Emeritus and Honorary Fellows - Somerville College Oxford

Baroness Royall of Blaisdon

Principal

Baroness Royall of Blaisdon Principal

principals.office@some.ox.ac.uk

01865 270630

Share on

Profile

Jan Royall is Somerville’s Principal.

She has had a distinguished career in politics, notably serving as Chief Whip in the House of Lords and then as Leader of the House from 2008-2010. She also served as Shadow Leader of the House of Lords from 2010-2015.

Prior to her parliamentary career, she was a senior adviser in the European Commission before heading its office in Wales. In 2004 she was appointed to the Lords as Baroness Royall of Blaisdon and in 2005 became a Government Spokesperson for Health, International Development, Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs.

Following a degree in Spanish and French at the University of London, Jan’s first job was importing flowers into Europe from Colombia but she soon started working in the world of politics. She spent six years working as General Secretary of the British Labour Group in the European Parliament, then went to work for then-Leader of the Opposition, Neil Kinnock.

Jan stepped down from frontbench politics in May 2015 in order to engage in her other interests, including youth policy, higher education, women, diversity and inclusion, democratic engagement, health, the EU, and foreign affairs, and she continues to speak out on these issues in the House of Lords from the backbenches. Jan is a trustee, patron and active supporter of many charities and organizations including Full Fact, the Centre for Opposition Studies, South Gloucestershire and Stroud College and the ASHA Centre. She is co-chair of the Oxford inclusive Economy Partnership. She was formerly chair of the People’s History Museum, Pro Chancellor of the University of Bath and Vice President of the Party of European Socialists.

Jan works with governments, political parties and NGOs in many countries on democracy building, leadership, nurturing civil society and women’s empowerment.

Learn More Baroness Royall of Blaisdon

Prateek Agrawal

Fellow & Tutor in Physics; Associate Professor in Particle Physics

Prateek Agrawal Fellow & Tutor in Physics; Associate Professor in Particle Physics

prateek.agrawal@physics.ox.ac.uk

Share on

Profile
Publications

I am a theoretical physicist and a Tutorial Fellow in Physics at Somerville.

I am interested in understanding the fundamental laws of nature and ways we can test them. My research revolves around open questions in fundamental physics, such as the nature of dark matter and dark energy, and explanations for the patterns in the basic building blocks of particle physics.

I grew up in India, and obtained my bachelor’s degree in engineering physics from IIT Bombay. I moved to the University of Maryland for my PhD in particle physics. I was a postdoctoral researcher at Fermilab and at Harvard before moving to Oxford.

Agrawal, P., Hook, A. & Huang, J. “A CMB Millikan experiment with cosmic axiverse strings.” J. High Energ. Phys. 2020, 138 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/JHEP07(2020)138

Prateek Agrawal, Georges Obied, Paul J. Steinhardt, Cumrun Vafa, “On the cosmological implications of the string Swampland”, Physics Letters B, Volume 784, 2018, Pages 271-276, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.physletb.2018.07.040.

Prateek Agrawal, Francis-Yan Cyr-Racine, David Pinner, Lisa Randall, “Rock ‘n’ Roll Solutions to the Hubble Tension”, ArXiv 1904.01016, 2019

Learn More Prateek Agrawal

Daniel Anthony

Fellow & Tutor in Medicine; Professor of Experimental Neuropathology

Daniel Anthony Fellow & Tutor in Medicine; Professor of Experimental Neuropathology

daniel.anthony@some.ox.ac.uk

Share on

Profile
Publications

My work centres on inflammatory diseases, and I lead the Experimental Neuropathology Laboratory at the University of Oxford in the Department of Pharmacology.

As a Fellow of Somerville College and an Honorary Professor at the University of Southern Denmark, my research explores the effect of systemic inflammation on the outcome of central nervous system (CNS) injury and disease. I also investigate circulating extracellular vesicles in CNS diseases and the role of cytokine production in neuropsychiatric disorders.

My career started with a Ph.D. from University College London in 1994, followed by a British Biotech Fellowship in Oxford focusing on CNS metalloproteinase expression. Downstream, this research has led to clinical trials with protease inhibitors in inflammatory diseases, including COVID. My work has also identified new biomarkers for disease diagnosis and progression in human and veterinary medicine, using a mix of in vivo and molecular biology, immunohistochemistry, MRI/PET imaging, and metabolomics.

After a Lecturer position in Neurobiology at the University of Southampton, I returned to Oxford in 2004 to further my research on the neurobiology of inflammation. My work is has led to over three hundred publications and patents. I was made Chair in Experimental Neuropathology in 2015 and I was awarded a Fellowship by the British Pharmacological Society in 2020. At Somerville College, my focus is on educating future medical professionals, combining my research insights with teaching.

At Somerville College, I teach physiology and pharmacology to preclinical and graduate entry medical students.

For a full list of publications: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1380-6655

The following is a selected list of Professor Anthony’s recent publications. For a complete list, visit https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1380-6655

1. Dunstan IK, McLeod R, Radford-Smith DE, Xiong W, Pate T, Probert F, Anthony DC. Unique pathways downstream of TLR-4 and TLR-7 activation: sex-dependent behavioural, cytokine, and metabolic consequences. Front Cell Neurosci. 2024 Feb 13;18:1345441. doi: 10.3389/fncel.2024.1345441. eCollection 2024.

