Patrick Kehoe, PhD
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Associate Editor
Term Expiration:
12/31/2025
Affiliation(s):
University of Bristol
ORCID URL:
Areas of Interest:
Alzheimer's disease, amyloid, amyloid-beta degrading enzymes, angiotensin converting enzyme, blood pressure, cerebrovascular disease, genes, hypertension, neprilysin, vascular dementia
Biography & Research:
As Gestetner Professor of Translational Dementia Research, I jointly head (with Dr Scott Miners) the Cerebrovascular and Dementia Research Group in Bristol Medical School: Translational Health Sciences, at the University of Bristol.
Prof Kehoe was one of the first graduates at University College Dublin, Ireland, to complete a new Joint Honours Degree programme in Genetics and Pharmacology before completing his PhD from the Department of Psychological Medicine in the former University of Wales College of Medicine (now part of Cardiff University) in 1998. After his PhD on the molecular genetics of Alzheimer’s disease and a period as an MRC-funded post-doctoral researcher working on some of the first sibling pair linkage studies of Alzheimer’s disease he took a career break to work as an NHS Research & Development Manager for the Avon and Wiltshire NHS Partnership Trust. In 2003 he returned to academia as the Gestetner Research Fellow and in 2006 took over part of the leadership of what was a much earlier incarnation of the current group where his research has since focused on the role of the Renin Angiotensin System in Alzheimer’s disease. This work was a follow-up to his PhD based-seminal paper of genetic association between variation in the ACE-1 gene and Alzheimer’s disease risk. This included work spanning genetics, neuropathology, biochemistry and pharmacoepidemiology and culminated in an NIHR EME-funded multi-site clinical trial (RADAR) of the RAS-acting drug losartan in Alzheimer’s disease, on which he was Chief Investigator. He is motivated by the work in this pathway because of the angiotensin hypothesis of Alzheimer's disease, a term he coined after almost 2 decades of work, which proposes that RAS dysfunction may be a significant factor in the widely acknowledged, but still poorly understood, association between hypertension and blood pressure regulation with respect to the development of Alzheimer’s disease (AD) and other dementias.
Other areas of research are the aetiology of various forms of Vascular Cognitive Impairment (VCI). This includes a large international collaborative project to try and identify genetic risk factors for VCI, potential synergies with genetic risk factors for stroke. He has previously led collaborative research initiatives to harmonise the conceptualisation and classification of different forms of VCI.
Another new and emerging area of research, with colleagues (Dr Claire Perks and Dr Rachel Barker) in the Bristol Medical School, is that of investigations into mechanisms that might explain what are regularly observed inverse associations between the incidence rates of cancer in people with Alzheimer's disease and vice versa.
Prof Kehoe has over a decade in leadership of increasing seniority. He has jointly led the Translational Dementia Research Group since 2006 whilst serving in the last decade as Head of Section and Research Director for the Bristol Medical School, and more recently Faculty Research Director for the Faculty of Health & Life Sciences, playing a key role in the development of the new research strategy for the faculty formed in 2023. He is also co-Director of the South West Dementia Brain Bank and in 2024 was appointed to the role of Director of the Elizabeth Blackwell Institute for Health Research.
Externally Prof Kehoe is currently an Executive Committee member of the European Alzheimer's & Dementia Biobank (EADB), a key delivery partner in a MEGA-GWAS of VCI, on which he is one of the lead investigators, in partnership with the CHARGE consortium. He was until 2023 one of th longest standing Executive members of the European Alzheimer's Disease Collaboration (EADC) , has previously served on the Research Strategy Council for the Alzheimer's Society and is site Investigator for the Brains for Dementia Research Initiative.
