Group Lead
Dr Adeniyi Olagunju
Adeniyi is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Pharmacology and Therapeutics. He studied pharmacy at the Obafemi Awolowo University in Nigeria, Master of Research in Biomedical Science & Translational Medicine and PhD in Pharmacology at the University of Liverpool. He leads a group within CELT that uses a three-pronged strategy to advance evidence-based recommendations for long-acting therapeutics use in pregnancy and lactation: clinical research, human-relevant in vitro models and physiologically based pharmacokinetic modelling.
Team members
Shakir Atoyebi
Shakir is a Research Associate within the Perinatal Pharmacology group. He is developing mechanistic models to estimate fetal drug exposure during pregnancy towards better understanding of drug fetotoxocity. He obtained a Bachelor of Pharmacy and Master of Science degrees from Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile Ife, Nigeria. He is currently completing his PhD studies at the University of Liverpool with the Duncan Norman Research scholarship. For his doctoral studies, he developed physiologically-based pharmacokinetic models to study the disposition of long-acting cabotegravir and rilpivirine during pregnancy. In addition, he explored dosing strategies to overcome drug-drug interactions involving some antiretrovirals in children and pregnant women.
Ilenia D’angelo
Ilenia joined the Perinatal Pharmacology Group within the Institute of Systems, Molecular and Integrative Biology, as a Research Technician.
With six years of laboratory experience at The Francis Crick Institute and University College London, Ilenia has built a background in Perinatal studies and Pluripotent Stem Cells. Within the Perinatal Pharmacology Group, Ilenia will facilitate the understanding of drug safety and efficacy during pregnancy, through the generation of a human-relevant in-vitro model.
Rachel Daley
Rachel is a stakeholder engagement specialist with 20+ years of experience across public, private, and voluntary sectors. After her son's rare childhood cancer relapse in 2018, she founded a non-profit organisation supporting caregivers raising children with additional health and care needs.
She is a triple-graduate and fellow of the School for Social Entrepreneurs and built a thriving and sustainable charitable organisation applying her lived experience and professional acumen. Now, as Stakeholder Engagement Coordinator at the University of Liverpool’s Centre for Long-Acting Therapeutics, she merges personal and professional expertise with advocacy for inclusive healthcare. With strengths in leadership, relationship-building, and impact measurement, she remains dedicated to driving meaningful, community-driven change.
Salima (Sulaima) El Haj
Salima is a PhD student within the Perinatal Pharmacology Group. She is interested in using mathematical and statistical methods to formulate and solve problems. Her research project explores developing a framework for integrated analysis of clinical pharmacology and real-world data for assessing the safety of medicines during pregnancy. She obtained a Master of Pharmacy degree from the University of Nottingham, a MSc in Applied Statistics and Operational Research from Birkbeck, University of London and a MSc in Public Health in Developing Countries from London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. She has a diverse work experience that includes roles in clinical pharmacy and data analysis in several large health related organisations.
Mark Ryan
Mark is a Scientific Data Curator within the Perinatal Pharmacology Group. He is working on new open access initiatives aimed at facilitating access to the clinical development landscape of long-acting therapeutics, and the pharmacokinetic data of therapeutics in human pregnancy. Through these initiatives, we will support the curation of data generated from research within our group, and by collaborators and other scientists in globally representative, open access databases. Mark holds a BSc in Biochemistry and a Master of Research in Advanced Biological Sciences from the University of Liverpool. He previously worked in industry as a biocurator.
Dr Prajith Venkatasubramanian
Prajith has obtained a Doctorate of Pharmacy and a Masters of Science in Pharmacology and Drug Discover from Coventry University. He is a Research Assistant / Data Curator within CELT as a member of the Perinatal Pharmacology Group. Prajith is working on long-acting antiretroviral therapies and antipsychotics. He collects, analyses, and interprets scientific information from peer-reviewed scientific journals, reviewing submissions & conducts independent research, developing documentation for the user community. Alongside this, Prajith is involved in contributing to the development and expansion of initiatives.