Catherine Mary Green is an English biologist who is an Associate Professor in Chromosome Dynamics at the Wellcome Centre for Human Genetics at the

University of Oxford , mottoeng = The Lord is my light , established = , endowment = £6.1 billion (including colleges) (2019) , budget = £2.145 billion (2019–20) , chancellor ...

. Her research considers chromosome stability during the replication of DNA. During the

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic, also known as the coronavirus pandemic, is an ongoing global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The novel virus was first identif ...

Green was part of the Oxford team who developed the

Oxford–AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine The Oxford–AstraZeneca COVID19 vaccine, sold under the brand names Covishield and Vaxzevria among others, is a viral vector vaccine for prevention of COVID-19. Developed in the United Kingdom by Oxford University and British-Swedish comp ...

Early life and education

Green grew up in

Gravesend Gravesend is a town in northwest Kent, England, situated 21 miles (35 km) east-southeast of Charing Cross (central London) on the Bank (geography), south bank of the River Thames and opposite Tilbury in Essex. Located in the diocese of Ro ...

and attended Gravesend Grammar School for Girls. She was an undergraduate at

Churchill College, Cambridge Churchill College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge, England. It has a primary focus on science, engineering and technology, but still retains a strong interest in the arts and humanities. In 1958, a trust was establish ...

, where she has said that her love of science was solidified. After completing part II of the

Natural Sciences Tripos The Natural Sciences Tripos (NST) is the framework within which most of the science at the University of Cambridge is taught. The tripos includes a wide range of Natural Sciences from physics, astronomy, and geoscience, to chemistry and biology, ...

and herewith obtaining a BA degree from Cambridge, Green was awarded an

Imperial Cancer Research Fund Cancer Research UK (CRUK) is the world's largest independent cancer research organization. It is registered as a charity in the United Kingdom and Isle of Man, and was formed on 4 February 2002 by the merger of The Cancer Research Campaign and t ...

(now Cancer Research UK) scholarship for her doctoral research. Green studied damaged DNA in

yeast Yeasts are eukaryotic, single-celled microorganisms classified as members of the fungus kingdom. The first yeast originated hundreds of millions of years ago, and at least 1,500 species are currently recognized. They are estimated to constitut ...

at the Clare Hall laboratories. After earning her PhD degree from the

University College London , mottoeng = Let all come who by merit deserve the most reward , established = , type = Public research university , endowment = £143 million (2020) , budget = ...

in 2000, Green moved to the Curie Institute, where she studied

DNA damage DNA repair is a collection of processes by which a cell identifies and corrects damage to the DNA molecules that encode its genome. In human cells, both normal metabolic activities and environmental factors such as radiation can cause DNA da ...

in human cells as a Marie Curie Fellow. Upon returning to the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotland, Wales and North ...

Green was appointed to the

University of Sussex , mottoeng = Be Still and Know , established = , type = Public research university , endowment = £14.4 million (2020) , budget = £319.6 million (2019–20) , chancellor = Sanjeev Bhaskar , vice_chancellor = Sasha Roseneil , ...

, where she studied DNA damage due to sunlight exposure.

Research and career

Green was made a

Cancer Research UK Cancer Research UK (CRUK) is the world's largest independent cancer research organization. It is registered as a charity in the United Kingdom and Isle of Man, and was formed on 4 February 2002 by the merger of The Cancer Research Campaign and t ...

Research Fellow in the Department of Zoology at the University of Cambridge in 2008. She held a Kaye Research Fellowship at

Christ's College, Cambridge Christ's College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge. The college includes the Master, the Fellows of the College, and about 450 undergraduate and 170 graduate students. The college was founded by William Byngham in 1437 as ...

. Her research considered the mechanisms of genome replication at the genetic and epigenetic levels. During this replication process the mutations that are responsible for

cancer Cancer is a group of diseases involving abnormal cell growth with the potential to invade or spread to other parts of the body. These contrast with benign tumors, which do not spread. Possible signs and symptoms include a lump, abnormal b ...

can occur, or be fixed. Understanding the process that underpins this replication, and how cells control this replication, allows Green to better understand the development of cancer. In 2012 Green moved to the

University of Oxford , mottoeng = The Lord is my light , established = , endowment = £6.1 billion (including colleges) (2019) , budget = £2.145 billion (2019–20) , chancellor ...

