where she cloned the phenylalanine hydroxylase gene and was also involved in cloning the genes for amelogenin and α1 anti-chymotrypsin.
She joined Professor Sir David Weatherall’s group in Oxford in 1983 where she started working on the genetics of the malaria parasite Plasmodium falciparum. Her group has cloned and sequenced a number of malaria genes, one of which is currently undergoing vaccine trials. In the mid-1990s she developed an interest in the inherited disorder of iron overload, haemochromatosis. For the last 15 or so years this has been the focus of her research interest. More recently she has gained experience in health and safety issues, as well as tissue regulation and associated governance matters. She is also a scientific advisor to the Haemochromatosis Society and is a fellow of the Royal College of Pathologists. Dr. Armand Peeters
Dr. Armand Peeters obtained an Honours degree in Biology at the University of Antwerp (Belgium) in 1991 for a study on the molecular basis of Familial Hypercholesterolemia (FH). Armand went to South Africa in 1993 to study FH at Tygerberg Medical School (University of Stellenbosch), graduated with a Master's degree in 1994 and continued his research on FH with a PhD study.
While working on his PhD, Armand was appointed as lecturer in the Genetics department of the University of Stellenbosch in 1996 and he graduated with his doctorate in 1997. Besides lecturing to BSc. and medical students, his research interests in the Genetics department were focused on genetically modifying crop plants. He started collaborating with the Department of Plant Genetics of the University of Ghent (Belgium) on the genetic engineering of antibodies in plants (“plantibodies”). Dr. Peeters relocated with his family back to Belgium in 2002, where he held a postdoctoral fellowship at the Catholic University of Louvain to study Alzheimer's disease. In 2003, his career came full circle when he started a postdoctoral fellowship in the Center for Medical Genetics of the University of Antwerp, the lab where he had started his Honours study. He has been investigating genetic risk factors for obesity for over six years, until he recently decided to apply his 15-plus years of genotyping experience to the treatment of chronic diseases. Dr. Peeters is currently establishing a molecular diagnostic company that specializes in pharmacogenetic testing. | ||
|