2. Xiong W, Anthony DC, Anthony S, Ho TBT, Louis E, Satsangi J, Radford-Smith DE. Sodium fluoride preserves blood metabolite integrity for biomarker discovery in large-scale, multi-site metabolomics investigations. Analyst. 2024 Jan 15. doi: 10.1039/d3an01359f.

3. Trofimov A, Pavlov D, Goswami A, Gorlova A, Chaprov K, Umriukhin A, Kalueff A, Deykin A, Lesch KP, Anthony DC*, Strekalova T. Lipopolysaccharide triggers exacerbated microglial activation, excessive cytokine release and behavioural disturbances in mice with truncated Fused-in-Sarcoma Protein (FUS). Brain Behav Immun Health. 2023 Sep 15;33:100686. doi: 10.1016/j.bbih.2023.100686. eCollection 2023 Nov.

4. Pereira PDC, Diniz DG, da Costa ER, Magalhães NGM, da Silva AJF, Leite JGS, Almeida NIP, Cunha KN, de Melo MAD, Vasconcelos PFDC, Diniz JAP, Brites D, Anthony DC, Diniz CWP, Guerreiro-Diniz C. Genes, inflammatory response, tolerance, and resistance to virus infections in migratory birds, bats, and rodents. Front Immunol. 2023 Aug 29;14:1239572. doi: 10.3389/fimmu.2023.1239572.

5. Radford-Smith DE, Anthony DC. Leveraging Health Linkage Data From the UK Biobank-With Great Power Comes Great Responsibility. JAMA Psychiatry. 2023 Aug 23. doi: 10.1001/jamapsychiatry.2023.2966.

6. Bloemendaal M, Veniaminova E, Anthony DC, Gorlova A, Vlaming P, Khairetdinova A, Cespuglio R, Lesch KP, Arias Vasquez A, Strekalova T. Serotonin Transporter (SERT) Expression Modulates the Composition of the Western-Diet-Induced Microbiota in Aged Female Mice. Nutrients. 2023 Jul 6;15(13):3048. doi: 10.3390/nu15133048.

7. Chan KW, Hebert J, Radford-Smith D, Anthony DC, Burnet PWJ. Live or heat-killed probiotic administration reduces anxiety and central cytokine expression in BALB/c mice, but differentially alters brain neurotransmitter gene expression. Chan KW, Hebert J, Radford-Smith D, Anthony DC, Burnet PWJ. Neuropharmacology. 2023 Sep 1;235:109565. doi: 10.1016/j.neuropharm.2023.109565

8. Radford-Smith DE, Anthony DC, Benz F, Grist JT, Lyman M, Miller JJ, Probert F. A multivariate blood metabolite algorithm stably predicts risk and resilience to major depressive disorder in the general population. EBioMedicine. 2023 Jun 14;93:104643. doi: 10.1016/j.ebiom.2023.104643. PMID: 37327674

9. Khan RMN, Ahn YM, Marriner GA, Via LE, D’Hooge F, Lee SS, Yang N, Basuli F, White AG, Tomko JA, Frye LJ, Scanga CA, Weiner DM, Sutphen ML, Schimel DM, Dayao E, Piazza MK, Gomez F, Dieckmann W, Herscovitch P, Mason NS, Swenson R, Kiesewetter DO, Backus KM, Geng Y, Raj R, Anthony DC, Flynn JL, Barry CE, Davis BG. Distributable, Metabolic PET Reporting of Tuberculosis. bioRxiv. 2023 Apr 3:2023.04.03.535218. doi: 10.1101/2023.04.03.535218. Preprint. PMID: 37333343

10. Radford-Smith DE, Yates AG, Rizvi L, Anthony DC, Probert F. HDL and LDL have distinct, opposing effects on LPS-induced brain inflammation. Lipids Health Dis. 2023 Apr 24;22(1):54. doi: 10.1186/s12944-023-01817-z.

11. Pate T, Anthony DC, Radford-Smith DE. cFOS expression in the prefrontal cortex correlates with altered cerebral metabolism in developing germ-free mice. Front Mol Neurosci. 2023 Apr 20;16:1155620. doi: 10.3389/fnmol.2023.1155620. eCollection 2023.

12. Radford-Smith DE, Anthony DC. Prebiotic and Probiotic Modulation of the Microbiota-Gut-Brain Axis in Depression. Nutrients. 2023 Apr 13;15(8):1880. doi: 10.3390/nu15081880.

13. Radford-Smith DE, Anthony DC. Mechanisms of Maternal Diet-Induced Obesity Affecting the Offspring Brain and Development of Affective Disorders. Metabolites. 2023 Mar 20;13(3):455. doi: 10.3390/metabo13030455

Learn More Daniel Anthony

Jonathan Burton

Sue and Kevin Scollan Fellow & Tutor in Organic Chemistry; Professor of Organic Chemistry

Jonathan Burton Sue and Kevin Scollan Fellow & Tutor in Organic Chemistry; Professor of Organic Chemistry

jonathan.burton@chem.ox.ac.uk

Share on

Profile
Publications

Jonathan Burton is a Professor of Organic Chemistry who leads a molecular synthesis research unit.

His research unit investigates total synthesis methods for organic molecules. He also teaches tutorials and lectures in organic chemistry. In 2016, he won an MPLS Teaching Award for ‘excellence in teaching’.

