Dr Patrick Vallance is a clinician scientist and clinical pharmacologist who has worked in academia and industry. He is President of R&D at GSK and under his leadership new medicines for cancer, asthma, autoimmune diseases and HIV infection have been discovered and approved for use worldwide. He has championed open innovation and novel industry-academic partnerships globally, and has maintained a strong focus on discovery of antibiotics and medicines for tropical diseases. Prior to joining GSK he was Professor of Medicine at UCL and Registrar of the Academy of Medical Sciences.

Vallance’s personal research was in the field of vascular biology. He made important discoveries in the field of nitric oxide and endothelial cell physiology and showed that the human arterial vasculature is actively dilated by continuous release of nitric oxide. He demonstrated the functional significance of this effect in different physiological and disease states and identified new pathways for regulating nitric oxide biosynthesis.

He was elected to the fellowship of the Academy of Medical Sciences in 1999, awarded the Goulstonian Lectureship of the Royal College of Physicians in 1996 and the Graham Bull Prize for Clinical Science in 2002.