Maria Fitzgerald
| |
|---|---|
Fitzgerald in 2016
| |
| Born | (1953-04-10) 10 April 1953 (age 71)[1] |
| Education | Godolphin and Latymer School |
| Alma mater |
|
| Awards | Joan Mott Prize Lecture (1996) |
| Scientific career | |
| Fields |
|
| Institutions | University College London |
| Thesis | The sensitisation of cutaneous nociceptors (1978) |
| Doctoral advisor | Patrick David Wall |
| Website | ucl |
Maria Fitzgerald FRS FRCA FMedSci[1][2] is a professor in the Department of NeuroscienceatUniversity College London.[2][3][4]
Maria Fitzgerald was born in Hampstead, London. Her mother was Booker Prize–winning novelist Penelope Fitzgerald, author of the Blue Flower. Her father, Desmond Fitzgerald, was a major in the Irish Guards. Her older brother, Edmund Valpy Fitzgerald, is an emeritus professor in the Oxford Department of International Development. Maria was educated at Godolphin and Latymer School and Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford, where she studied physiology. She was awarded a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1975 from the University of Oxford.[1] She trained in pain physiology and neuroscience with Bruce Lynn and Patrick David WallatUniversity College London, where she was awarded a PhD in 1978.[2][5] Maria was awarded her first research grant from the Medical Research Council in 1981, and her research has been continuously supported by the MRC ever since. She was awarded a "new blood lectureship" in the Department of Anatomy at UCL in 1984 and is now Professor of Developmental Neurobiology in the UCL Department of Neuroscience, Physiology and Pharmacology, and a member of UCL Neuroscience.
Fitzgerald studies the developmental physiology and neurobiology of nociceptor circuits[6] in the brain and spinal cord. Her work has had a major impact on our understanding of how pain perception emerges in early life and how early pain experience can shape pain sensitivity for life.[7] Fitzgerald's research has changed clinical perception by showing that pain in infancy requires appropriate measurement and treatment and that it should be tailored to the developmental stage of the child.[2][8]
In recognition of her work Fitzgerald was awarded the Jeffrey Lawson Award for Advocacy in Children's Pain Relief from the American Pain Society in 2011, the first basic scientist to have received this award. In 2013 she was elected to the Faculty of Pain Medicine of the Royal College of Anaesthetists for sustained and significant contributions to pain medicine.[9] She was elected a Fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences (FMedSci) in 2000 and a Fellow of the Royal Society (FRS) in 2016.[2] She has been awarded honorary membership in the International Association for the Study of Pain (IASP), the British Pain Society,[10] the International Society for Pediatric Pain (ISPP) and the Physiological Society[11] A podcast describing her research career is available on the Pain Research Forum.[12]
"All text published under the heading 'Biography' on Fellow profile pages is available under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License." --"Royal Society Terms, conditions and policies". Archived from the original on 25 September 2015. Retrieved 9 March 2016.
{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link)
| International |
|
|---|---|
| Academics |
|
