Dr. Kelly McNagny – Ph.D.
Dr. Kelly McNagny
Ph.D.
Dr. Kelly McNagny is a full professor in Medical Genetics and Biomedical Engineering, the Associate Director of the Canadian AllerGen Network Centre of Excellence, and Co-Director of its Biomarkers and Bioinformatics Platform and fills leadership roles in the Canadian Stem Cell Network Centre of Excellence (Sub-Chair of the Trainee Education Committee). His work focuses on stem cell behavior, innate immune responses, inflammatory disease, kidney disease, cancer biology and therapeutics. In 2015 he also served as the Scientific Director of the Centre for Drug Research and Development (CDRD), a National Centre of Excellence aimed at translating early stage scientific discoveries into therapies. He obtained a BSc in Biology and Biotechnology at Worcester Polytechnic Institute in Massachusetts in 1984, and subsequently a Ph.D in Cellular Immunology at the U of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB) in 1990. At UAB he worked with Dr. Max D. Cooper (Howard Hughes Medical Institute and National Academy of Sciences) and his research focused on cell surface proteins that regulate B cell maturation and homing. He then moved to the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Heidelberg, Germany where he performed his postdoctoral studies in the lab of Dr. Thomas Graf from 1991 to 1996. There his work focused on transcriptional control of hematopoietic stem cell maturation and cell fate. He performed some of the first studies to identify transcription factors that regulate the gene expression and differentiation of eosinophils, which are known to play a major role in allergic and asthmatic responses. In addition, he identified a number of novel hematopoietic stem cell surface proteins (the CD34 family) and began analyzing their function. He continued his studies at the EMBL as a semi-independent, Visiting Scientist from 1996 to 1998 prior to starting his own laboratory at The Biomedical Research Centre, at UBC in Vancouver. He has garnered several awards including the 2004 Showell-Pfizer Junior Faculty Award from the American Association for Immunology, a MSFHR Career Investigator Award.