News

Chicks hatch clue on life-saving therapy for preterm babies

5 June 2020

Scientists at the University of Cambridge have suggested that subtle changes to the drugs administered to mothers threatened with preterm birth or to premature babies could further improve clinical treatment and help increase their safety. While the current practice of using glucocorticoid therapy shows life-saving...

Professor Wolf Reik FRS appointed Acting Director of the Babraham Institute

28 May 2020

Professor Wolf Reik has been appointed the Babraham Institute's Acting Director with immediate effect, following the sad loss of Professor Michael Wakelam at the end of March. Professor Reik is an internationally renowned expert in the field of epigenetics and has led the Institute's Epigenetics research programme since...

Professor Wolf Reik receives an ERC Advanced Grant to study crucial developmental process

6 April 2020

New funding awarded to Professor Wolf Reik will support research into how the epigenetic landscape in early development impacts gastrulation, one of the earliest and most important processes in early development. This knowledge will inform strategies for regenerative medicine based on the use of stem cells, and improve our understanding of how developmental disorders arise in humans.

Graham Burton being presented with the 2019 SRF Distinguished Scientist Award

Graham Burton, Jorge Lopez-Tello and Kate Williams win 2019 SRF awards

24 January 2020

Three members of the Cambridge Reproduction SRI were recognised for the excellence of their research at the 2019 Society for Reproduction & Fertility (SRF) awards. The awards for Professor Graham Burton, Dr Jorge Lopez-Tello and Ms Kate Williams were presented at Fertility 2020, the largest UK educational forum focusing on fertility and reproductive medicine.

Placenta changes could mean male offspring of older mums more likely to develop heart problems in later life, rat study finds

28 November 2019

Changes occur in the placenta in older pregnant mothers leading to a greater likelihood of poor health in their male offspring, a study in rats has shown. Both male and female fetuses do not grow as large in older mothers, but there are sex-specific differences in changes to placental development and function. These are...

'The Hidden Affliction' book launch: photos and videos

21 November 2019

Last week saw the launch of a new multidisciplinary collection of essays about the relationship between the 'historic' sexually transmitted infections - gonorrhoea, chlamydia, and syphilis - and infertility. The Hidden Affliction: sexually transmitted infections and infertility in history (University of Rochester Press...

£10 million Human Developmental Biology Initiative announced

13 August 2019

Researchers from the Babraham Institute and the Gurdon Institute will contribute to a world-first research project that will unravel how human embryos develop in the first weeks and months after fertilisation, improving our understanding of fertility, birth defects and regenerative medicine . The £10 million Wellcome-...

Smoking and pre-eclampsia may cause fertility problems for offspring, study suggests

23 April 2019

Collaborative studies between research groups at the Department of Physiology Development and Neuroscience and Professor Sue Ozanne's in the Clinical School have yielded a paper published in FASEB J which has also had press interest.

Inaugural Event: SRI Reproduction

27 February 2019

The new SRI in Reproduction was officially launched on Friday 8 December 2018 in the Pitt Building. Around 100 academics from across all the disciplines gathered for a program of presentations and talks on the topic of reproduction.

Dr. Yuliya Hilevych discusses The Barton Clinic on Woman's Hour

26 February 2019

Cambridge scholar and fertility historian Dr Yuliya Hilevych was on BBC Woman's Hour this week discussing 'Mary’s Babies', a fictional play based on the true story of Mary Barton, a fertility treatment pioneer who set up a ground-breaking fertility clinic in London alongside her husband in the 1930s. The real clinic’s...