Having spent his undergraduate days in Oxford at New College, Jon moved to Cambridge to study a PhD with Professor Andrew Holmes FRS before becoming a Post-Doctoral researcher and an academic there. He has also spent a year working in Paris with Professor Alexander Alexakis. In 2007, he returned to Oxford to take up a University Lectureship in Organic Chemistry.

‘Short total syntheses of the avenaciolide family of natural products’ S. Ainsua Martinez, M. Gillard, A. -C. Chany, J. W.Burton Tetrahedron 2018.

Hot Paper ’ A Total Synthesis of Salinosporamide A’ L. B. Marx, J. W. Burton Chem. Eur. J. 2018, 24, 6747.

‘A Short Synthesis of Aphanamol I in Both Racemic and Enantiopure Forms’ S. J. Ferrara, J. W. Burton, Chem. Eur. J. 2016.

‘Synthesis of bicyclic tetrahydrofurans from linear precursors using manganese(III) acetate’ A.-C. Chany, L.B. Marx, J. W. Burton, Org. Biomol. Chem. 2015.

‘Diastereoselective Synthesis of Fused Lactone-Pyrrolidinones; Application to a Formal Synthesis of (−)-Salinosporamide A’ A. W. J. Logan, S. J. Sprague, R. W. Foster, L. B. Marx, V. Garzya, M. S. Hallside, A. L. Thompson, J. W. Burton, Org. Lett. 2014, 16, 4078.

Learn More Jonathan Burton

Sarah Butler

Librarian and Head of Information Services

Sarah Butler Librarian and Head of Information Services

librarian@some.ox.ac.uk

01865 270688

Share on

Profile

Sarah Butler is the College Librarian and Head of Information Services.

She is responsible for managing the College’s extensive lending library and its special collections, including the College’s collections of pictures (as Keeper of the College Pictures), chattels and antiquarian books. Please contact Sarah if you have any queries about consulting or using the College’s collections.

Sarah also oversees the Archives, IT and AV services, and is the lead on Data Protection for the College. She is happy to answer enquiries on any of those topics.

Learn More Sarah Butler

Dan Ciubotaru

Diana Brown Fellow & Tutor in Pure Maths; Professor of Mathematics

Dan Ciubotaru Diana Brown Fellow & Tutor in Pure Maths; Professor of Mathematics

Download CV

dan.ciubotaru@maths.ox.ac.uk

Share on

Profile
Publications

My research is in representation theory, an area of mathematics concerned with the study of symmetries.

I am particularly interested in unitary representations of reductive Lie groups and Hecke algebras in the framework of the local Langlands correspondence.

My research has been recently supported by the EPSRC grants “New Horizons” EP/V046713/1 (1/2021-12/2023) and EP/N033922/1 (09/2016-08/2020).

At Somerville, I teach Prelims and Part A Pure Maths tutorials. In 2017, I was awarded an MPLS Teaching Award. I am currently the Academic Lead for Prelims and Part A in the Maths Institute.

Some unipotent Arthur packets for reductive p-adic groups, with L. Mason-Brown and E. Okada, arXiv:2210.00251v2 (2023), to appear in IMRN.

Symplectic Dirac operators for Lie algebras and graded Hecke algebras, with M. De Martino and P. Meyer, Transformation Groups, online 08/2022, doi.org/10.1007/s00031-022-09762-4

Weyl groups, the Dirac inequality, and isolated unitary unramified representations, Special issue to the memory of T.A. Springer, Indag. Math. 33 (2022), no. 1, 1-23.

The Dunkl-Cherednik deformation of a Howe duality
Ciubotaru, D; De Martino, M
JOURNAL OF ALGEBRA volume 560 page 914-959 (15 October 2020)

Cocenters of p-adic groups, III: elliptic and rigid concenters
Ciubotaru, D; He, X
Peking Mathematical Journal (13 October 2020)

Dirac induction for rational Cherednik algebras
Ciubotaru, D; De Martino, M
International Mathematics Research Notices (5 July 2018)

On the reducibility of induced representations for classical p-adic groups and related affine Hecke algebras
Ciubotaru, D; Heiermann, V
Israel Journal of Mathematics issue 1 volume 231 page 379-417 (7 June 2019)

Learn More Dan Ciubotaru

Julie Dickson

Fellow & Tutor in Law; Professor of Legal Philosophy

Julie Dickson Fellow & Tutor in Law; Professor of Legal Philosophy

julie.dickson@law.ox.ac.uk

Share on

Profile
Publications

Julie Dickson (LLB, Dip. L.P. Glasgow; MA, DPhil Oxf.) is Professor of Legal Philosophy in the Faculty of Law, and Fellow and Senior Law Tutor at Somerville College. After completing an undergraduate law degree at the University of Glasgow in her native Scotland, and a D. Phil in Philosophy of Law at Balliol College, Oxford, she held lectureships at the University of Leicester and University College London before taking up a Fellowship in Law at Somerville College in 2002.

