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New leadership for MICRA

05 Feb 2020

Alistair Burns becomes new Director.

The Manchester Institute for Collaborative Research on Ageing (MICRA) welcomes Professor Alistair Burns as its new Director, as Professor Debora Price recently stepped down from her role as Director after an exceptional five years.

Alistair brings a wealth of experience: he was Editor of the International Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry for 20 years, (retiring in 2017) and is on the editorial boards of the British Journal of Psychiatry and International Psychogeriatrics. His research and clinical interests are in mental health problems of older people, particularly dementia and Alzheimer's disease.

Alistair says of his appointment: “It is with great pleasure that I take over as the Director of MICRA. Debora Price has done an outstanding job for the last five years. We know that ageing is a huge challenge for us all and I look forward to working with colleagues across the widest possible scope of disciplines to further our academic and pragmatic work in this area. The unique strengths of MICRA are many but include our links with the city region and the huge diversity of experience and expertise which the university and our partners can bring to bear on the issue of ageing.”

Also supporting Alistair will be Professor Tarani Chandola and Professor Rachel Watson as joint Deputy Directors.

Tarani is a Professor of Medical Sociology. He is a fellow of the Academy of Social Sciences and the Royal Statistical Society and is editor-in-chief of the journal Sociology. He said: “I am delighted to join MICRA’s leadership team. As someone who is a member of the UK-China Healthy Ageing Expert Working Group, I am keen that MICRA develops its already considerable international profile”.

Rachel Watson Professor of Cutaneous Science in the School of Biological Sciences, Faculty of Biology, Medicine and Health. She said: “My entire research career has been focused on understanding the biological impact of ageing. I am thrilled to be part of this multidisciplinary network of researchers; MICRA allows us to lift our heads up from our own research and see the impact of ageing more broadly, allowing interaction with other disciplines with the aim of improving older life.”