Prof. Lorraine O’Driscoll

Lorraine is elected fellow of TCD (FTCD), elected fellow of the Royal Society for Biology UK (FRSB), and elected member of the Royal Irish Academy (MRIA), where she is appointed Vice-President (VP RIA). Following her PhD on biotechnology, she undertook biomedical research for industry in the US and Europe and also gained post-doctoral experience at Harvard University and the University of Miami. Lorraine has led/is leading a number of large-scale initiatives, including extracellular vesicles in health and disease. For example, she was founding Chair of the first -and largest- funded EV Research Consortium worldwide i.e., the ME-HaD consortium that included 360 academic, clinics, and industry participants in 31 countries; and Director/Coordinator of a H2020-funded programme (TRAIN-EV), training 15 PhD students in EVs technologies in academia, industry, and clinics.  She is also Lead Investigator of the All-Ireland Cancer Liquid Biopsies Consortium, supported by the HEA through the Government of Ireland’s shared island fund; a collaboration including Trinity College Dublin, Queen’s University Belfast, and University of Galway. Translating bench research to utility, she has been/is PI on 5 cancer clinical trials. Her research has been cited >35,500 times and she is on the lifetime list of Stanford’s Top 2% researchers. Lorraine is passionate about collaborating with cancer patient advocates and training future research leaders and has supervised 39xPhD students and 5xMD students to completion.