Meet Matthew Bainbridge, PhD, TESS Scientific Advisory Board Member

Q: What is your role at TESS Research Foundation?

I am a member of the the TESS Scientific Advisory Board.  This Board helps set the research agenda for the organization.  We also review scientific grant applications and help organize TESS Research Foundation’s annual scientific conference.

Q: How does the work you are doing have the potential to help those with SLC13A5 Epilepsy?

Our goal is to help fund strong science that is focused on practical questions that can help these sick kids.  We promote patient-first approaches and seed novel ideas so that they can develop into full-funded research programs.

Q: What inspires you to contribute your time and skills to TESS?

As a basic scientist one rarely gets the opportunity to directly benefit patients.  Working with TESS is a chance to help kids in a way that wouldn’t be possible for me otherwise.  I think most people would help if they could, and I am no different in that regard.

Q: Have you learned anything through your work with TESS Research Foundation that you’d like to share?

I have been impressed by the large number and diverse set of researchers TESS has attracted. People from all over the world, from very different backgrounds providing very different prospectives.  I did not previously appreciate how hard it was to balance the needs of TESS (a very patient focused/translational research) with the more fundamental research proposed by many scientists.