, where she joined the Wellcome Centre for Human Genetics. Here Green expanded her work in genomics to encompass the genetic and epigenetic stability of DNA. Green was made Monsanto Senior Research Fellow at

Exeter College, Oxford Exeter College (in full: The Rector and Scholars of Exeter College in the University of Oxford) is one of the Colleges of the University of Oxford, constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England and the fourth-oldest college of the un ...

in 2017. She leads the core facility in Chromosome Dynamics at the Wellcome Centre. During the

Green was part of the

Jenner Institute The Jenner Institute is a research institute on the Old Road Campus in Headington, east Oxford, England. It was formed in November 2005 through a partnership between the University of Oxford and the UK Institute for Animal Health. It is ass ...

team who developed a

coronavirus disease Coronavirus diseases are caused by viruses in the coronavirus subfamily, a group of related RNA viruses that cause diseases in mammal Mammals () are a group of vertebrate animals constituting the class Mammalia (), characterized by ...

vaccine. The Jenner Institute vaccination platform had been prepared for the

MERS Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS) is a viral respiratory infection caused by ''Middle East respiratory syndrome–related coronavirus'' (MERS-CoV). Symptoms may range from none, to mild, to severe. Typical symptoms include fever, cough, ...

and

SARS Severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) is a viral respiratory disease of zoonotic origin caused by the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus (SARS-CoV or SARS-CoV-1), the first identified strain of the SARS coronavirus species, ''sever ...

outbreaks, and so was ready to respond quickly to the emerging disease. Green worked with

Sarah Gilbert Dame Sarah Catherine Gilbert (born April 1962) is an English vaccinologist who is a Professor of Vaccinology at the University of Oxford and co-founder of Vaccitech. She specialises in the development of vaccines against influenza and emergi ...

on the production of the

ChAdOx1 nCoV-19 ChAdOx1 is an adenoviral vector for vaccines that was developed by the Jenner Institute, University of Oxford. The vector is a chimpanzee adenovirus modified to avoid its replication. Adenoviruses are effective vectors for inducing and boosting ...

vaccination. The team started research in January 2020, and managed to identify a chimpanzee

adenovirus Adenoviruses (members of the family ''Adenoviridae'') are medium-sized (90–100 nm), nonenveloped (without an outer lipid bilayer) viruses with an icosahedral nucleocapsid containing a double-stranded DNA genome. Their name derives from the ...

vector (ChAdOx) that generated a strong immune response to

SARS-CoV-2 Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS‑CoV‑2) is a strain of coronavirus that causes COVID-19 (coronavirus disease 2019), the respiratory illness responsible for the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. The virus previously had a ...

. They used the SARS-CoV-2 genome that had beens sequenced by researchers in

Wuhan Wuhan (, ; ; ) is the capital of Hubei, Hubei Province in the China, People's Republic of China. It is the largest city in Hubei and the most populous city in Central China, with a population of over eleven million, the List of cities in China ...

. The adenovirus cannot replicate, so does not cause further infection, and instead acts as a vector to transfer the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein. The spike protein, an external protein that enables the virus to enter cells, is responsible for the immune system response. In early April the team were awarded £22 million of funding from the

Government of the United Kingdom ga, Rialtas a Shoilse gd, Riaghaltas a Mhòrachd , image = HM Government logo.svg , image_size = 220px , image2 = Royal Coat of Arms of the United Kingdom (HM Government).svg , image_size2 = 180px , caption = Royal coat of arms of t ...

to run human trials. The vaccine underwent clinical trials in

Oxford Oxford () is a city in England. It is the county town and only city of Oxfordshire. In 2020, its population was estimated at 151,584. It is north-west of London, south-east of Birmingham and north-east of Bristol. The city is home to the ...

in April 2020, which were successful. As of January 2022 more than 2.5 billion doses of the vaccine have been released to more than 170 countries worldwide. In 2021 Green and Sarah Gilbert published ''Vaxxers: the inside story of the Oxford AstraZeneca vaccine and the race against the virus''.

Selected publications

Green has an

h-index The ''h''-index is an author-level metric that measures both the productivity and citation impact of the publications, initially used for an individual scientist or scholar. The ''h''-index correlates with obvious success indicators such as winn ...

of 39 according to

Google Scholar Google Scholar is a freely accessible web search engine that indexes the full text or metadata of scholarly literature across an array of publishing formats and disciplines. Released in beta in November 2004, the Google Scholar index includes p ...

. Her publications include: * * * *

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Green, Catherine M. Year of birth missing (living people) Living people People educated at Mayfield Grammar School Alumni of Churchill College, Cambridge Alumni of University College London British biochemists Academics of the University of Oxford Academics of the University of Cambridge British women biologists Women biochemists