Professor Dickson works mainly in general jurisprudence or philosophy of law, and especially on methodological issues, and her publications on this topic include her books, Evaluation and Legal Theory (2001): Evaluation and Legal Theory: : Legal Theory Today Julie Dickson Hart Publishing (bloomsbury.com) and Elucidating Law (2022): Elucidating Law – Julie Dickson – Oxford University Press (oup.com) She is also interested in theoretical aspects of transnational law, especially European Union Law, including the theory of legal systems in the EU context. In 2012, together with her colleague Professor Pavlos Eleftheriadis, she co-edited and contributed to a volume presenting some of the best contemporary work combining legal and political philosophy and European Union law:

Philosophical Foundations of European Union Law – Julie Dickson, Pavlos Eleftheriadis – Oxford University Press (oup.com)

Professor Dickson teaches Jurisprudence and European Union Law at both undergraduate and postgraduate levels, and has been the recipient of a University of Oxford teaching excellence award and nominated for an “Outstanding Tutor” award in the student-led Oxford Students Union teaching awards. She serves on the editorial board of several journals, including Legal Theory, Law and Philosophy, Transnational Legal Theory, the Oxford Journal of Legal Studies and Problema, and was the Review Articles editor of the Oxford Journal of Legal Studies from 2003-2016.

Professor Dickson’s latest book on the methodology of Legal Philosophy, Elucidating Law, has recently been published by Oxford University Press: Elucidating Law – Julie Dickson – Oxford University Press (oup.com) She is now working on a short book on the possibility and potential of content-independence in law (under contract with Cambridge University Press). She is also a keen amateur photographer with a particular interest in wildlife photography.

See also the interview on the Jurisprudence in Oxford subject page: https://www.law.ox.ac.uk/research-and-subject-groups/jurisprudence-oxford/julie-dickson

J Dickson, Elucidating Law (Oxford University Press 2022)

J Dickson, ‘Methodology in Legal Philosophy’ in Mathieu Carpentier (ed), Meta-theory of Law (ISTE Ltd 2022)

J Dickson, ‘Descriptive Legal Theory’ in M Sellers & S Kirste (ed), Encyclopaedia of the Philosophy of Law and Social Philosophy (Springer 2019)

J Dickson, ‘Does It Matter Where We Start?: Some Remarks on Some Remarks by John Gardner on the Methodology of Legal Philosophy’ (2019) 19 Jerusalem Review of Legal Studies 71

J Dickson, ‘Why General Jurisprudence is Interesting’ (2017) 49 Crítica 11

‘Estado del arte de la filosofía del derecho’ / ‘State of the Art in Legal Philosophy’ (2016) Problema (UNAM Press, México, D.F.). J.Dickson

Ours is a Broad Church: Indirectly Evaluative Legal Philosophy as a Facet of Jurisprudential Inquiry’ (2015) 6 Jurisprudence 207. J. Dickson

‘Who’s Afraid of Transnational Legal Theory?: Dangers and Desiderata ‘ (2015) Transnational Legal Theory, J. Dickson

‘Law and Its Theory: a Question of Priorities’ in R P George and J Keown (eds), Reason, Morality and Law: the Jurisprudence of John Finnis (Oxford University Press 2013) J. Dickson

‘Introduction: The Puzzles of European Union Law’ in J Dickson & P Eleftheriadis (eds), Philosophical Foundations of European Union Law (Oxford University Press 2012), J. Dickson and P. Eleftheriaidis

‘Legal Positivism: Contemporary Debates’ in Andrei Marmor (ed), The Routledge Companion to Philosophy of Law (Routledge 2012), J. Dickson

‘The Idea of a Legal System: Between the Real and the Ideal’ in N Walker (ed), MacCormick’s Scotland (Edinburgh University Press 2012), J. Dickson

‘Towards a Theory of European Union Legal Systems’ in J Dickson & P Eleftheriadis (eds), Philosophical Foundations of European Union Law (Oxford University Press 2012), J. Dickson

‘Directives in European Union Legal Systems: Whose Norms Are They Anyway?’ (2011) 17 European Law Journal 190, J. Dickson

‘On Naturalizing Jurisprudence: Some Comments on Brian Leiter’s View of What Jurisprudence Should Become ‘ (2011) 30 Law and Philosophy 477, J. Dickson

‘Is Bad Law Still Law? Is Bad Law Really Law?’ in Maksymilian Del Mar and Zenon Bankowski (eds), Law as Institutional Normative Order (Ashgate 2009), J. Dickson

‘How Many Legal Systems? Some Puzzles Regarding the Identity Conditions of, and Relations Between, Legal Systems in the European Union’ (2008) 2 Problema 9, J. Dickson

‘Is the Rule of Recognition Really a Conventional Rule?’ (2007) 27(3) Oxford Journal of Legal Studies 373, J. Dickson

‘Descriptive Legal Theory’ (2006) IVR Encyclopaedia of Jurisprudence, Legal Theory and Philosophy of Law, J. Dickson

Evaluación en la teoría del derecho (Spanish language edition of Evaluation and Legal Theory, UNAM Press, México, D.F. 2006), J. Dickson

‘Interpreting Normativity’ in Properties of Law: Essays in Honour of Jim Harris (OUP 2006), J. Dickson

‘Methodology in Jurisprudence: a critical survey’ (2004) 10(3) Legal Theory 117, J. Dickson

‘The Central Questions of Legal’ (2003) 56 Current Legal Problems 63, J. Dickson

Evaluation and Legal Theory (Hart Publishing 2001), J. Dickson

‘Interpretation and Coherence in Legal Reasoning’ (2001) (Fall 2001 Edition, revised June 2005 and September 2009) The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (ed. – E. Zalta), J. Dickson

‘Legal Positivism and Moral Scepticism: An Unholy Alliance?’ (1999) 28 Anglo-American Law Review 243, J. Dickson

Learn More Julie Dickson

Samantha Sebastian

Fellow & Tutor in Music; Associate Professor in Music Faculty of Music

Samantha Sebastian Fellow & Tutor in Music; Associate Professor in Music Faculty of Music

Share on

Profile
Publications

I am an Associate Professor in the Faculty of Music, and a Tutorial Fellow at Somerville.

