Timothy Sargeant, PhD

Dr Tim Sargeant started his career in neuroscience with a PhD at Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand. Tim went on to two postdoctoral positions at the Department of Medicine and the Department of Pathology at the University of Cambridge (UK) where he researched the cell’s recycling machinery (called the lysosomal system) and obtained training in molecular and cell biology. Tim was appointed to head of Lysosomal Health in Ageing in the Hopwood Centre for Neurobiology (formally the Lysosomal Diseases Research Unit) at SAHMRI in 2015. His current research focuses on the role of autophagy and lysosomal recycling in common age-related disease such as Alzheimer’s disease. The lysosomal system is important for slowing cell ageing, as it removes damaged and unwanted material from the cell. This process is critically important for healthy brain function. Work from Lysosomal Health in Ageing and others has shown that this system is damaged in Alzheimer’s disease, and that changes in genes that are involved in the lysosomal system are associated with Alzheimer’s disease. Our current research focuses on development of methods for measurement of lysosomal system activity (through a process called autophagy) in humans. We are also developing interventions that improve the lysosomal system with the goal of delaying Alzheimer’s disease.