Dr Stephany Veuger

Dr Stephany Veuger is an Associate Professor in Applied sciences,  Previously she has held posts with Sunderland University (Senior Lecturer in Clinical Biochemistry in the Department of Pharmacy, Health and Well-being), the Open University (lecturer) and Newcastle University  (lecturer and e-learning developer).

Her first class degree in biomedical sciences was obtained at Northumbria University and her PhD on the interactive effects of Poly(ADP-ribose) polymerase and DNA-dependent protein kinase in response to DNA damage was obtained in the Cancer Research Unit at Newcastle university. 

Stephany holds an MA in Education Leadership and is building a strong teaching and learning focus to her research She is committed to remaining up-to-date with new developments in the fields of medical education and health sciences to ensure improvement of learning and teaching quality. Her pedagogical interests lie in student autonomy and self-regulation as she strongly believes that independent learning offers a route to lifelong learning. She was awarded senior fellow of the Higher Education Academy in recognition of her support of staff as well as student practice and is now a mentor and reviewer for staff hoping to gain fellowship.

In addition to her pedagogic and scientific research activities, Stephany has participated in numerous community outreach and fundraising activities benefitting cancer sufferers and cancer research. She has co-hosted a one day practical course in cancer research for A level students and their teachers as part of Newcastle Cancer centre’s community engagement programme.

Stephany teaches extensively on the Medical Diploma which is run in collaboration with St Georges University in Grenada in the Caribbean and on the undergraduate and postgraduate courses for Biomedical Sciences;

Further Information

Senior fellow of the Higher Education Academy (SFHEA)

Member of the European Medical Writer’s Association (EMWA)

Research themes & scholarly interests

A major focus of her research has been to evaluate DNA repair inhibitors as potential drugs to be used in combination with current therapies or as stand-alone therapies in cancer treatment. She has supported anticancer drug discovery projects by (1) evaluating drugs to exploit underlying molecular defects in a range of human cancers (2) investigating interactive effects of proteins involved in the sensing and responding to DNA damage (3) developing and validating pharmacodynamic biomarkers for agents progressing to clinical trials. She has played a key role within the drug development group at the Northern Cancer Centre where her work evaluating agents progressing to clinical trials and in developing biomarkers contributed towards the successful introduction of PARP inhibitors into patients. Stephany is currently focussing on the repurposing of PARP -1 inhibitors for cancer therapy. Stephany is collaborating with medicinal chemists at Northumbria University to explore the underlying biological mechanisms of novel therapeutics both alone and in combination with repair inhibitors  

Stephany's research is focussed on the mechanisms of DNA repair following ionising radiation/chemotherapeutic drugs and the role of NFkappa B in mediating resistance. Much of this is mechanistic in nature and relates an understanding of the contribution of activated NFkappa B to cellular responses to DNA damage with disease resistance to therapy. This is important as by defining resistance mechanisms to IR and clinically important DNA damaging agents, it has important implications for the way in which cancer therapies are used and how future regimens may be developed (disease to medicine use). She has an interest in both solid tumours (breast and prostate) and haematological malignancies (AML, CLL) as well as paediatric malignancies (neuroblastoma).

Translational studies - so called- ‘bench to bedside’ are the focus of some of her research in chronic lymphoblastic leukaemia (CLL) and the application of DNA-PK or ATM inhibitors. This work is currently under review.