New role to support joint research between Cardiff University and Cardiff and Vale University Health Board

A new role to support joint research between Cardiff University and Cardiff and Vale University Health Board has been announced.

Professor Colin Dayan has been appointed as Director of the Joint Research Office, a new venture between the two organisations to support a joint approach to the development and delivery of human-based research.

“The role will support all of our staff in developing and running a research portfolio including, for example, development of study proposals and grant applications, ​expanding commercial trials portfolios and building collaborative research teams between the University and the UHB,” said a joint statement from Professor Ian Weeks, Pro-Vice Chancellor and Head of the University’s College of Biomedical and Life Sciences, and Dr Stuart Walker, Executive Medical Director at Cardiff and Vale UHB.

“Strong clinical leadership will be essential for this venture and as such we are delighted to have someone of Colin’s standing taking on that leadership role.”

Professor Dayan trained in medicine at University College, Oxford, and Guy’s and Charing Cross Hospitals in London, before a PhD in the immunology of Graves’ Disease. He became a consultant senior lecturer in medicine (diabetes/endocrinology) at the University of Bristol in 1995 and Head of Clinical Research at the Henry Wellcome Laboratories for Integrative Neuroscience and Endocrinology in Bristol in 2002.

In 2010, he was appointed to the Chair of Clinical Diabetes and Metabolism and Head of Section at Cardiff University’s School of Medicine. He served as Director of the Institute of Molecular and Experimental Medicine from 2011 to 2015.

Professor Dayan has been the University Hospital of Wales’s Grand Round Chair since 2015 and continues to practice acute and ward-based internal medicine. He is the lead for diabetes in the Cardiff whole pancreas transplantation programme and continues to pursue a very active research programme in the immunotherapy of Type 1 Diabetes.

“This is a very exciting opportunity to create an internationally competitive clinical research environment in Cardiff,” he said.

“Success will bring benefits to all of our staff as well as our patients.”

The new role will be sited in the Lakeside offices at the University Hospital of Wales campus and will start in the new year.