Irish-British physician and scientist (born 1958)
Sir Stephen Patrick O'Rahilly
FRS
FRCP
FRCPI
FRCPath
FMedSci
FRSB
MRIA (born 1 April 1958) is an Irish-British
physician and scientist known for his research into the molecular
pathogenesis of human
obesity ,
insulin resistance and related metabolic and
endocrine disorders.
[2]
[3]
[4]
[5]
[6]
[7]
[8]
[9]
[10]
O'Rahilly was born on 1 April 1958 in
Dublin , Ireland.
[11]
[12] He was educated at Beneavin De La Salle College in
Finglas , Dublin.
[1] He studied medicine at
University College Dublin , graduating in 1981 with
Bachelor of Medicine, Bachelor of Surgery, Bachelor of Obstetrics (MB BCh BAO) degrees.
[11]
[12] He later continued his studies and completed a
Doctor of Medicine (MD) degree in 1987.
[12]
O'Rahilly undertook research into Type 2
diabetes and insulin resistance at the
University of Oxford and
Harvard Medical School , before joining the
University of Cambridge where he is a Professor of Clinical Biochemistry and Medicine, Director of the Wellcome-MRC Institute of Metabolic Science-Metabolic Research Laboratories,
[13] Director of the MRC Metabolic Diseases Unit
[13] and co-director of the Wellcome-MRC Institute of Metabolic Science. He is also the scientific Director of the
National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR) Cambridge Biomedical Research Centre, Associate Faculty at the
Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute and honorary consultant physician at
Addenbrooke's Hospital , Cambridge.
[14]
[15]
[16] He is a professorial fellow of
Pembroke College, Cambridge .
Notable Cambridge scientists with whom O'Rahilly has shared paper authorship include
Krishna Chatterjee ,
David Dunger ,
Sadaf Farooqi ,
Nita Forouhi ,
Antonio Vidal-Puig ,
Nick Wareham , and
Giles Yeo ,
O'Rahilly was elected to the
Academy of Medical Sciences in 1999, the
Royal Society in 2003. His nomination reads:
Stephen O'Rahilly has made major contributions to the understanding of the molecular mechanisms underlying human disorders of energy balance and metabolism. His work first established that mutations in single genes could result in severe human
obesity and that these defects largely acted through disruption of central satiety mechanisms. These findings have altered clinical approaches to the evaluation of the
obese child and have identified a subtype of obesity amenable to dramatically effective therapy. His studies of patients with extreme insensitivity to insulin have also provided new insights into human insulin action and its disruption in states of insulin resistance.
[17]
He was awarded the
Heinrich Wieland Prize
[18] in 2002, the
InBev-Baillet Latour Health Prize in 2010
[19] and the
Debrecen Award for Molecular Medicine in 2014.
[20] He delivered the 2016
Harveian Oration
[21] at the
Royal College of Physicians of London .
O'Rahilly was
knighted in the 2013 Birthday Honours for services to medical research.
[22]
[23]
In 2017, he became a member of the
Royal Irish Academy .
[24] In 2018, he was made an Honorary Doctor of RCSI University of Medicine and Health Sciences in Dublin.
[25]
In 2019, O'Rahilly was elected as an Honorary Fellow of the
Learned Society of Wales (LSW).
[26] He was also awarded the
Banting Medal for his contributions towards diabetes research by the
American Diabetes Association in the same year.
[27]
O'Rahilly was awarded the
Croonian Medal in 2011 by the Royal College of Physicians. He was awarded it again, by the Royal Society in 2022, this time jointly with
Sadaf Farooqi and they presented their lecture
[28] at the
Royal Society in 2022.
In 2023, O'Rahilly was awarded the OU Health Harold Hamm International Prize for Biomedical Research in Diabetes for his outstanding research into the link between obesity and Type 2 diabetes.
[29]
O’Rahilly lives in Cambridge, England with his wife, journalist Philippa Lamb, and his stepson Felix Lamb. He was married to Suzy Oakes from 1990 until her death in 2011.
He holds dual Irish and British citizenship.
[30]
^
a
b
c
d
"O'RAHILLY, Prof. Stephen" .
Who's Who . Vol. 2015 (online
Oxford University Press ed.). A & C Black. (Subscription or
UK public library membership required.)
^ Neill, U. S. (2013).
"A conversation with Stephen O'Rahilly" . Journal of Clinical Investigation . 123 (6): 2335–2336.
doi :
10.1172/JCI70726 .
