Ryan West is a postdoctoral research associate working in an interdisciplinary role within the departments of Biology and Psychology at the University of York.
“My research background is in the study of neurodegenerative diseases, having worked as a member of Eli Lilly’s Parkinson’s Disease drug-hunting team and completed a PhD looking at the genetic causes of Frontotemporal Dementia, an early onset form of dementia. Now using fruit flies as a model organism myself, and my supervisors Dr Alex Wade from the department of Psychology and Dr Chris Elliott from Biology, are investigating the genetic causes of Parkinson’s disease with a focus upon visual defects associated with the disease.”