Professor Stephen R Bloom

Steve Bloom is the Head of Division for Diabetes, Endocrinology and Metabolism, Chair of the academic Section of Investigative Medicine at Imperial College London and Chief of Service for Pathology at Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust. He heads a 40 strong research team investigating the physiology of regulatory peptides in CNS and periphery.

Professor Bloom received his undergraduate medical training at Cambridge University. His house officer, senior house officer and registrar posts were largely undertaken at The Middlesex Hospital where he also received his MRC Clinical Research Fellow training. He moved to the Royal Postgraduate Medical School at Hammersmith Hospital in 1974 where his roles have included Senior Lecturer (Consultant Physician), Reader in Medicine, Chairman of the Higher Degrees Committee and Academic Board, Professor of Medicine (Honorary Consultant Physician), Director of the Endocrinology Clinical Service and Deputy Director, Department of Medicine, Director of Chemical Pathology (renamed Metabolic Medicine and later Investigative Medicine), Chief of Clinical Service Chemical Pathology and Chief of Service Endocrinology and Diabetes.

His research work over the years falls into five related categories: endocrinology clinical research, physiology and pathology of gut hormones, control of insulin release and insulin resistance, role of neuropeptides in organ control and the role of neuropeptides in CNS regulation of appetite and related hypothalamic functions. He currently leads a research group investigating hypothalamic appetite control systems and gut hormones. This group’s discovery that oxyntomodulin reduces appetite offers a potential new treatment for obesity and in 2005 Steve co-founded spin out company ‘Thiakis Ltd’ to commercialise these findings.

In the past Steve has been a member of the Main Scientific Board for AstraZeneca and advisory boards for Upjohn and Novartis. He has published over 1000 papers (excluding review articles) in journals such as Nature, J Biol Chem, PNAS, JCI and NEJM