Dr Aravinthan Varatharaj BMBCh MA(Oxon) PhD PGCME MRCP
NIHR Clinical Lecturer in Neurology
Thinking inside and outside the brain
Aravinthan Varatharaj is the NIHR Clinical Lecturer in Neurology at the University of Southampton. He studies the interaction between infection and the brain, and in particular how this affects people with multiple sclerosis. He uses advanced neuroimaging techniques and has set up dynamic-contrast enhanced magnetic resonance imaging in Southampton for the measurement of blood-brain barrier health. Disturbance of the blood-brain barrier may explain why infections outside the brain can affect the function of the brain and mind.
Dr Varatharaj studied medicine at Oxford and has trained in Montreal, Liverpool, and London. He came to Southampton in 2014.
- BA(Hons), Medical Sciences, University of Oxford, 2007
- BMBCh, Medicine and Surgery, University of Oxford, 2010
- MA(Hons), Medical Sciences, University of Oxford, 2011
- MRCP (London), 2013
- PGCME, Medical Education, University of Dundee, 2014
- Specialty Certificate in Neurology, Royal College of Physicians, 2018
- PhD, Clinical Neurosciences, University of Southampton, 2021
- NIHR Clinical Lecturer, 2021-present
- MRC Clinical Research Training Fellow, 2018-2021
- NIHR Academic Clinical Fellow, 2015-2018
- Specialist Registrar in Neurology, Wessex Neurological Centre, Southampton General Hospital, 2014-present