My main research interests lie in music and migration, intercultural relations, and collective voice. One strand of my research focuses on the musical lives of migrant and former refugee communities, in emigration, diaspora and resettlement. Another focuses on the functionalisation of music as public pedagogy to enable self-representation and address intergroup conflict. In other projects I’ve examined the construction and experience of ‘diversity’ in secondary school music curricula. My current project is a community-engaged diasporic study about the interface between the musical voice and global labour migration, particularly in relation to Overseas Filipino Workers.

I publish on these topics in journals and edited volumes across ethnomusicology, community music, and music education, and serve on the editorial boards of International Journal of Community Music and Research Studies in Music Education.

My teaching for the Music Faculty includes convening courses on ‘Foundations in the Study of Music’, ‘Music in the Community’, ‘History and Philosophy of Music Education’, and ‘Music Education: Practice and Pedagogy’. In addition to these courses, at Somerville College, I provide tutorials for the modules on ‘Musical Thought and Scholarship’, ‘Critical Studies in Ethnomusicology’, ‘World Jazz’, and ‘Women in Popular Music’.

Recent postgraduate supervisees’ dissertation titles include, ‘Institutional music education and public pedagogy in Afghanistan’ (DPhil), ‘Music and trust in international relations: Bilateral relationship between Canada and France’ (DPhil), ‘Black musicians and accessibility to music education and the classical music industry, UK and US’ (MPhil), ‘Music integration programmes for migrants in North-Rhine Westphalia, Germany’ (MPhil).

The below-listed publications are authored under the name Samantha Sebastian Dieckmann or Samantha Dieckmann.

Encountering publicness and multiculture: Public pedagogy with a multilingual community choir. 2025 (forthcoming). Journal article. Ethnomusicology.

Voicing voicing: Attuning to the material in studio recording the Lullaby Choir. 2024. Journal article. Music Education Research.

Building bridges: Translating refugee narratives for public audiences with arts-based media. Journal article. Journal of Intercultural Studies. Co-author with Rose Campion.

War and conflict in resettlement contexts: Music in children’s everyday lives. 2021, in press. Book chapter. Oxford Handbook of Early Childhood Music Learning and Development. Co-author with Kathryn Marsh.

Addressing tribalism in displacement: Self-directed music activities in Blacktown’s South Sudanese community. 2020. Book chapter. My Body was Left on the Street: Music Education and Displacement.

From dropping out to dropping in: Exploring why individuals cease participation in musical activities and the support needed to reengage them. 2020. Journal article. Psychology of Aesthetics, Creativity, and the Arts. Co-author with Amanda Krause, Melissa Kirby and Jane W. Davidson.

Peace, empathy and conciliation through music. 2019. Journal special issue. International Journal of Community Music. Co-editor with Jane W. Davidson.

Bridging musical worlds: the effects of musical collaboration between student musician-educators and South Sudanese Australian youth. 2019. Book chapter. Visions of Intercultural Music Teacher Education. Co-author with Kathryn Marsh and Catherine Ingram.

Emotions. 2018. Journal article (co-authored). Music and Arts in Action. (Special issue: Keywords for music in peacebuilding). Co-author with Jane W. Davidson.

Organised cultural encounters: Collaboration and intercultural contact in a lullaby choir. 2018. Journal article. The World of Music (New Series). Co-author with Jane W. Davidson.

Constructing whiteness in Blacktown: Everyday encounters with diversity in Australia’s music. 2018. Book chapter. Diversity in Australia’s music: Themes Past, Present and for the Future.

Learn More Samantha Sebastian

Beate Dignas

Barbara Craig Fellow & Tutor in Ancient History; Associate Professor in Ancient History

Beate Dignas Barbara Craig Fellow & Tutor in Ancient History; Associate Professor in Ancient History

beate.dignas@some.ox.ac.uk

Share on

Profile
Publications

My broad interests are in Greek History and Religion, especially late Classical and Hellenistic, as well as in the cultures and history of ancient Anatolia.

More specifically, I focus on the Hellenistic Period, especially priesthood and the link between ethnic and religious identities.

I am currently engaged in a study of the religious landscape and cultural identity of pre-Attalid Pergamon. Stemming from articles on the religious identity of Attalid Pergamon this is evolving into a long-term research project with regular research output of article length but also ultimately a monograph that will bring together much interdisciplinary research and, I think, will be of interest to a wide scholarly community. At present I am investigating the genesis of the cult of Dionysus in Mysia as well as the possible identification/ association of the Attalid hero Telephos with the Hittite divinity/ ruler Telepinu.

I am also beginning work on a comprehensive study on ‘Satyrs in the Hellenistic World’, trying to approach the phenomenon of the satyr in visual and textual culture not from an art-historical but cultural perspective. Apart from looking at the religious dimension and investigating the role of the satyr in Dionysiac worship the study will relate the figure of the satyr to the expressions and responses of Hellenistic societies, both local and transregional.

