Making an Impact

A Cardiff University Reader in Arthritis Research and  Director of Innovation & Impact has been announced as the New Director for Arthritis Research UK Biomechanics and Bioengineering Centre.

Dr Valerie Sparkes, Reader at the School of Healthcare Sciences has recently been appointed by Arthritis Research UK and Cardiff University, as the next director for the Arthritis Research UK Biomechanics and Bioengineering Centre. Dr Sparkes took up the role as director on Wednesday 1August 2018. This appointment follows the retirement of Professor Bruce Caterson as centre director at the end of July 2018.

Dr Sparkes has been involved in the centre since its inception, helping shape the strategy of the centre in its second term of funding. She is a member of Cardiff Institute of Tissue Engineering and Repair (CITER), and is Honorary Secretary of the British Orthopaedic Research Society.

Dr Sparkes said: “The Centre has access to some of the most up to date research facilities including the Musculoskeletal Biomechanics Research Facility in the School of Engineering, a Virtual Reality Gait Analysis Interactive Laboratory in the School of Healthcare Sciences, and a suite of neuroimaging equipment that is unique in Europe at the Cardiff University Brain Research Imaging Centre."

Dr Sparkes vision is to utilise the strength of the team of researchers within the Centre together with state of the art technologies within Cardiff University to increase collaboration and the multidisciplinary nature of the research already taking place within the centre.

To find out more please visit the Arthritis Research UK Biomechanics and Bioengineering Centre.