Frances Ashcroft Explained

Honorific Prefix:Dame
Frances Ashcroft
Birth Name:Frances Mary Ashcroft
Birth Date:1952 2, df=y
Nationality:British
Field:Physiology[1]
Education:Talbot Heath School
Alma Mater:University of Cambridge (BA, PhD)
Awards:UNESCO award (2012)
Croonian Lecture (2013)
Thesis Title:Calcium electrogenesis in insect muscle
Thesis Url:http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.448200
Thesis Year:1978

Dame Frances Mary Ashcroft (born 1952) is a British ion channel physiologist.[1] She is Royal Society GlaxoSmithKline Research Professor at the University Laboratory of Physiology at the University of Oxford. She is a fellow of Trinity College, Oxford, and is a director of the Oxford Centre for Gene Function. Her research group has an international reputation for work on insulin secretion, type II diabetes and neonatal diabetes.[2] [3] Her work with Andrew Hattersley has helped enable children born with diabetes to switch from insulin injections to tablet therapy.[4] [5] [6] [7]

Education

Ashcroft was educated at Talbot Heath School and the University of Cambridge where she was awarded a degree in Natural Sciences followed by a PhD in zoology in 1978.[8] [9]

Career and research

Ashcroft then did postdoctoral research at the University of Leicester and the University of California at Los Angeles.[10] Ashcroft is a director of Oxion: Ion Channels and Disease Initiative, a research and training programme on integrative ion channel research, funded by the Wellcome Trust.[11]

Ashcroft's research focuses on ATP-sensitive potassium (KATP)channels and their role in insulin secretion. Ashcroft is working towards explaining how a rise in the blood glucose concentration stimulates the release of insulin from the pancreatic beta-cells, what goes wrong with this process in type 2 diabetes, and how drugs used to treat this condition exert their beneficial effects.[12] Ashcroft has authored a few science and popular science books based on ion channel physiology:

Her work has helped people with neonatal diabetes, a very rare disease, switch from insulin injections to oral drug therapy.[1]

Honours and awards

Ashcroft was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1999.[16] In 2007 Ashcroft was awarded the Walter B. Cannon Award, the highest honour bestowed by the American Physiological Society.[17] She was one of five 2012 winners of the L'Oreal-UNESCO Award for Women in Science.[18]

Ashcroft was awarded an honorary degrees of Doctor of the University from the Open University in 2003 and Doctor of Science from the University of Leicester on 13 July 2007.[9]

Ashcroft was awarded the Croonian Lecture by the Royal Society in 2013.[19]

In the 2015 Birthday Honours, she was appointed a Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire (DBE) 'for services to Medical Science and the Public Understanding of Science'. She was elected a Fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences (FMedSci) in 1999.[20]

A. S. Byatt's novel A Whistling Woman is half dedicated to Ashcroft.[21]

Personal life

Ashcroft appeared (as a diner) on MasterChef during the 2011 series, along with several other Fellows of the Royal Society.

Notes and References

  1. Web site: Women in Physiology. Static.physoc.org. 21 June 2019.
  2. Ashcroft . F. M. . Harrison . D. E. . Ashcroft . S. J. H. . 10.1038/312446a0 . Glucose induces closure of single potassium channels in isolated rat pancreatic β-cells . Nature . 312 . 5993 . 446–448 . 1984 . 6095103. 1984Natur.312..446A . 4340710 .
  3. 10.1016/0079-6107(89)90013-8. Electrophysiology of the pancreatic β-cell. Progress in Biophysics and Molecular Biology. 54. 2. 87–143. 1989. Ashcroft . F. M. . Frances Ashcroft. Rorsman . P. . Patrik Rorsman. 2484976. free.
  4. Ashcroft . F. M. . 10.1146/annurev.ne.11.030188.000525 . Adenosine 5'-Triphosphate-Sensitive Potassium Channels . Annual Review of Neuroscience . 11 . 97–118 . 1988 . 2452599.
  5. Web site: Frances Ashcroft talks to ReAgent about career advice for scientists. reagent.co.uk. 11 June 2014.
  6. Book: The Physiological Society. 2015. Women physiologists : centenary celebrations and beyond. 9780993341007. 922032986. Susan. Wray. Elizabeth. Tilli Tansey. Susan Wray. Tansey. London.
  7. Ashcroft. Frances M.. Frances Ashcroft. Harrison. Donna E.. Donna E. Davies. Ashcroft. Stephen J. H.. 1984. Glucose induces closure of single potassium channels in isolated rat pancreatic β-cells. Nature. 312. 5993. 446–448. 10.1038/312446a0. 0028-0836. 6095103. 1984Natur.312..446A. 4340710.
  8. copac.jisc.ac.uk. PhD . Frances Mary. Ashcroft . Calcium electrogenesis in insect muscle . University of Cambridge . 1978 . . 500372918.
  9. Web site: Oration for Professor Frances Ashcroft by Professor Gordon Campbell. On the occasion of being awarded Doctor of Science summer 2007. le.ac.uk. University of Leicester. 25 June 2012.
  10. Web site: Frances Ashcroft, Professorial Fellow in Physiology. Trinity College, University of Oxford. 2015-04-21. 2014. 1 April 2019. https://web.archive.org/web/20190401191010/https://www.trinity.ox.ac.uk/people/profiles/frances-ashcroft/. dead.
  11. Web site: Welcome to Oxion. Oxion: Ion Channels and Disease Initiative, Universities of Oxford, Cambridge, London and MRC Hartwell. 2015-04-21.
  12. Web site: Frances Ashcroft — GLAXOSMITHKLINE Royal Society Professor. Department of Physiology, Anatomy and Genetics, Medical Sciences Division, University of Oxford. 2015-04-21. 2015.
  13. 1999, Academic Press,
  14. 2000, HarperCollins,
  15. 2012, W. W. Norton and Company,
  16. Web site: Dame Frances Ashcroft DBE FMedSci FRS. The Royal Society. 6 July 2012. London. royalsociety.org. Anon. 1999. One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from the royalsociety.org website where:
  17. Oxford physiology professor earns APS' Walter B. Cannon Award . 27 April 2007 . American Physiological Society . . 22 March 2015 .
  18. Web site: Ashcroft receives L'oreal-UNESCO Award for Women in Science. https://web.archive.org/web/20111108225044/https://www.ox.ac.uk/media/news_stories/2011/111108_3.html . 8 November 2011 . 8 November 2011 . ox.ac.uk . 24 October 2017.
  19. Web site: dead . Croonian Lecture—List of lecturers: 21st century . https://archive.today/20120714111601/http://royalsociety.org/awards/croonian-lecture/ . 14 July 2012 . Royal Society . 24 October 2017 .
  20. Web site: Professor Dame Frances Ashcroft - The Academy of Medical Sciences. Acmedsci.ac.uk. 21 June 2019. 21 June 2019. https://web.archive.org/web/20190621064856/https://acmedsci.ac.uk/fellows/fellows-directory/ordinary-fellows/professor-frances-ashcroft. dead.
  21. An interview with A. S. Byatt. Cerles Review. Jenny. Newman. James. Friel. 2003. 11 September 2010. I remember sitting at high table with my friend, Professor Frances Ashcroft, to whom A Whistling Woman is half dedicated..

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