Dr Adam Dale

Dr Dale is an NIHR Academic Clinical Lecturer in Infectious Diseases and Medical Microbiology in the Faculty of Medicine, and Honorary Registrar in Infectious Diseases and Medical Microbiology at University Hospital Southampton. 

His research focuses on understanding the immunological mechanisms that afford protection against upper respiratory tract pathobiont colonisation, with the ultimate aim of informing next-generation vaccine design. A critical component of his research involves the use of controlled human infection models, utilising wild-type and genetically modified strains of Neisseria lactamica, and Bordetella pertussis. 

Dr Dale graduated from the University of Leeds in 2010 where he completed undergraduate degrees in both Medicine and Microbiology in Relation to Medicine. Following post-graduate clinical training in South Yorkshire and the West Midlands, in 2014 he was appointed as an Academic Clinical Fellow in Infectious Diseases and Medical Microbiology within the Wessex Deanery where he worked in the Research Group of Professor Robert C. Read. 

Dr Dale's PhD was funded by an independently-obtained Wellcome Trust Doctoral Training Fellowship and focused on characterisation of the adaptive immune responses generated in response to controlled infection with wild-type and genetically modified strains of N. lactamica. He was a major contributor to a first-in-man study demonstrating that asymptomatic human colonisation with a knock-in strain of N. lactamica expressing the meningococcal adhesin, Neisseria Adhesin A (NadA), generated anti-meningococcal immune responses, and may therefore have utility as a future bacterial medicine. 

Qualifications

• Microbiology in Relation to Medicine, University of Leeds (2008).

• MBChB (hons), University of Leeds (2010).

• Membership of the Royal College of Physicians (2013).

• Fellow of the Royal College of Pathologists (Medical Microbiology/Virology) (2017).

• PhD, University of Southampton (2021). 

Appointments

•  NIHR Academic Foundation Programme, Sheffield University Teaching Hospitals/University of Sheffield (2010-2012).  

• Core Medical Training, West Midlands Deanery (2012-2014). 

• NIHR Academic Clinical Fellowship, Infectious Diseases/Medical Microbiology, Wessex Deanery/University of Southampton (2014-2017). 

• Wellcome Trust Research Training Fellowship (2017-2020).

• Specialist Registrar (ST6) in Infectious Diseases/Medical Microbiology, University Hospital Southampton (2020-2021). 

• NIHR Academic Clinical Lecturer in Infectious Diseases, University of Southampton, and Honorary Specialist Registrar in Infectious Diseases/Medical Microbiology, University Hospital Southampton (2021-present).