Συνεδρία υποδοχής του Καθηγητή κ. Peter John Barnes ως Ξένου Εταίρου της Ακαδημίας Αθηνών, Τετάρτη 7 Δεκεμβρίου 2022 και ώρα 19:00

Την Τετάρτη 7 Δεκεμβρίου 2022 και ώρα 19.00 θα μεταδοθεί ζωντανά η συνεδρία υποδοχής του κ. Peter John Barnes, Καθηγητή Πνευμονολογίας στο Imperial College του Λονδίνου, ως Ξένου Εταίρου της Ακαδημίας Αθηνών.

Κατά τη διάρκεια της τελετής υποδοχής, ο Ακαδημαϊκός κ. Χαράλαμπος Ρούσσος θα παρουσιάσει τον Καθηγητή κ. Peter John Barnes, ο οποίος ακολούθως θα εκφωνήσει ομιλία με θέμα “Can we reverse age-related diseases to prolong healthy life?”.

Ακολουθεί σύντομη περίληψη της ομιλίας και το βιογραφικό σημείωμα του ομιλητή.

Abstract:

Humans have long searched for the elusive elixir of life. Accelerated ageing is now recognised as a key mechanism of many age-related diseases, including chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), now the third ranked cause of death in the world. I will use COPD to illustrate how understanding premature ageing may lead to new treatments that may even reverse the ageing process and prolong healthspan. Many elderly people suffer from several age-related diseases (multimorbidity of the elderly), which is a major drain on healthcare costs. This is because there are common molecular pathways involved in age-related diseases, leading to the accumulation of senescent cells, which are sometimes described as “zombie” cells. Senescence spreads from cell to cell, resulting in disease progression but also spreads through the circulation to other organs accounting for multimorbidity. We have shown that small vesicles released from senescent cells can induce senescence in normal cells. Novel drugs that selectively kill senescent cells (senolytic therapies) can reverse age-related disease in animals and clinical trials are now beginning, with the hope of reducing progression and potentially reversing age-related diseases.

Professor Peter J. Barnes DM, DSc, FRCP, FCCP, FMedSci, FRS

Peter Barnes is Professor of Thoracic Medicine at the National Heart and Lung Institute, and was Head of Respiratory Medicine at Imperial College 1987-2017 and Honorary Consultant Physician at Royal Brompton Hospital, London. He qualified at Cambridge and Oxford Universities (first class honours). He has published >1500 peer-review papers on asthma, COPD and related topics and has written or edited over 50 books. His research has focused on cellular and molecular mechanisms of asthma and COPD and their treatments He was recently named as in the top 10 most highly cited researchers in the world and has an h-index of >200, with >140,000 citations. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 2007, the first respiratory researcher for over 150 years, a founding fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences, and member of the Academy of Europe. He was elected a Master Fellow of the American College of Chest Physicians and Honorary Fellow of the British Pharmacological Society. He is member of the Scientific Committee of the global guidelines on COPD (GOLD). He also serves on the Editorial Board of over 30 journals and is currently Associate Editor of Journal of COPD Foundation and respiratory Editor of Up-to-Date. He has given several prestigious lectures, including the Amberson Lecture at the American Thoracic Society, the Sadoul Lecture at the European Respiratory Society and the Croonian Lecture at the Royal College of Physicians, London. He has received honorary degrees from the Universities of Ferrara (Italy), Athens (Greece), Tampere (Finland), Leuven (Belgium) and Maastricht (Netherlands). He was President of the ERS 2013/14. He was awarded the Trudeau Medal of the ATS in 2020.