PMC
3668822 .
PMID
23722908 .
^ Weston, K. (2011).
"Translating metabolic biochemistry into the clinic: An interview with Steve O'Rahilly" . Disease Models & Mechanisms . 4 (2): 141–144.
doi :
10.1242/dmm.007641 .
PMC
3046085 .
PMID
21357759 .
^ Gerken, T.; Girard, C. A.; Tung, Y. -C. L.; Webby, C. J.; Saudek, V.; Hewitson, K. S.; Yeo, G. S. H.; McDonough, M. A.; Cunliffe, S.; McNeill, L. A.; Galvanovskis, J.;
Rorsman, P. ; Robins, P.; Prieur, X.; Coll, A. P.; Ma, M.; Jovanovic, Z.;
Farooqi, I. S. ; Sedgwick, B.; Barroso, I.;
Lindahl, T. ;
Ponting, C. P. ;
Ashcroft, F. M. ;
O'Rahilly, S. ;
Schofield, C. J. (2007).
"The Obesity-Associated FTO Gene Encodes a 2-Oxoglutarate-Dependent Nucleic Acid Demethylase" . Science . 318 (5855): 1469–1472.
Bibcode :
2007Sci...318.1469G .
doi :
10.1126/science.1151710 .
PMC
2668859 .
PMID
17991826 .
^
Stephen O'Rahilly's publications indexed by the
Scopus bibliographic database. (subscription required)
^ Oʼrahilly, Stephen; Montague, C. T.;
Farooqi, I. S. ; Whitehead, J. P.; Soos, M. A.; Rau, H.; Wareham, N. J.; Sewter, C. P.; Digby, J. E.; Mohammed, S. N.; Hurst, J. A.; Cheetham, C. H.; Earley, A. R.; Barnett, A. H.; Prins, J. B. (1997).
"Congenital leptin deficiency is associated with severe early-onset obesity in humans" . Nature . 387 (6636): 903–8.
Bibcode :
1997Natur.387..903M .
doi :
10.1038/43185 .
PMID
9202122 .
S2CID
205032762 .
^ Seminara, S. B.; Messager, S.; Chatzidaki, E. E.; Thresher, R. R.; Acierno, J. S.; Shagoury, J. K.; Bo-Abbas, Y.; Kuohung, W.; Schwinof, K. M.; Hendrick, A. G.; Zahn, D.; Dixon, J.; Kaiser, U. B.; Slaugenhaupt, S. A.; Gusella, J. F.; O'Rahilly, S.; Carlton, M. B. L.; Crowley, W. F.; Aparicio, S. A. J. R.; Colledge, W. H. (2003).
"TheGPR54Gene as a Regulator of Puberty" .
New England Journal of Medicine . 349 (17): 1614–27.
doi :
10.1056/NEJMoa035322 .
PMID
14573733 .
^
Farooqi, I. S ; Jebb, S. A.; Langmack, G.; Lawrence, E.; Cheetham, C. H.; Prentice, A. M.; Hughes, I. A.; McCamish, M. A.; O'Rahilly, S. (1999).
"Effects of Recombinant Leptin Therapy in a Child with Congenital Leptin Deficiency" .
New England Journal of Medicine . 341 (12): 879–84.
doi :
10.1056/NEJM199909163411204 .
PMID
10486419 .
^ Payne, F.; Lim, K.; Girousse, A.; Brown, R. J.; Kory, N.; Robbins, A.; Xue, Y.; Sleigh, A.; Cochran, E.; Adams, C.; Dev Borman, A.; Russel-Jones, D.; Gorden, P.; Semple, R. K.; Saudek, V.; O'Rahilly, S.; Walther, T. C.; Barroso, I.; Savage, D. B. (2014).
"Mutations disrupting the Kennedy phosphatidylcholine pathway in humans with congenital lipodystrophy and fatty liver disease" . Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences . 111 (24): 8901–8906.
Bibcode :
2014PNAS..111.8901P .
doi :
10.1073/pnas.1408523111 .
PMC
4066527 .
PMID
24889630 .
^
"Professor Steve O'Rahilly, Head of Department and Professor of Clinical Biochemistry and Medicine" . University of Cambridge. Archived from
the original on 13 April 2014.
