Professor Louise Kenny CBE, Executive Pro-Vice-Chancellor Faculty of Health and Life Sciences at the University of Liverpool, has been announced as the new Chair of the MRC Population and Systems Medicine (PSMB) Board.
As Chair, Louise will play a key role in delivering MRC objectives across the portfolio. She will begin her secondment at the MRC from April 2024 alongside her current role at the University.
Louise is widely regarded as one of the world’s leading experts on hypertensive disorders of pregnancy and she has published over 300 papers, reviews and book chapters on both the short and long term sequalae of these disorders in mothers and infants, applying a range of methodologies.
The work of Louise’s group has translated from the bench to clinical practice and has led to changes in guidelines both nationally and internationally. Following her move back to the University of Liverpool in 2018, Louise established the Wellcome Trust funded programme Children Growing up in Liverpool (C-GULL), a new birth cohort, the first of its kind in Liverpool and the first new cohort in the UK for over a decade.
She has received numerous awards for her work; most recently she was elected a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in the 2022 New Year Honours for services to research in the NHS.
Commenting on the appointment, Professor Kenny said: “I’m delighted to join the Board of Population and Systems Medicine at the MRC. The remit of this Board covers some of the most pressing and intractable health challenges at the level of molecule through to the metropolis. I am looking forward to working with the Board members and my new colleagues at the MRC to support our scientific community in addressing these issues.”