Professor Adam Benham

Director of PG Studies

Affiliations
Affiliation	Telephone
Director of PG Studies in the Department of Biosciences	+44 (0) 191 33 41259

Biography

I graduated from St. Catherine's College, Oxford, with first class honours in Biochemistry and obtained my PhD in transplantation immunology with Prof. John Fabre at the Institute of Child Health, University College, London. I received an EU postdoctoral fellowship to study the biochemistry of antigen presentation with Prof. Jacques Neefjes at the Netherlands Cancer Institute in Amsterdam and then joined Prof. Ineke Braakman's laboratory at Utrecht University, Netherlands, to research mechanisms of protein quality control in the endoplasmic reticulum (ER).

Since establishing my laboratory at Durham University, I have been investigating both the quality control of proteins involved in antigen presentation and the machinery that controls oxidative protein folding in various cells and tissues. My laboratory is particularly interested in how these fundamentally important biological pathways underpin human and animal health. For example, we have discovered a novel member of the Protein Disulfide Isomerase (PDI) family called PDILT that is required for sperm:egg binding (in collaboration with Osaka University, Japan). This work may lead to the development of new tests and cures for unexplained male infertility and has been covered extensively by the media. We are also working with colleagues at UNIFESP-EPM, Sao Paulo, to understand the role of the PDI family in the development and function of the male epididymis.

Our work on immune molecules (the Major Histocompatibility Complex, MHC) seeks to explain how these proteins are loaded with their peptide cargo and how oxidative protein folding and ER chaperones contribute to their quality control. This has applications in understanding neoantigen presentation and in the design of cancer vaccines. In BBSRC funded work, we are working with Scancell, Nottingham and Liverpool University to determine the trafficking of MHC-neoantigen complexes.

Other studies in my laboratory have revealed links between the ER quality control machinery and gastrointestinal disease (in collaboration with clinical colleagues at James Cook University Hospital, Middlesbrough). We are also harnessing new microscopy and quantitative proteomics technologies (SWATH) to explore the biology of proteostasis and stress responses in the skin (in collaboration with P&G), including extracellular matrix proteins such as collagen, and pigment trafficking in melanocytes.

Alongside my research activities, I am Postgraduate Director for the Department of Biosciences, academic lead for the Departmental mass spectrometry provison, module co-ordinator for undergraduate Level 2 Immune Systems and contributer to Biology of Disease undergrauate teaching at Level 3. I am on the editorial board of the journals "Antioxidants and Redox Signaling" and "Biology Direct" and I serve on the Biochemical Society Training Theme Panel. I have been appointed as an external examiner for various undergraduate degree courses and postgraduate training programmes.

My research has been funded by the BBSRC, MRC, Wellcome Trust, Arthritis Research UK, Leverhulme Trust, Royal Society, European Union, JGWP Foundation, IBM and FAPESP (Brazil) and the support of these organisations is gratefully acknowledged.

A selection of our peer-reviewed research publications can be found below.