Dr Donal Wall
Donal hails from Galway in the West of Ireland and undertook his undergraduate degree at the National University of Ireland, Galway in Science. He then carried out a PhD in infectious disease at University College Dublin studying a tuberculosis-like disease in foals. After this he did a postdoctoral fellowship at Harvard Medical School and Massachusetts General Hospital studying Salmonella infection. There followed a postdoctoral fellowship at the University of Edinburgh studying herpes viruses, before taking up his current position in Glasgow University.
He has been at Glasgow about 14 years and is now a Reader In infectious diseases. He and his colleagues work on a number of infectious diseases, inflammatory conditions, cancer and – the topic of his talk today – the microbiome. His work includes: using bacteria to target tumours; bacteria associated with Crohn’s disease; and how the microbiome affects our health and well-being.
Donal’s talk concerns the human microbiome – the multiplicity of micro-organisms living in and on our bodies which have a profound impact on our health and wellbeing.