Marion Watson

Dr Marion Watson is Head of Operations at the Jenner Institute overseeing a wide range of clinical trial research and development activities on vaccines for malaria, TB and emerging pathogens, notably since early 2020 vaccine trials for COVID-19.

Following a biochemistry degree and PhD in molecular biology at Imperial College, London she spent 15 years in early phase drug discovery in pharma before returning to academic research at Oxford 1997. Working from the NHS based Public Health Resource Unit she was a researcher on a range of public health and primary care studies, ran the Primary Healthcare Research Network and became a Senior Lecturer in research methods at Oxford Brookes University.  She developed intensive undergraduate and Masters level modules at a time when GCP training was unavailable outside commercial settings and continues to work in training development and delivery through the NIHR and at Imperial College London.

At Oxford University she spent 3 years as a Senior Research Support Associate in the Clinical Trials and Research Governance team providing sponsorship reviews, GCP monitoring, support and training for researchers. Alongside she was Biological Safety Officer for the Oxford Radcliffe Hospitals NHS Trust from 2001 to 2011 with a remit for governance of all work involving Genetically Modified Organisms, notably Gene Therapy Clinical Trials including a range of vaccine trials at the Jenner Institute. In 2011 she moved to Imperial College London as Quality Assurance Manager for the Imperial Clinical Research Facility, an early phase clinical trials unit and part of the Imperial Centre for Translational and Experimental Medicine. She returned to Oxford in 2017 as Operational Lead for Experimental Medicine and Rheumatology in the Nuffield Department of Orthopaedics, Rheumatology and Musculoskeletal Sciences before moving to the Jenner Institute.