Maddy did her PhD at UCL, studying roles for mechanical forces in dermal scarring. She moved to CRUK London Research Institute for her postdoctoral training, where she developed advanced imaging approaches to understand adhesion receptor signalling in cancer progression. She was awarded a Royal Society University Research fellowship to start her lab at King’s College London in 2006 and was subsequently appointed as Reader in 2013 and Professor in 2015.
Maddys research focuses on understanding how external mechanical or biochemical cues influence receptor activation and cell behaviour in diseases such as cancer, fibrosis and inflammatory diseases. Her work is highly interdisciplinary in nature, working with clinicians, physicists, engineers and computational scientists to explore advanced technological solutions to understand disease mechanisms. She also works extensively with technology and pharmaceutical companies to translate her research for patient benefit.
Maddy founded and is Director of both the Nikon Imaging Centre and Microscopy Innovation Centres at King’s that offer open access to advanced light microscopy platforms to researchers both at King’s and externally. She is also Director of the newly established Smart Trials Hub at King’s – a unique facility housing state of the art multimodal technology platforms and data science solutions for human tissue profiling, enabling discovery of novel therapies and personalised medicine approaches.
Maddy has extensive additional leadership roles in academia and beyond. She is currently Dean for Research Excellence Frameworks at King’s, having previously held the role as Vice Dean for Impact & Innovation, with oversight of academic-industry partnering activities across life sciences and medicine. Maddy currently Chairs the Molecular and Cellular Medicine Board at UKRI-MRC, contributing to shaping national biomedical funding strategies. She additionally chairs the EuroBioImaging Board, a European open access imaging infrastructure funded by 19 member states and is a member of 6 further scientific advisory boards for national and international organisations. Maddy is also Honorary Secretary for life Sciences and a council member for the Royal Microscopical Society. She has received several awards in recognition of her work and is a fellow of the Royal Microscopy Society and Academy of Medical Sciences.
