Holly Gregory
Research Fellow
Holly is a Research Fellow at the UCL School of Pharmacy, investigating the delivery of drugs and growth factors to the central and peripheral nervous systems via synthetic biomaterials. She has particular expertise in local delivery of neurotrophic/immunosuppressive therapeutics from microparticles and orientated fibrous scaffolds.
Current projects:
1. Microparticle pre-coating for controlled local delivery of tacrolimus to enable nerve allograft transplantation
This project is designed to formulate an immunosuppressive coating for allogeneic nerve grafts, so they can be transplanted into nerve injured patients without the requirement for lengthy systemic administration of anti-rejection drugs.
2. Local immunosuppression to improve the welfare of animals in neural transplantation experiments
This work aims to formulate and co-administer immunosuppressive microparticles alongside human-derived therapeutic cells into the rat brain, used in models of neurodegenerative disease, so that these laboratory animals do not have to undergo daily injections of tacrolimus/cyclosporine to prevent rejection of the xenogeneic cells.
Previous experience
Holly undertook her PhD between 2018-2023 in the Phillips Lab, where she was funded by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council in the Centre for Doctoral Training in Advanced Therapeutics and Nanomedicines. She researched the development of drug-eluting, micro-structured biomaterials fabricated by electrospinning – thesis title ‘Nanofibrous biomaterials with encapsulated therapeutics and aligned architecture for peripheral nerve regeneration’. During this period Holly was also employed as a Research Assistant, working across various translational projects in drug delivery to peripheral nerve, as a Research Consultant at P&G, where she worked on optimisation of in vitro models of neuronal degeneration using 3D cell culture, and as an undergraduate Laboratory Demonstrator.
Prior to joining UCL, Holly obtained a First Class Masters in Chemistry (MChem) from the University of Sheffield where she undertook an integrated Year in Industry placement in materials science.
Contact – [email protected]
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2243-8201