Great to catch up with Claire Clelland last Thursday! Claire worked with us a few years ago on research around neurogenesis as part of her PhD and MPhil. She is now at UCSF, where she's doing incredible research in gene editing with the potential to transform how we treat certain brain diseases.

Congratulations to our Academic Clinical Fellow, Rosana-Bristena Ionescu, on being awarded an ACT Research Grant for the IMUN-HD project! The project investigates the role of the immune system in Huntington’s disease using cutting-edge single-cell sequencing and advanced proteomic profiling.

Great to be at #ISSCR2026 in Montreal! Roger delivered a plenary lecture on the latest progress from stem cell trials for PD—an exciting step forward for the field. It was also fantastic to catch up with Zoe Hewitt (Regen CTC, UK) and Jihwan Song (Seoul).

A landmark study led by Lund University in collaboration with the University of Cambridge, reports the first clinical results from the STEM-PD trial. The study shows that transplanting stem cell-derived dopamine progenitor cells into the brain is feasible👏 🔗 www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Roger is in Montreal at the annual ISSCR meeting where he is discussing dopamine cell therapies in Parkinson's disease including the Lund-Cambridge Stem PD trial. He is giving a plenary talk on Saturday presenting the data from this and other published trials using this approach - exciting times!

Congratulations to our PhD student Sophie on being awarded a completion grant from Newnham College, Cambridge. 🎓 This is a well-deserved recognition of her commitment, dedication, and excellent work as she enters the final stage of her doctoral research and prepares to submit her thesis this summer🌟

Roger joined international colleagues in Barcelona for the ASAP meeting to explore new ways of understanding what may go wrong in PD as we age. This could pave the way to an entirely new treatment approach for this condition. We're looking forward to seeing where this work leads! #CRNBarcelona2026

We're pleased to share our new article, "Safeguarding Advanced Therapies—The Dangers of Therapeutic Neuroabandonment: How Should We Ensure Patient Safety and Scientific Integrity When a Commercial Clinical Trial Sponsor Becomes Insolvent?" movementdisorders.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/...

Episode 418 of The TogetherForSharon Podcast is now live on Spotify! Roger joined George, Sharon’s son, for a Q&A on stem cell therapies for Parkinson’s disease and the World Parkinson Congress. Listen here: open.spotify.com/episode/6qv6...

Q & A with Sharon's son, George. Episode 418 Special Guest Dr. Roger Barker, Stem Cell Therapies for Parkinson's disease and the World Parkinson Congress

The TogetherForSharon® Podcast · Episode

open.spotify.com

Roger and Claire Henchcliffe discuss the development, goals, and educational value of International Society for Stem Cell Research's new stem cell medicine course for Parkinson disease! Now live: www.neurologylive.com/view/inside-...

Inside the Development of ISSCR’s New Parkinson Disease Stem Cell Program | NeurologyLive - Clinical Neurology News and Neurology Expert Insights

Neurologists Roger Barker, MBBS, MRCP, PhD, FMedSci, and Claire Henchcliffe, MD, DPhil, discuss the development, goals, and educational value of ISSCR's new stem cell medicine course for Parkinson dis...

neurologylive.com

Really pleased that our partnership with LSBU has helped us host 4 fantastic students for work experience placements over the last two years. Even better — 2 students have now gone on to fully funded PhDs 🎉 We are very proud of their achievements. Big thanks to Alison Alvarez for all her help!

Our report on the OXB-102/Axo-Lenti-PD trial had now been published in the Movement Disorders Journal 🎉 Thank you to all who contributed to the study and write up, and especially to the participants involved! movementdisorders.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/...

Observations on an Open‐Label Phase 1/2 Dopamine Gene Therapy Trial (OXB‐102/Axo‐Lenti‐PD) in People with Parkinson's Disease

Background SUNRISE-PD was a dose-escalating, phase 1/2 study investigating a second-generation lentiviral vector gene therapy delivering the genes for dopamine synthesis (OXB-102) to treat Parkinson...

movementdisorders.onlinelibrary.wiley.com

Beyond the “Breakthrough” “I don’t think we need a cure. If you can slow it down by 50 percent and pick people up early on, you’ve probably done it.” A new article from The Initiative Magazine explores Roger's work, perspective, and the future of PD. 👇 theinitiativemagazine.com/en/article/r...

Roger Barker: Beyond the “Breakthrough”

“I don’t think we need a cure,” neuroscientist Roger Barker said. “If you can slow it down by 50 percent and pick people up early on, you’ve probably done it.”

theinitiativemagazine.com

Huge congratulations to Roger on receiving two 2026 Editor of Distinction Awards from Springer Nature 🎉 He was recognised with both the Editorial Contribution Award and the Author Service Award, highlighting his dedication to authors, excellence in peer review, and commitment to advancing discovery.

