People

Francesco A. Aprile

Principal Investigator

Francesco is a Lecturer in Chemistry and UKRI Future Leaders Fellow. He obtained his PhD from the University of Milano-Bicocca (Italy) and was previously a Senior Research Fellow of the Alzheimer’s Society in the Department of Chemistry at the University of Cambridge.

Siân Allerton

PhD Student

I carried out my undergraduate degree in chemistry at Durham University and in my final year I completed an external masters project as part of the Koksch Group at the Freie Universität Berlin. There I focussed on the use of synthetic peptides as effective cell culture platforms. Now, as a member of the Aprile Group, I am looking into the structural and pathological consequences of alpha-synuclein/lipid membrane interactions.

Nicole Christou

PhD Student

Nicole joined the group in January 2021 as part of the MRes/PhD program from the Institute of Chemical Biology. Her project focuses on the role of pathological post-translational modifications on the function and druggability of amyloid-beta oligomers in Alzheimer’s disease at both structural and single-molecule levels. She is co-supervised by Prof Ramon Vilar (Chemistry) and Dr Liming Ying (Medicine).

Ying Ge

Research Associate

Ying completed her BSc and PhD in biochemistry at the University of St Andrews and joined the Arpile group as a post-doctoral research associate in Jan 2021. She is interested in post-translational modifications (PTMs) in amyloid proteins and antibody discovery.

Xiaotong (Erin) Lin

PhD Student

Erin joined the group in Oct 2021 where she completed her MRes in Chemical biology and bio-entrepreneurship. She completed her BSc in Chemistry at King's College London. Her current project focuses on probing Amyloid-β peptide in Alzheimer's disease. Her project is co-supervised by Professor Ramon Vilar.

Benedict Moss

MSci Student

Ben is in his final year of an MSci Chemistry with Medicinal Chemistry degree. His project focuses on the effects of different post-translational modifications on the aggregation of the amyloid beta 42 peptide

Rebecca Thrush

PhD Student

I completed my undergraduate degree at the University of Cambridge including a masters within the Centre for Misfolding Diseases under the super vision of Dr Janet Kumita. I am now studying for my PhD as part of the Aprile group at Imperial College London, investigating N-terminal post-translational modifications of alpha-synuclein and their role in Parkinson’s disease.

Devkee Vadukul

Research Associate

Devkee joined the group in 2020 and works primarily on protein misfolding and amyloid formation. Her current project focusses on heterogenous protein aggregation in neurodegenerative diseases.

Former Group Members

2021-2022 Alexandra Yendrzheyevskiy (MRes student)
2021-2022 Claudia Lambert (MRes student)
2019-2022 Dimitra Gialama (Research Associate)
2021-2022 Athina Masoura (MSci Chemistry)
2019-2022 Yiyun Jin (Research Assistant)
2021 Jingzhou Yang (UROP)
2021 Nicole Christou (MRes in Biological and Physical Chemistry)
2020-2021 Joe White (MSci Chemistry)
2019-2020 Michelle Simon (MRes in Drug Discovery and Development)
2017-2019 Shianne Chhangur