Melanie joined NIBSC in 2007, and is a Senior Scientist in the Endocrinology section. She has over 10 years’ experience in the development of WHO International Standards for protein hormones and endocrine products and the application of biological and immunological assays for their measurement. Melanie is currently leading projects to develop International Standards for human insulin and anti-thyroid peroxidase antibodies.
Melanie studied at Cardiff University, where she also completed her PhD in 2007 in Molecular Virology with a project investigating the Natural Killer cell immune evasion functions of Human Cytomegalovirus. Melanie’s research interests at NIBSC are centred around investigating the safety and efficacy of stem cells, including pluripotent stem cells (iPSC and hESC) and mesenchymal stem cells (MSC). Previous projects have involved investigating the differentiation of pluripotent stem cells to the pancreatic lineage and the regulation of this process (gene and miRNA expression), and current work is focussed on investigating the impact of stem cells on the immune system, specifically the immunogenicity of iPSC derivatives and immunomodulation by MSCs.