Garry Laverty

Reader in Pharmaceutical Sciences at School of Pharmacy, Queen's University Belfast

Presenter

Dr Garry Laverty is a current Royal Society-Leverhulme Trust Senior Research Fellow and Reader in Pharmaceutical Sciences at Queens University Belfast. His research focuses on using peptide-like hydrogels for drug delivery and biomaterial applications, authoring 56 papers and securing £3.1 million as Project Lead. His work has been published within top-tier journals such as the Journal of the American Chemical Society, Journal of Controlled Release and Advanced Healthcare Materials,.

His research studies peptides that have the ability to form hydrogel structures when triggered specific physiological stimuli (e.g. pH, temperature, enzymes). They have huge potential within the fields of drug delivery and biomaterials with the group's focus primarily on the development of sustained release drug delivery systems e.g. long-acting injectables to improve adherence to medicines, antimicrobial biomaterials and drug delivery systems with the ability to cross biological barriers.

Using peptides provides a unique ability to tailor the peptide sequence to desired functional properties biocompatibility, biodegradability, mechanical strength, drug release and functionality.

His work is funded by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC), the Medical Research Council (MRC), the Wellcome Trust, the Royal Society, the Leverhulme Trust, Innovate UK, Invest NI and Intertrade Ireland alongside successful applications to Institut Laue-Langevin (ILL, Grenoble) and the UK Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC) for neutron scattering beam time.

His most recent work relates to the development of an injectable in situ forming peptide hydrogel implant for sustained drug delivery. EPSRC, MRC and Wellcome Trust support has allowed this to be developed primarily for use in HIV/AIDs and combined contraception but this system is also showing promise for use in conditions with medication adherence and drug delivery issues (e.g. ocular use, cancer, tuberculosis, malaria, antipsychotics). Commercialisation has been driven by Innovate UK (and Invest NI funding, resulting in an international patent application (WO/2024/200593).