^
a
b Ellen Ruppel Shell,
Fat Genes ,
Discover Magazine , 1 May 2000
^
a
b
c
"O'Rahilly, Sir Stephen (Patrick), (born 1 April 1958), Professor of Clinical Biochemistry and Medicine (formerly Professor of Metabolic Medicine), Departments of Medicine and Clinical Biochemistry, since 1996, Head, Clinical Biochemistry Department, since 2002, and Director, Institute of Metabolic Science, Metabolic Research Laboratories, since 2007, University of Cambridge; Fellow of Pembroke College, Cambridge, since 2007; Hon. Consultant Physician, Addenbrooke's Hospital, since 1994; Director, MRC Metabolic Diseases Unit (formerly MRC Centre for Obesity and Related Metabolic Diseases), since 2007; Scientific Director, NIHR Cambridge Biomedical Research Centre, since 2010" .
Who's Who 2023 . Oxford University Press. 1 December 2022. Retrieved 9 August 2023 .
^
a
b
"Stephen O'Rahilly, University of Cambridge Metabolic Research Laboratories" . Archived from
the original on 14 June 2014.
^
"NIHR Cambridge Biomedical Research Centre Web Site" . [
dead link ]
^ Roberts, E. W.; Deonarine, A; Jones, J. O.; Denton, A. E.; Feig, C; Lyons, S. K.; Espeli, M; Kraman, M; McKenna, B; Wells, R. J.; Zhao, Q; Caballero, O. L.; Larder, R; Coll, A. P.;
O'Rahilly, S ;
Brindle, K. M. ;
Teichmann, S. A. ; Tuveson, D. A.;
Fearon, D. T. (2013).
"Depletion of stromal cells expressing fibroblast activation protein-α from skeletal muscle and bone marrow results in cachexia and anemia" .
Journal of Experimental Medicine . 210 (6): 1137–51.
doi :
10.1084/jem.20122344 .
PMC
3674708 .
PMID
23712428 .
^ Loos, R. J.; Lindgren, C. M.; Li, S; Wheeler, E; Zhao, J. H.; Prokopenko, I; Inouye, M; Freathy, R. M.; Attwood, A. P.; Beckmann, J. S.; Berndt, S. I.; Prostate, Lung; Jacobs, K. B.; Chanock, S. J.; Hayes, R. B.; Bergmann, S; Bennett, A. J.; Bingham, S. A.; Bochud, M; Brown, M; Cauchi, S; Connell, J. M.; Cooper, C; Smith, G. D.; Day, I; Dina, C; De, S; Dermitzakis, E. T.; Doney, A. S.; et al. (2008).
"Common variants near MC4R are associated with fat mass, weight and risk of obesity" . Nature Genetics . 40 (6): 768–75.
doi :
10.1038/ng.140 .
PMC
2669167 .
PMID
18454148 .
^
"EC/2003/27: O'Rahilly, Stephen Patrick" . London: The Royal Society. Archived from
the original on 13 July 2015.
^
Heinrich Wieland Prize
Archived 12 November 2013 at the
Wayback Machine
^
"Professor Stephen O'Rahilly wins the 2010 InBev-Baillet Latour Prize" . Disease Models & Mechanisms . 3 (7–8): 402. 2010.
doi :
10.1242/dmm.006080 .
PMID
20610691 .
^
"Debrecen Award for Molecular Medicine" . University of Debrecen. Archived from
the original on 13 December 2014. Retrieved 7 January 2015 .
^
"Harveian Oration and dinner 2016" . Royal College of Physician . 27 June 2016. Retrieved 28 November 2016 .
^
"No. 60534" .
The London Gazette (Supplement). 15 June 2013. p. 1.
^
Stephen O'Rahilly knighted , BBC News, 14 June 2013
^
"18 New Members of the Royal Irish Academy" . Royal Irish Academy . 26 May 2017. Retrieved 27 November 2021 .
^
"RCSI celebrates graduation of 900 healthcare and research professionals" .
Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland . 15 November 2018.
^
LSW Honorary Fellows The Learned Society of Wales, 20 May 2019
^
2019 Banting Medal for Scientific Achievement - Stephen O'Rahilly, MD , ADA Diabetes Pro, 20 May 2019
^
Croonian Medal and Lecture The Royal Society, 14 April 2022
^ McIntosh, Kate (7 June 2023).
"2023 OU Health Harold Hamm International Prize for Biomedical Research in Diabetes" . For staff . Retrieved 9 January 2024 .
^ Keenan, Dan (15 June 2013).
"Irish research scientist to be knighted by Queen Elizabeth" .
The Irish Times .
International National Academics Other