Economy of the Sacred in Hellenistic and Roman Asia Minor’ (Oxford University Press 2002)

Rome and Persia in Late Antiquity’ (together with E. Winter, Cambridge University Press 2007; repr. 2008; Persian translation 2008)

Practitioners of the Divine: Greek Priests and Religious Officials from Homer to Heliodorus’ (edited together with K. Trampedach, Harvard University Press 2008)

Creating the Past, Controlling the Present: Historical and Religious Memory in the Ancient World’ (edited together with R.R.R. Smith, Oxford University Press 2012)

Priests and Prophets among Pagans, Jews and Christians (edited together with R.C.T. Parker and G.G. Stroumsa, Peeters 2013)

Learn More Beate Dignas

Emily Flashman

Fellow and Tutor in Biology; Associate Professor in Molecular Plant Sciences

Emily Flashman Fellow and Tutor in Biology; Associate Professor in Molecular Plant Sciences

Share on

Profile

Emily is an Associate Professor in the Department of Biology.

She leads a research group investigating enzymes involved in stress-sensing, with a particular focus on oxygen-sensing enzymes in plants and their role in flood tolerance. She gained her BSc in Biochemistry at the University of Southampton and her DPhil in the Department of Cardiovascular Medicine in Oxford.

Emily’s research uses a molecular approach to understand the structural and functional properties of enzymes involved in plant stress responses. This understanding will enable targeted manipulation of the activity of these enzymes. By correlating biochemical and biological studies, Emily will be able to identify and implement interventions that can improve plant stress tolerance. Ultimately, she hopes this will help reduce crop losses as a result of climate change.

Learn More Emily Flashman

Christopher Hare

Fellow & Tutor in Law; Travers Smith Associate Professor of Corporate and Commercial Law; Dean

Christopher Hare Fellow & Tutor in Law; Travers Smith Associate Professor of Corporate and Commercial Law; Dean

christopher.hare@law.ox.ac.uk

Share on

Profile
Publications

Christopher Hare is an Associate Professor of Law and a Fellow of Somerville College.

Christopher was an undergraduate at Trinity College, Cambridge and was in the first cohort of students to spend their third year at the University of Poitiers, France. He then spent a year at Harvard Law School (LLM) and read for the BCL at Brasenose College.

Christopher initially practised as a barrister at 3 Verulam Buildings, Gray’s Inn before moving to a fellowship and college lectureship at Jesus College, Cambridge.

He has spent the last seven years in New Zealand, where he was a Senior Lecturer in the Law Faculty at the University of Auckland. Christopher’s teaching and research interests lie broadly in the law of obligations and the corporate and commercial law fields, with particular focus on domestic and international banking law, corporate finance, and shareholder remedies.

C Hare, ‘The Duties of Bank Customers: W(h)ither Tai Hing?’ (2012) 23 Journal of Banking and Finance Law and Practice 1

C Hare, Company Law in New Zealand (LexisNexis 2011)

C Hare, ‘Banking Law’ (2011) New Zealand Law Review 121

Learn More Christopher Hare

Michael Hayward

Fellow & Tutor in Inorganic Chemistry; Professor of Inorganic Chemistry

Michael Hayward Fellow & Tutor in Inorganic Chemistry; Professor of Inorganic Chemistry

michael.hayward@chem.ox.ac.uk

01865 272623

Share on

Profile
Publications

Dr Hayward’s research focuses on the synthesis and characterisation of novel solids, with a particular interest in new electronic and magnetic materials.

A particular area of interest is the utilization of unusual synthetic techniques and conditions to increase the degree of control and selectivity exhibited by solid state reactions, with a view to undertaking the directed synthesis of ‘designed’ solid-state compounds. Synthetic effort in the group is focused in two major areas: Low-temperature Topochemical Manipulation of Solids and the Synthesis of Complex Cation-Ordered Phases.

Mike completed his D.Phil. in Oxford under the supervision of Prof. M.J. Rosseinsky (now at the University of Liverpool). After completing a period of post-doctoral research with Prof. R.J. Cava at Princeton University he returned to Oxford, initially as a Royal Society University Research Fellow and is now a Professor of Inorganic Chemistry and Fellow of Somerville College.

‘Switching between Proper and Hybrid-Improper Polar Structures via Cation Substitution in A(2)La(TaTi)O-7 (A = Li, Na)’, Mallick, S, Fortes, AD, Zhang, W, Halasyamani, PS, Hayward, 2021, Chemistry of Materials Vol 33 Issue 7

‘Polar Structures of KNdNb2O7 and KNdTa2O7’ Mallick, S, Gibbs, AS, Zhang, W, Halasyamani, PS, Benedek, NA, Hayward, MA, 2020, Chemistry of Materials Vol. 32 Issue 18

‘LaSrCo0.5Rh0.5O3.25 and LaSrNi0.5Rh0.5O3.25:Topochemically Reduced, Mixed Valence Rh(I)/Rh(III) Oxides.’ Xu, Z, Palgrave, RG, Hayward, MA, 2020, Inorganic Chemistry Vol. 59 Issue 18

