Press release

Royal Society honour for Professor Kate Storey

Published on 10 May 2022

Professor Kate Storey, of the University of Dundee, has been elected a Fellow of the Royal Society (FRS), the world's oldest scientific academy in continuous existence.

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Professor Kate Storey, of the University of Dundee, has been elected a Fellow of the Royal Society (FRS), the world's oldest scientific academy in continuous existence.

Professor Storey is Head of the Division of Cell & Developmental Biology and Chair of Neural Development in the School of Life Sciences at Dundee.

Professor Storey said, “Being made a Fellow of the Royal Society is a major honour for any scientist and I am delighted to join the illustrious list of Fellows.

“We don’t do this work in search of honours – the priority is to make new discoveries and have a positive impact on human health – but it is certainly very nice to receive recognition for the work I have done with many students, post-doctoral researchers and numerous other collaborators over the years.

“Science involves teamwork and I would particularly like to acknowledge my creative working relationship with my research technician Pamela Halley, Dundee born and bred, who worked with me for 21 years and made a great contribution to everything we have achieved so far.”

Research in Professor Storey’s laboratory focusses on early development of the nervous system and her work has uncovered a fundamental signalling mechanism that regulates neural differentiation in vertebrate embryos.

She has also pioneered live tissue-imaging approaches revealing novel mechanisms regulating neural cell behaviour, including a new form of cell sub-division and how progenitors with regenerative potential are set aside in the adult spinal cord. Her work also addresses how neural development is impacted by cellular stress triggered by environmental factors.

Professor Storey is also a Fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences and in 2019 was awarded the Waddington Medal, the only national award in Developmental Biology and which honours outstanding research performance as well as services to the scientific community.

Welcoming this year’s new Fellows, Sir Adrian Smith, President of the Royal Society said, “It is an honour to welcome so many outstanding researchers from around the world into the Fellowship of the Royal Society.

“Through their careers so far, these researchers have helped further our understanding of human disease, biodiversity loss and the origins of the universe. I am also pleased to see so many new Fellows working in areas likely to have a transformative impact on our society over this century, from new materials and energy technologies to synthetic biology and artificial intelligence. I look forward to seeing what great things they will achieve in the years ahead.”

Enquiries

Grant Hill

Senior Public Affairs Officer

+44 (0)1382 384768

G.Hill@dundee.ac.uk