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Staff Profile

Dr Mark Ashton

Senior Lecturer in Medicinal Chemistry

  • Telephone: 0191-2082348
  • Address: School of Pharmacy
    Faculty of Medical Sciences
    Newcastle University
    King George VI Building
    Newcastle-Upon-Tyne
    NE1 7RU
Background

Dr Mark Ashton is a Senior Lecturer in Medicinal Chemistry in the School of Pharmacy and member of the Translational and Clinical Research Institute in the Faculty of Medical Sciences.

 

Following a career in the pharmaceutical industry (Mark has experience of both medicinal chemistry and process chemistry), Mark joined the School of Pharmacy at Sunderland University as a Senior Lecturer in Medicinal Chemistry. In 2017 he moved to join the new School of Pharmacy at Newcastle University; his roles include member of School’s Executive Board, Stage 1 Lead, Admissions Tutor, and Outreach Lead.

 

His research interests are in the area of antiviral drug development and he currently has collaborations with research groups in China, India and the UK.

 

Areas of Expertise

 

Medicinal Chemistry

 

Organic Chemistry

 

Heterocyclic Chemistry

 

Professional Affiliations

 

Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry (FRSC)


Chartered Chemist (CChem)

 

Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy (SFHEA)


Awards


2024 - Newcastle University Education Award, Taught Supervisor of the Year


2023 - School of Pharmacy, Best Lecturer Award


2022 - School of Pharmacy, Best Lecturer Award


2019 - School of Pharmacy, Best Lecturer Award 

Teaching

Undergraduate Teaching:

Stage 1 Lead

Fundamentals of Pharmacy: the integration of Science and Practice

 

Contributor:

Stage 2 - Pharmaceutical Care: Pathology, Patients and Professionalism

Stage 3 - Applied Pharmaceutical Interventions: Design, Delivery and Decisions

Stage 4 - Research Project

               Targeted Therapeutics: Optimisation, Critique and Responsibility

Publications

  • Articles

    • Rathbone A, Cartwright N, Cummings L, Noble R, Budaiova K, Ashton M, Foster J, Payne B, Duncan S. Exploring young people's attitudes to HIV prevention medication (PrEP) in England: a qualitative study. BMJ Open 2024, 14(3), e077733.
    • Hosny A, Ashton M, Gong Y, McGarry K. The development of a predictive model to identify potential HIV-1 attachment inhibitors. Computers in Biology and Medicine 2020, 120, 103743.
    • McGarry K, Nelson D, Ashton M. A method to explore the connectivity patterns of proteins and drugs for identifying disease communities. SN Computor Science 2020, 1, 137-154.
    • Chenevas-Paule C, Wolff H-M, Ashton M, Schubert M, Dodou K. Development of a predictive model for the stabilizer concentration estimation in microreservoir transdermal drug delivery systems MTDDS) using lipophilic pressure sensitive adhesives as matrix/carrier. Journal of Pharmaceutical Sciences 2017, 106(5), 1371-1383.
    • Chenevas-Paule C, Wolff H-M, Ashton M, Schubert M, Dodou K. Development of a predictive model for the long-term stability assessment of drug-in-adhesive transdermal films using polar pressure sensitive adhesives as carrier/matrix. Journal of Pharmaceutical Sciences 2017, 106(5), 1293-1301.
    • Wong R, Ashton M, Dodu K. Analysis of residual crosslinking agent content in UV cross-linked poly(ethylene oxide) hydrogels for dermatological application, by gas chromatography. Journal of Pharmaceutical Analysis 2016, 6(5), 307-312.
    • Wong RSH, Ashton M, Dodou K. Effect of Crosslinking Agent Concentration on the Properties of Unmedicated Hydrogels. Pharmaceutics 2015, 7(3), 305-319.
    • Heed J, Ashton M. Current therapies for and research in the treatment of thromboembolism. The Pharmaceutical Journal 2011, 287, 64-65.
    • Ashton M, Crockatt K. Current therapies and research and development in the treatment of asthma. The Pharmaceutical Journal 2011, 286, 569-570.
    • Ashton M, Todd A. Current research and development of new treatments for schizophrenia. The Pharmaceutical Journal 2011, 286, 174-175.
    • Medhi M, Ashton M. Current pharmacological treatments and research and development in HIV. The Pharmaceutical Journal 2011, 286, 695-696.
    • Ashton M, Sherwood J, Ferriman H. Current and future options for the management of hypertension. The Pharmaceutical Journal 2011, 286, 48-49.
    • Sherwood J, Ashton M, Newton C, Biles S. Current and future options for the management of heart failure. The Pharmaceutical Journal 2011, 286, 437-438.
    • Lumbard K, Ashton M. Research and developments of vaccines and drug treatments for influenza. The Pharmaceutical Journal 2010, 285, 690-691.
    • Simpson H, Ashton M. Current research and developments in pharmacological treatments for obesity. The Pharmaceutical Journal 2010, 285, 557-558.
    • Marth G, Anderson R, Thompson BG, Ashton M, Groundwater PW. Chemo- and regioselectivity in the reactions of polyfuncional pyrroles. Tetrahedron 2010, 66(32), 6113-6120.
    • Meth-Cohn O, Ashton M. Regioselective electrophilic formylation—3-substituted thiophenes as a case study. Tet Lett 2000, 41(15), 2749-2752.

  • Authored Book

    • Ashton M, Groundwater PW, Stocker S, Todd A. An Integrated Guide to Human Drug MetabolismFrom Basic Chemical Transformations to Drug-Drug Interactions. Elsevier, 2024. Submitted.

  • Book Chapters

    • Boon-Seen S, Gong Y, Ashton M. Applications of the Fischer indole Synthesis in Medicinal Chemistry. In: Scriven EFV; Ramsden CA, ed. Advances in Heterocyclic Chemistry. Amsterdam: Academic Press, 2023, pp.1-85.
    • Hann V, Dawson P, Ashton M. Allosteric Integrase Inhibitors. In: Atta-ur-Rahman, ed. Frontiers in Clinical Drug Research – HIV. Bentham Science Publishers, 2016, pp.49-126.
    • Hann V, Ashton M. HIV Integrase – Biology and Inhibitor Design. In: Atta-ur-Rahman, ed. Frontiers in Clinical Drug Research – HIV. Bentham Science Publishers, 2015, pp.185-286.
    • Anderson R, Todd A, Molyneux L, Ashton M. Stereochemistry and Drug Action. In: Rostron, C; Barber, J, ed. Pharmaceutical Chemistry. Oxford University Press, 2013.

  • Conference Proceedings (inc. Abstracts)

    • Hosny A, Anderson R, Carlile M, Dawson P, Ashton M. A 3D-QSAR Pharmacophore based virtual screening and docking approach to identify novel HIV-1 entry inhibitors. In: New Approaches in Medicinal Chemistry II. 2017.
    • McGarry K, Emery K, Varnakulasingam V, McDonald S, Ashton M. Complex network based computational techniques for edgetic modelling of mutations implicated with human diseases. In: 16th UK Workshop on Computational Intelligence, UKCI-2016. 2016, Lancaster University.
    • Wong R, Ashton M, Wolff H-M, Dodou K. Effect of Photoinitiator Concentration on the Properties of Unmedicated Hydrogels. In: 42nd Annual Meeting & Exposition of the Controlled Release Society. 2015, Edinburgh, Scotland.

  • Patent

    • Murugan A, Ashton M, Bergstrom L, Kristoffersson A, Lindsjo M, Sjo P, Meigh J. 2-Pyridone compounds used as inhibitors of neutrophil elastase. WO 2011/039528 A1, 2010.

  • Review