‘Structure and magnetism of the Rh4+-containing perovskite oxides La0.5Sr0.5Mn0.5Rh0.5O3 and La0.5Sr0.5Fe0.5Rh0.5O3’, Hasanli, N, Scrimshire, A, Bingham, PA, Palgrave, RG, Hayward, MA, 2020, Daltan Transactions, Royal Society of Chemistry

‘Preparation of the noncentrosymmetric ferrimagnetic phase La0.9Ba0.1Mn0.96O2.43 by topochemical reduction’, Parsons, T, Hadermann, J, Halasyamani, P, Hayward, M, 2020, Journal of Solid State Chemistry, Volume 287

Learn More Michael Hayward

Michelle Jackson

Fellow & Tutor in Ecology; Associate Professor of Freshwater/Marine Ecology

Michelle Jackson Fellow & Tutor in Ecology; Associate Professor of Freshwater/Marine Ecology

michelle.jackson@zoo.ox.ac.uk

Share on

Profile
Publications

I am a Professor of Freshwater Ecology in the Department of Zoology, and a Tutorial Fellow at Somerville.

My main research interest lies in understanding individual-to-ecosystem level responses to environmental change, including warming, invasion, pollution and habitat loss. I am particularly interested in interactions among these stressors, and how stressor effects cascade through food webs with implications for ecosystem processes and services. I use a combination of field studies across both natural and anthropogenic stressor gradients, manipulative experiments and meta-analyses to seek general predictive rules in multiple stressor effects. Most of my research is in freshwater ecosystems, spanning from the Arctic to the tropics.

My lab group’s website can be found at jacksonlab.co.uk

Quality over quantity: Trophic cascades in a warming world
April 2021. Journal article. Functional Ecology

The Temporal Dynamics of Multiple Stressor Effects: From Individuals to Ecosystems
January 2021. Journal article. Trends in Ecology and Evolution

Influence of nutrient enrichment on the growth, recruitment and trophic ecology of a highly invasive freshwater fish
December 2020. Journal article. Aquatic Ecology.

Food web properties vary with climate and land use in South African streams
August 2020. Journal article. Functional Ecology.

Towards a unified study of multiple stressors: divisions and common goals across research disciplines.
May 2020. Journal article. Proc Biol Sci

Invasion syndromes: a systematic approach for predicting biological invasions and facilitating effective management
May 2020. Journal article. Biological Invasions

Using stable isotope analysis to answer fundamental questions in invasion ecology: Progress and prospects
February 2020. Journal article. Methods in Ecology and Evolution.

Bending the rules: exploitation of allochthonous resources by a top-predator modifies size-abundance scaling in stream food webs.
December 2018. Journal article. Ecology letters

Learn More Michelle Jackson

Sara Kalim

Fellow and Director of Development

Sara Kalim Fellow and Director of Development

sara.kalim@some.ox.ac.uk

01865 280596

Share on

Profile

Sara Kalim read Classics at Somerville from 1990-94. She then spent 14 years in the media, working as Head of Development for two major television production companies. Her work included developing access and ideas, and fundraising for documentaries and current affairs programming.

Sara has most recently worked for the University of Oxford for three years at the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism, Department of Politics and International Relations, where she held responsibility for financial and strategic planning, and played an instrumental role in securing journalism scholarships from a variety of funding sources.

As Director of Development, Sara oversees Somerville’s fundraising strategy and development, is responsible for fundraising campaigns (including for the Margaret Thatcher Scholarship Trust and the Oxford India Centre), and heads up the Development Team. She is also a member of the College’s Management Team.

Sara has a long-standing family connection to India, with family coming from Patna, Bihar. She also studied at Somerville making her the perfect advocate to drive the further development of the Centre. Sara’s focus is on fundraising and profile-raising working with philanthropists and corporate partners.

If you are interested in making a gift, or are thinking about leaving a legacy, please do not hesitate to get in touch.

Learn More Sara Kalim

Simon Kemp

Fellow & Tutor in French; Associate Professor of French

Simon Kemp Fellow & Tutor in French; Associate Professor of French

simon.kemp@some.ox.ac.uk

Share on

Profile
Publications

I teach French literature and language for the college and university.

Although I teach a wide variety of literature from the nineteenth century onwards, my main interest is in twentieth- and twenty-first-century French culture. I’m currently working on the second volume of a trilogy of academic studies on the representation of consciousness and the unconscious mind.

The first volume, Writing the Mind, explored how writers since Marcel Proust have drawn on ideas from religion, philosophy, psychoanalysis and science for their understanding of how the mind works, and reflected these ideas in the minds of the characters who people their fiction. From existentialist theories of consciousness in Jean-Paul Sartre’s philosophical novels to neuroscience and evolutionary theory in Marie Darrieussecq’s recent writing, by way of Freudian psychoanalysis in André Breton’s Surrealist texts or theological speculations in Georges Bernanos’s Catholic novels, the human mind has been presented in subtly and fascinatingly different ways across the course of the last century. I have been unpicking these differences in order to chart developments in literary representation, drawing up a cultural history of consciousness.

The second volume, Reading the Mind, examines the validity and usefulness of competing theories of the mind in literary criticism, and the final volume, Seeing the Mind, will focus these same concerns on film studies.

I also continue to speak and publish on topics relating to two previous monographs: the use and abuse of detective stories by French literary writers keen to explore themes of perception, reason and truth, and the state of narrative form in the contemporary French literary novel, conceived as a ‘return to the story’ in the wake of a period dominated by radical experiment.

