Jonathan Dry

Biography

Jonathan Dry is Principal Scientist and global strategy lead for AstraZeneca’s world-recognised Oncology Bioinformatics team. Jonathan completed a BSc (Hons) in Biomedical Science at the University of Manchester where his research focused on the genetics of diabetes and exposed him to the richness of information in DNA that can be uncovered with computational tools.  To pursue this interest, he was awarded a scholarship at the University of Exeter to study for an MSc in Bioinformatics and he graduated with distinction.  Jonathan collaborated with GlaxoSmithKline to develop computational models determining the risk of recombinant protein breakdown by proteases in host cells.  At AstraZeneca, Jonathan specialised in gene expression microarray data analysis and has supported and influenced a number of discovery programmes, including drugs targeting MEK, PARP, mTOR, PI3K and ERBB.  He introduced pioneering approaches for harnessing genomic data from cancer cell lines, uncovering numerous disease associations, and discovering mechanisms of drug target dependency leading to biomarkers of drug response. Perhaps his most notable contribution to date is the identification of transcriptional readouts which demonstrate MEK activity. This was the first transcriptomic personalised healthcare (PHC) hypothesis tested in AstraZeneca clinical trials and enhanced the development of the MEK inhibitor, selumetinib.  

Research Interest

BIOCHEMISTRY