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Profile – Professor Fiona Ducotterd, ARUK Drug Discovery Institute

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04/05/2025

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Professor Fiona Ducotterd

Name:

Professor Fiona Ducotterd

Job Title:

Chief Scientific Officer

Place of work / study:

ARUK Drug Discovery Institute, University College London

Area of Research:

My group translates novel disease biology into drug discovery projects for dementia.

How is your work funded:

Alzheimer’s Research UK core grant funds the drug discovery team, infrastructure and portfolio and some projects are funded by additional specific grants from, e.g. LifeArc-UKDRI, UKDRI, MRC.

Tell us a little about yourself:

I am Chief Scientific Officer at the Alzheimer’s Research UK UCL Drug Discovery Institute (UDDI). Prior to this role in academia, I spent >20 years working in industry (e.g. MSD, GSK, Eisai, Vertex) in the UK, USA, Japan and China in drug discovery and development, business development and strategic alliances in industry. I trained as an electrophysiologist and then worked on a range of putative drug targets from validation through to regulatory filing as a bench scientist, project leader and group leader. I now lead a biotech-like team of 24 multidisciplinary scientists discovering new medicines for neurodegenerative diseases in partnership with leading academic innovators, industry alliances and spin out companies to translate cutting edge emerging disease biology into drug discovery projects.

Drug discovery is a team sport and I enjoy building diverse and multidisciplinary teams to take on challenging projects. I have a BSc in Molecular Biology from the University of Edinburgh and a PhD in Neuroscience from the University of Newcastle and have a 3 year old daughter, Isla and hearing dog, Yuna. When I was doing my first industry job working on the first generation of possible disease modifying treatments for Alzheimer’s, my Granny was living with Alzheimer’s. Seeing my Granny suffer and meeting so many other patients and families in my work inspires me to focus on the toughest questions and be bold in my research to end the suffering dementia causes for future generations.

Tell us a fun fact about yourself:

I’m scared of the dark.

Why did you choose to work in dementia:

My Granny had dementia. That personal link of my work to patients is highly motivating and there is a lot still to discovery that will help patients and families in the future.