Roger attended the departmental PI retreat on Thursday 21st May at Madingley hall in Cambridge. Great day was had by all as the department gels in its work and ambitions!

A fantastic start to the 7th World Parkinson Congress in Phoenix, Arizona🌵A special moment seeing Roger open #WPC2026 as President of the WPC - and marking what will be his final duty in the role! We’re also very proud of our PhD student James Shonhard, who presented his poster at the congress 👏

Roger and Katie held a dissemination event last Tuesday 19th May for our FELL HD participants to present the results of the trial. The event was well received with some great questions! Thank you to all those who attended 👏

Great day at Cambridge Dementia Research Day on 28 April Zanna spoke about “can we leverage sleep to prevent dementia?” and Roger did a brilliant patient-facing interview that brought the human side of the research into focus!

Great to be in Edinburgh for the 39th EFI/BSHI Conference 2026! Roger gave a plenary lecture on dopamine cell therapies in Parkinson’s disease as part of the conference theme, “From Genes to Grafts: Where Innovation Meets Medicine.” More about the conference here: efi-conference.org

Today, on International Huntington’s Disease Awareness Day, our team is wearing purple for Juvenile HD and blue for Huntington’s Disease awareness💜💙 Learn more about HD and the support available through the Huntington’s Disease Association: www.hda.org.uk #InternationalHDAwarenessDay

A big thanks to everyone who joined us for this year’s Barker Lab retreat! Three great days of talks from across the groups, loads of useful feedback and discussion, a very competitive quiz, and an excellent pub dinner to finish things off 🍻 Already looking forward to the next one 🎉

Had a great time at the CCTU Neuroscience theme event on Thursday! Roger & Katie presented FELL-HD, Saeed shared STEM-PD, and Zanna showcased DORA-HD. It wrapped up with a really insightful panel discussion with trial participants. Such a great event—big thanks to Emma Cutting and the CCTU team 🎉

Exciting News: Roger has ranked 29 in UK and 208 in the world for the 2026 Edition of Best Scientists in the field of Neuroscience by Research.com!🎉 Summary of the statistics and trends:research.com/careers/worl...rt Full ranking for the UK: https://research.com/scientists-rankings/neuroscience/gb

World Online Ranking of Best Neuroscientists – 2026 Report | Research.com

research.com

Excited to share that our team is joining ASAP CRN @asapresearch.parkinsonsroadmap.org! We look forward to collaborating with scientists globally to catalyze breakthroughs in Parkinson’s & accelerate discoveries that lead to new treatments. Explore more: asapcrn.org #ParkinsonsDisease

Roger is giving a plenary lecture today on dopamine cell therapies in Parkinson's disease at 39th EFI/BSHI Conference 2026 in Edinburgh! From Genes to Grafts: Where Innovation meets Medicine 🔬 efi-conference.org

We are delighted to announce the publication of “Stem cell treatments and Parkinson's disease: Science and misconceptions” in the Journal of Parkinson’s Disease. The article by Athena Stamper, Harry Bulstrode and Roger Barker can be found here: doi.org/10.1177/1877...

Stem cell treatments and Parkinson's disease: Science and misconceptions - Athena Stamper, Harry Bulstrode, Roger A Barker, 2026

Parkinson's disease (PD) is a common neurodegenerative disorder associated with the accumulation of alpha-synuclein in Lewy bodies and Lewy neurites, as we...

doi.org

Welcome Rosana-Bristena Ionescu to the Barker Lab 🎉 Bristena will be joining us as a Clinical Research Fellow for the next 2 years! She will do a joint project between the Barker and Jones labs using cutting-edge single-cell RNA sequencing to explore how the immune system shapes the course of HD.

Check out this great new webinar by Huntington's Disease Foundation featuring a presentation from Zanna Voysey 🎉 The HDF have just released a new webinar episode called What Your Blood Tells Us: The Science Behind HD Biomarkers Avaliable now on YouTube: www.youtube.com/watch?v=llim...

What Your Blood Tells Us: The Science Behind HD Biomarkers, 3/24/2026; Lauren Byrne and Zanna Voysey

YouTube video by Huntington's Disease Foundation

youtube.com

The Cambridge Clinical Trials Unit Neuroscience Theme Event is back 🎉 Join online or in person on Thursday 30th April 13:00-16:00, to hear results from completed trials, flash presentations, and a panel discussion with trial participants! Please register here: www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/neuroscien...

Roger was honoured today to give a talk virtually at the Cambridge Nanjing forum on cell therapies for Parkinson's disease!