Meet the research leader in autoimmune diseases
Associate Professor Simon Barry BSc PhD
Associate Professor Barry is the leader of the Autoimmune Diseases Stream at the Children's Research Centre and Head of the Molecular Immunology Laboratory in the Discipline of Paediatrics at the University of Adelaide, where he is also Postgraduate Coordinator. In addition, Associate Professor Barry is a Senior Research Fellow at the Women's and Children's Health Research Institute (WCHRI).
Associate Professor Barry is concerned with the basis of immunological defects that cause autoimmune diseases such as type 1 diabetes, multiple sclerosis and inflammatory bowel disease. His research is focused on the behaviour of regulatory T cells (the policemen of the immune system) and the genes that drive their formation and function, with a view to identifying new and better ways of diagnosing and treating autoimmune disease in all of its forms.
Associate Professor Barry and his colleagues are the first in the world to have identified all of the genes necessary for immune tolerance and regulatory T cell function, an achievement noted by the Faculty of 1000 as an important contribution to immunology. Associate Professor Barry and his team are currently working on a new stem cell therapy for autoimmunity that involves converting stem cells from the blood found in the umbilical cord into healthy immune cells that can thwart immune attacks. If successful, this new immune cell therapy could be another landmark first in the treatment of autoimmune disease.
