Professor Ruth A Roberts is Chair and Director of Drug Discovery at Birmingham University, UK and Cofounder of ApconiX, an integrated toxicology and ion channel company that brings together a team of world-renowned nonclinical safety experts with over 300 years of drug discovery and development experience. Before that Ruth was Global Head of Regulatory Safety at AstraZeneca (2004-2014) and Director of Toxicology for Aventis in Paris, France (2002-2004).
Professor Roberts received her BSc in Biochemistry and her PhD in Medical Oncology from the University of Manchester, UK. She is former president of EUROTOX, former president of the British Toxicology Society (BTS), a Fellow and past president of the Academy of Toxicological Sciences (ATS) and was elected fellow of the Royal College of Pathologists in 2012 and of the Royal Society of Biology in 2014. She is currently Vice Chair of the Health and Environmental Science Institute (HESI) Board and has co-chaired the HESI Biomarkers of Neurotoxicity scientific committee since its inception in 2015.
Professor Roberts was the recipient of the SOT Achievement award in 2002, the EUROTOX Bo Holmstedt Award in 2009 and the SOT 2018 Founders award, given in recognition of outstanding leadership in fostering the role of toxicological sciences in safety decision making. With >150 publications in peer reviewed journals, she is interested in developing and implementing innovative models in drug discovery and development and particularly in ensuring academic research achieves its translational potential.