Swansea University recognises Julian Hopkin CBE
Swansea University will present former Rector of Medicine and Health, Professor Julian Hopkin CBE, with an Honorary Fellowship today (Wednesday 20 July 2011) during the Degree and Award Congregation for the College of Human and Health Sciences.
Professor Hopkin, a physician in emergency medicine, has been a driving force for medical education and research in Wales. He has overseen the development of Swansea University’s College of Medicine and its research arm, the Institute of Life Science (ILS).
Founded in 2001, the College of Medicine has grown rapidly under Professor Hopkin’s guidance to become a major centre for medical training and research. 2008 marked the College’s first submission to the independent Research Assessment Exercise, which ranked Swansea joint seventh in the UK for biomedical research in the Allied Health Professions and Studies unit of assessment.
Professor Hopkin’s experimental medicine research group in the Institute of Life Science has worked on Th-2 immune signalling in asthma, allergy and parasitic worm infection, the impact of genetic variation within the pathway, and developing specific inhibitors of the pathway as potential therapeutics for asthma and allergy.
Professor Hopkin is a Fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences and a Derwydd er Anrhydedd of Gorsedd Beirdd Ynys Prydain. He has been a Fellow of Brasenose College Oxford; Editor of the Quarterly Journal of Medicine; a Board Member at the Medical Research Council; and Visiting Professor at the Universities of Osaka, Kyoto and Rome. He was also appointed as a Swansea University Non-executive Director of the Abertawe Bro Morgannwg University NHS Trust in 2008.
In the 2011 New Year’s Honours List he was made a Commander of the British Empire for Services to Medicine.
Professor Hopkin said: “The Honorary Fellowship means a great deal to me, marking as it does the wonderful team effort in establishing and developing the College of Medicine at Swansea University over the past twelve years. The College’s innovative approaches to medical education and to interdisciplinary research and development, and its partnership with ABM University Health Board, promise much for medicine and health locally and globally.”
Swansea University's Vice-Chancellor, Professor Richard B Davies, said: “Professor Hopkin is an extraordinary physician who has managed to achieve the near impossible. He has balanced his broad portfolio of medical, managerial, and pastoral responsibilities with what appears to be consummate ease, and yet has still found time to pursue his research interests.
“The University, the City, and the people of Wales owe him a huge debt of gratitude for his innovative approach to advancing medical education and research, and I am delighted that we are able to recognise his achievements with the award of an Honorary Fellowship of Swansea University.”
Swansea University’s Summer Degree and Award Congregations take place from Monday, July 18 – Friday, July 22. The Congregations are held in the City and County of Swansea’s Brangwyn Hall (part of the Guildhall). For more information about Swansea University Graduation Week, visit: www.swansea.ac.uk/graduation/.
