Alejandra Tomas

Dr Tomas has been a Principal Investigator at the Department of Metabolism, Digestion and Reproduction, Imperial College London since 2015 and Head of Section of Cell Biology and Functional Genomics since 2024. She is the Lead of the Imperial College London Network of Excellence on Membrane Receptors, and co-Lead of the Imperial Diabetes Network. She received a BSc in Biochemistry from the University of Valencia (Spain), an MSc in Molecular Cell Biology from the University of Paris-Saclay (France) and a Ph.D. in Biochemistry from University College London (United Kingdom), before undertaking postdoctoral training at the University of Geneva (Switzerland). Her research has led to the identification of novel factors and modes of regulation of glucagon receptor family signaling (e.g. Diabetes, Science Advances, Molecular Metabolism, Endocrinology), characterized the trafficking profiles of novel GLP-1R biased peptides with improved therapeutic potential (e.g. Nature Communications, Chemical Science) and assessed the influence of the lipid microenvironment on islet GLP-1R function (e.g. PLoS Biology, eLife). Her work is currently funded by the Medical Research Council and the Wellcome Trust, and she holds fruitful collaborations with Pharma companies such as Eli Lilly and Vertex.
Short description of current research interest: Research in Dr Tomas lab specializes in the study of the spatiotemporal regulation of signaling of the glucagon receptor family in pancreatic β-cells and other metabolically relevant tissues (adipocytes, hepatocytes). Her laboratory is running projects on glucagon receptor family cell subtype and/or subcellular signal compartmentalization, role in lipid handling and mitochondrial function, post-translational modifications, genetic variants, and receptor lipid binding sites.