Our Research Committee helps us decide which research projects to fund during our grant rounds. They also help us with advice and knowledge on the wider medical and research landscape, to help us do what’s best for people affected by alopecia. As we are members of the Association of Medical Research Charities (AMRC), we follow their guidelines on Expert Review, which means that our funding processes are up to widely recognised high standards. This gives our community the confidence that money donated to our charity is being put to good use, and that it goes directly towards finding ways to improve the lives of those affected by alopecia.

These guidelines state that the experts on our Research Committee must have term limits, meaning fresh ideas and perspectives are given the chance to shine through in how our charity approaches research. This year, this has meant we have had to part ways with three committee members who had been serving since the Research Committee was created, back in 2018:

• Professor Simon Milling, who served as Chair of the committee, and has investigated (and continues to investigate) the immunology of alopecia areata in his laboratory at the University of Glasgow. He is succeeded in the role as Chair by Professor Desmond Tobin (see the announcement from earlier this year).

• Dr Abby Macbeth, who was one of the leading figures in establishing the priorities for alopecia research during the Priority Settings Partnership, facilitated by the James Lind Alliance, back in 2014-15.  

• Professor Fiona Henriquez-Mui, who is an expert in Parasitology and Protistology, and supervised a PhD project on immune cells in alopecia areata. This project was funded by Autoimmune Alopecia Research UK (AAR-UK), which later merged with Alopecia UK.

We are very grateful to all three for helping us grow the charity’s involvement in research over the years.

New committee members

It also means we have the chance to welcome three new people into this committee. We are looking forward to hearing their perspectives, and welcoming their contributions, to help us achieve better care, and more research, for people with alopecia.

• Dr Susan Holmes is a Consultant Dermatologist based in Glasgow. She developed an interest in alopecia as a trainee, working with Professor Colin Munro on the genetics of monilethrix. Susan established an alopecia clinic in Glasgow in 1999 and has a longstanding interest and involvement in alopecia research. She is an Honorary Associate Clinical Professor with the University of Glasgow in recognition of this work.

• Professor Clare Bennett is an immunologist, based at University College London, with a track record of investigating how immune cells in our skin develop and function. She is particularly interested in understanding how diseases in the skin can affect the ability of the skin immune system to protect us from infection. Professor Bennett currently sits on national and international grant funding panels and is an active member of the British Society for Immunology.

• Dr Claire Higgins is a Reader (equivalent to an Associate Professor) in the Department of Bioengineering at Imperial College London. She is also the Principal Investigator of the ‘Skin Regeneration Laboratory’ who use interdisciplinary approaches to improve our holistic understanding of skin and hair, both in homeostasis conditions and after disease or injury. She is the President of the European Hair Research Society, and Vice-President of the Institute of Trichologists. In 2023, she organised the European Hair Research Society annual meeting in Sheffield, which was attended by >200 people from 30 different countries.

We welcome the new members and aim to get them involved early doors as we plan to launch our new research strategy later this year… Stay tuned!

To view profiles of the full Research Committee, see this page.