Portraits of the pandemic: celebrating CIR scientists in the College COVID-19 response
December 2020: Three members of the Centre feature in new portraits celebrating the response of the College of Medicine and Veterinary Medicine (CMVM) to the pandemic.
Kenny Baillie, Kev Dhaliwal and Jennifer Marshall were photographed to represent researchers working towards COVID-19 treatments, clinical staff operating COVID-19 research trials, and research assistants aiding in the setup of Containment Level 3 labs respectively.
Working with Edinburgh-based photographer Laurence Winram, the College commissioned 13 portraits to shine a spotlight on the massive team effort behind this response – from clinical, research, teaching, technical and professional services.
The individuals highlighted represent staff and students who have worked tirelessly throughout the lockdown and beyond in response to this unprecedented challenge. The portraits are bound for display in the Elsie Inglis lounge in the Chancellor’s Building shortly.
Kenneth Baillie
Kenny is an Intensive Care Consultant and Senior Clinical Research Fellow.
He leads a research programme across the UK to understand the new disease and to find genetic determinants of critical illness. He also helped steer the RECOVERY trial, the UK’s flagship clinical trial for testing potential COVID-19 treatments, and contributed to the discovery of the first effective treatment for life-threatening COVID-19, dexamethasone. Kenny also supervises both undergraduate and postgraduate students and lectures current students.
Kenny represents our researchers and clinical staff working to better understand Covid-19 and trial new treatments.
Kev Dhaliwal
Kev is Chair of Molecular Imaging and Healthcare Technology and an Honorary Consultant in Respiratory Medicine. He established an interdisciplinary team from the Centre for Inflammation Research with other universities and industry, who were re-deployed to work on the STOPCOVID project. The initiative aims to test existing and experimental drugs to find potential treatments for COVID-19.
Kev represents our researchers and professional staff working to identify COVID-19 treatments.
Jennifer Marshall
Jennifer is a Research Assistant interested in infectious diseases, working in Professor David Dockrell’s research group.
Since the COVID-19 pandemic started, Jennifer has been involved in the set-up of the new containment level 3 laboratory on the Edinburgh Bioquarter campus. This new facility enables researchers to work on pathogens that have higher health and safety requirements, including work on SARS-CoV-2, the causative agent of the current coronavirus pandemic.