I also maintain a lively interest in translation studies, and currently convene the Advanced French Translation course for the university. In 2007, I received the University Teaching Award for outstanding contribution to learning and teaching.

When I came to Somerville in 2010, I set up the college’s annual Study Day, offering sixth-formers a taste of the university experience, and I continue to be heavily involved in the college’s outreach programmes. I also set up the Modern Language Faculty’s Schools and Outreach blog ‘Adventures on the Bookshelf‘ a few years ago, which is full of information about modern languages as a subject, and applying and studying here.

I welcome enquiries from anyone considering taking an undergraduate or graduate degree at Somerville.

Adventures on the Bookshelf

‘« Comment peut-on être cochon ? » : Darwinisme et conscience chez Darrieussecq’, Dalhousie French Studies, 115 (2020), 21-28.

‘L’Usage de la parole : Darrieussecq, Sarraute et le langage de la pensée’, in K. Germoni, S. Milcent-Lawson and C. Narjoux (eds), L’Écriture « entre deux mondes » de Marie Darrieussecq, (Éditions universitaires de Dijon, 2019).

‘« La même d’une phrase à l’autre » : Language and selfhood in Marie-Darrieussecq’s twenty-first-century fictions’, Crossways, 3(1) (2019)

‘L’Après-Œdipe : the future of psychoanalytic criticism in an era of cognitive and evolutionary psychology’, Australian Journal of French Studies, 55 (2018), 237-47

Writing the Mind: Representing Consciousness From Proust to the Present (London: Routledge, 2017)

Learn More Simon Kemp

Robin Klemm

Fellow & Tutor in Medicine; Associate Professor of Physiological Metabolism

Robin Klemm Fellow & Tutor in Medicine; Associate Professor of Physiological Metabolism

robin.klemm@dpag.ox.ac.uk

Share on

Profile
Publications

Robin’s research focuses on the molecular basis of lipid metabolism in professional fat storing cells called adipocytes.

He carried out his PhD work at the Max Planck Institute of Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics in the lab of Kai Simons. Robin worked on the sorting principles of lipids in the secretory pathway and developed novel organelle isolation methods allowing the rapid purification of several organelles for analysis by mass spectrometry-based proteomics and lipidomics. He presented the first quantitative membrane lipidomes of eukaryotic organelles and identified the role of sphingolipids and sterols in the formation of secretory vesicles at the trans-Golgi network.

During his postdoctoral work at the Harvard Medical School in the lab of Tom Rapoport, Robin reconstituted homotypic ER fusion pathways with purified GTPases of the dynamin family called Atlastin in metazoans and Sey1p in yeast. Depletion of these ER fusogens had unexpected consequences for lipid droplet biology and whole-body lipid metabolism.

Starting his independent work as a group leader at the University of Zurich, Robin switched his focus to lipid droplet biology in adipocytes. The Klemm lab has identified new molecular machinery coupling mitochondria to the ER and adipocyte lipid droplets. The spatial organization of metabolism across several organelles is a fascinating aspect of cellular biochemistry and its regulation and control is absolutely crucial for whole body health and metabolic homeostasis.

In 2020, Robin moved his lab to the University of Oxford. At the Department of Physiology, Anatomy and Genetics, his group investigates the molecular basis of adipocyte LD formation, spatial organization of lipid metabolism and the role of de novo lipogenesis in the etiology of obesity and type II diabetes.

Adipocyte-like signature in ovarian cancer minimal residual disease identifies metabolic vulnerabilities of tumor initiating cells
Journal article
Artibani M. et al, (2021), JCI Insight

Getting in Touch Is an Important Step: Control of Metabolism at Organelle Contact Sites
Journal article
Klemm RW., (2021), Contact, 4, 251525642199370 – 251525642199370

The cell biology of lipid droplets: More than just a phase.
Journal article
Klemm RW. and Ikonen E., (2020), Semin Cell Dev Biol, 108, 1 – 3

Essential role of non-vesicular lipid transport in microtubule-controlled cell polarisation
Journal article
Hersberger-Trost M. et al, (2020)

Principles of organelle spatial organization and interactions.
Journal article
Klemm RW. and Carvalho P., (2020), Mol Biol Cell, 31, 401 – 402

Learn More Robin Klemm

Chris Wells

Head of Maintenance

Chris Wells Head of Maintenance

maintenance.head@some.ox.ac.uk

Share on

Profile

Learn More Chris Wells

Irangani Abeysekera

Honorary Fellow

Irangani Abeysekera Honorary Fellow

Share on

Profile

Irangani Abeysekera is a former Sri Lankan ambassador.

After reading Modern History at Somerville, she became her country’s first female career diplomat, serving in the UK, Thailand and Germany.

Learn More Irangani Abeysekera

1 2 3 … 21 >

Emeritus, Honorary and Foundation Fellows

Baroness Royall of Blaisdon

Prateek Agrawal

Daniel Anthony

Jonathan Burton

Sarah Butler

Dan Ciubotaru

Julie Dickson

Samantha Sebastian

Beate Dignas

Emily Flashman

Christopher Hare

Michael Hayward

Michelle Jackson

Sara Kalim

Simon Kemp

Robin Klemm

Chris Wells

Irangani Abeysekera

A Brief History of Somerville

Postgraduate

Interactive Map