Imperial academics recognised in King’s Birthday Honours

Professor Sir Peter Barnes FRS

Imperial experts in asthma and COPD, vascular surgery, cancer, and endocrinology are among those recognised in the King’s Birthday Honours 2023.

Professor Sir Peter Barnes FRS, from the National Heart and Lung Institute, has been made a Knight Bachelor, and Professor Dame Averil Mansfield, from the Department of Surgery and Cancer, has been made a Dame.

Dr Natalie Shenker, from the Department of Surgery and Cancer, has been awarded an MBE, and Professor Graham Williams, from the Department of Metabolism, Digestion and Reproduction, has been awarded an OBE.

Professor Sir Peter Barnes

Sir Peter is Professor of Thoracic Medicine at the National Heart and Lung Institute and he was Head of Respiratory Medicine at Imperial until 2017.

His research is focused on cellular and molecular mechanisms of asthma and COPD, understanding and developing therapies, and research into biomarkers for these diseases. His work integrates basic science with clinical studies, providing novel insights into common airway diseases.

"I was very surprised but extremely honoured to receive this award. I want to pay tribute to all of the wonderful students, post-docs, research fellows and colleagues that I have worked with at Imperial over several decades..." Professor Sir Peter Barnes FRS National Heart & Lung Institute

The Honours citation says: “He is the most eminent respiratory physician and scientist in the UK, whose work has transformed the understanding and treatment of asthma and chronic obstructive lung disease (COPD). His innovative research, often in close partnership with the pharmaceutical industry, has led directly to the development of new drugs for the treatment of asthma, which are now in widespread use and benefitting millions of patients globally."

Sir Peter said: "I was very surprised but extremely honoured to receive this award. I want to pay tribute to all of the wonderful students, post-docs, research fellows and colleagues that I have worked with at Imperial over several decades - I first started research at Hammersmith back in 1978.

"Imperial has always been enormously supportive of my research, which I plan to continue. I am delighted that this award is for services to respiratory science, which is still poorly recognised and funded, despite the fact that one in seven people in this country suffer from respiratory diseases and it is now the third commonest cause of death."

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Sir Peter was Consultant Respiratory Physician at Hammersmith Hospital before moving to the Royal Brompton Hospital as Professor of Clinical Pharmacology in 1985. He has been the most highly cited respiratory researcher in the world over the last 30 years with over 1,500 peer-reviewed papers and over 150,000 citations.

He was a founding Fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences in 1998 and was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 2007. He is also a member of the Academy of Europe and the American Association of Physicians, Master Fellow of the American College of Chest Physicians, Fellow of the ERS and ATS, Honorary Fellow of St Catharine’s College Cambridge and of the British Pharmacological Society, with honorary degrees from four European universities. He served as President of the European Respiratory Society in 2013/14.

Professor Dame Averil Mansfield

Professor Dame Averil Mansfield has been made Dame for services to surgery and to equality in medicine. She is an Emeritus Professor of Vascular Surgery in Imperial’s Department of Surgery and Cancer.

Dame Averil was the first female vascular surgeon and was made the first female UK Professor of Surgery in 1993.

The Honours citation says: “She is a pioneering surgeon who blazed a trail for women in medicine, having been the first person in her family to enter higher education. She has made an outstanding national contribution to healthcare, academia and equality.

"I hope that my appointment as a Professor at Imperial and now this honour will encourage the young to achieve great things and I hope that they will get the happiness that my career has given to me." Professor Dame Averil Mansfield Department of Surgery and Cancer

“She was President of the Association of Surgeons of Great Britain and Ireland and of the Vascular Surgical Society; President of the BMA and Vice President of the Royal College of Surgeons of England; Chair of Council of The Stroke Association.”

Dame Averil said: "I am both surprised and delighted to receive this honour. I have enjoyed the many different aspects of my career as a vascular surgeon and have been supported by family, friends and colleagues throughout. Although as a woman I made a relatively unusual choice of specialty, I did not at any time meet discrimination and was always encouraged to fulfil my potential.

"I hope that my appointment as a Professor at Imperial and now this honour will encourage the young to achieve great things and I hope that they will get the happiness that my career has given to me."

As a passionate advocate for encouraging more women into medicine, Dame Averil was the founding chair of the networking group Women in Surgical Training at the Royal College of Surgeons in 1991. The group has grown from an initial membership of under 200 to more than 6,000 today. The Honours citation notes that she is still regarded as the group’s guiding light and her advice is frequently sought.

She continues to travel around the UK to speak with students and young doctors about their future careers. In February of this year, she also released a memoir titled 'Life in Her Hands: The Inspiring Story of a Pioneering Female Surgeon'.

Dr Natalie Shenker

Dr Shenker is awarded an MBE for services to charity and human milk banking. Dr Shenker and Gillian Weaver set up the UK’s first non-profit human milk bank, the Hearts Milk Bank, in 2016. While this got to work sending milk into hospitals in 2017, a team came together to develop the Human Milk Foundation around Hearts. The Human Milk Foundation launched on 1 August 2018, with the aim of building a new model to provide equitable access to donor human milk and breastfeeding support, and initiating vital research and education.

Alongside this, Dr Shenker’s work at Imperial has developed the use of cells derived from breast milk as a resource in which cell-specific epigenetic changes can be assessed, with potential for the development of cancer risk prediction tools.

This work has led to the establishment of a nationwide prospective population cohort study, the BECS study, which aims to recruit milk samples from several thousand women over the next 6 years. She has developed collaborations between numerous research groups across the UK and beyond, and her future work will focus on establishing a bioresource to expand the scope of research that can be conducted into breast milk.

Professor Graham Williams

Professor Williams has been awarded an OBE for services to endocrinology – the clinical study of glands and hormones. He is Head of the Molecular Endocrinology Laboratory in Imperial’s Department of Metabolism, Digestion and Reproduction at the Hammersmith Campus. His research focuses on the genetic origins of bone and cartilage disease, and molecular mechanisms of thyroid hormone action during skeletal development and in adult bone maintenance and tissue repair.

In addition to this work, Professor Williams is currently President of the European Thyroid Association (ETA) and was previously a member of the ETA’s Executive Committee (2008-2011). He has also served as President of the Society for Endocrinology (2016-2019) and as President of the British Thyroid Association (2011-2014).

Professor Williams said: "It was a huge surprise to receive this award and I am absolutely delighted, especially for my wonderful parents and family. My scientific and clinical co-workers at Imperial have been dedicated, innovative and supportive, and I am enormously grateful to every one of them.

"It has been humbling to work with so many colleagues and volunteers at the Society for Endocrinology and the British, American and European Thyroid Associations. I am especially pleased that endocrinology has been recognised; an immensely stimulating and rewarding field that reaches out to many patients and people from all backgrounds all over the world. It is a real privilege for me to be part of the endocrinology community and to help keep endocrinology in the public domain."