Charles ffrench-Constant is a clinician-scientist who graduated from Cambridge in 1980. Following further clinical and scientific training at the Hammersmith hospital, UCL, MIT and Cambridge, he started his independent research career in 1991 as a Wellcome Trust Senior Fellow and Consultant in Genetics at Cambridge, becoming Chair in Neurological Genetics in 1999.
He moved to Edinburgh in 2008 to establish the Multiple Sclerosis Research Centre, progressing over the next 12 years to Directorships of the MRC Centre for Regenerative Medicine, Edinburgh Neuroscience, the Wellcome Trust PhD Programme in Translational Neuroscience and Dean of Research for the College of Medicine. He is an experienced grant panel chair having previously chaired the committees of four major charities and the Wellcome Trust’s Molecular and Cellular Neuroscience expert review group.
His research, funded by a Wellcome Senior Investigator Award, focuses on the biology of myelin formation and repair in the brain with the aim of discovering novel therapies in multiple sclerosis. He has trained many postdocs and students, 13 of whom now run their own labs in Europe or the US.
He was elected FMedSci in 2017, FRSE in 2018 and was awarded the Chancellor’s Award for Research by Edinburgh in 2019.
He moved in 2021 to become the Pro-Vice-Chancellor for Medicine and Health Sciences at the University of East Anglia.