The University of Glasgow has welcomed two new appointments to senior positions within the College of Medical, Veterinary & Life Sciences (MVLS).

Professor Massimo Pignatelli has been appointed Head of the School of Medicine and Professor Rhian Touyz has been appointed Director of the Institute of Cardiovascular & Medical Sciences.

Prof Pignatelli joins from the University of Bristol where he was Professor of Histopathology and Head of the Department of Clinical Sciences.

Prof Touyz joins from the Kidney Research Centre, Ottawa Hospital Research Institute (OHRI) where she is Canada Research Chair in Hypertension and Senior Scientist and Professor of Medicine. She will take up her role in November.

Professor Anna Dominiczak, Head of MVLS, said: “On behalf of all my colleagues in MVLS I would like to extend my warmest welcome to Profs Pignatelli and Touyz.

“These are two very prestigious appointments and I am confident that they will bring a huge amount of experience and expertise to the College and University. I am not alone in looking forward to working with them in the coming months.”

Prof Pignatelli said: “It is an enormous privilege to be appointed Head of the School of Medicine at Glasgow. It is one of the largest and most prestigious Medical Schools in Europe and I will ensure the School plays a full role in the delivery of the College of Medical, Veterinary and Life Sciences’ and the overall University’s strategy with particular emphasis on excellence, partnership and collaboration in education and research”.

Prof Touyz said: “I am delighted to be joining the outstanding research and clinical groups at the Institute of Cardiovascular & Medical Sciences to lead research at the forefront in the pursuit of knowledge and scientific discovery.

“I am committed to ensuring the success and future growth of the Institute through continued support of researchers, recruitment of the top scientists, training of the next generation of cardiovascular researchers, promoting internationalisation and facilitating inter-institutional networking.”

Prof Pignatelli graduated from the University of Bologna and is a Council Member and Secretary of the European Association of Pathology Chairs and Programme Directors and Chair of the World Cancer Research Advisory Research Panel.

During his time at Bristol University he was also Head of the new Department of Clinical Sciences (2004-2010) following the restructuring and reorganisation of the former department of clinical medicine.  He was Head of the Postgraduate School of Pathology (2007-2010) and Clinical Lead for Histopathology (2000-2003) and Laboratory Medicine (2006-2009).  

His research is focused on epithelial adhesion molecules and particularly their exploitation as biomarkers for tissue diagnosis, prognosis and response to treatment.

Prof Touyz graduated from the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa and completed a post-doctoral fellowship at the Clinical Research Institute of Montreal, Quebec, Canada.

She is a Senior Scientist at the OHRI and professor of medicine in the Division of Nephrology and has received numerous academic and research awards.
Prof Touyz has published over 260 original papers and is Associate Editor of Clinical Science and the Journal of the American Society of Hypertension and she is on the editorial board of numerous specialty journals. She is the 2012 in-coming Editor-in-Chief of Clinical Science.

She is also the Chair of the Council for High Blood Pressure Research of the American Heart Association, she co-chairs the Recommendations Task Force of the Canadian Hypertension Education Program, is the Secretary and Executive Member of the International Society of Hypertension, the Scientific Officer of the Cardiovascular committees at the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) and the Heart and Stroke Foundation of Canada (HSFC), among others.

Prof Touyz’s main areas of research relates to molecular, cellular and vascular mechanisms of hypertension. As a clinician-scientist she has a particular interest in translational research.

For more information contact Stuart Forsyth on 0141 330 4831 or stuart.forsyth@glasgow.ac.uk

First published: 23 May 2011

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