- More than 350 staff, students and friends of the University of Sheffield are taking part in The Big Walk 2022 to raise vital funds for genetic disease research
- Funds raised will go towards a state-of-the-art bioreactor, which will accelerate life-saving gene therapy treatments from the lab into clinical trials
- Fundraisers taking part in the walk include Professor Julia Dobson, who lost her dad to motor neurone disease (MND), Dr Philip Powell, who works with boys and men with Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy (DMD) and hopes gene therapy will help the patients he works with, and Sam Guest, who has Cystic Fibrosis and hopes gene therapy will have a lifelong impact for others like it did for him
- The last Big Walk, which took place in 2019, raised over £37,000 for student scholarships
Hundreds of staff, students, alumni and friends of the University of Sheffield are hiking across the Peak District today (Friday 24 June 2022) to raise money for life-changing genetic disease therapies.
The Big Walk 2022 is set to raise thousands of pounds in support of the University of Sheffield's Genetic Disease Research Appeal, which will fund the development of pioneering gene therapy treatments for diseases such as motor neurone disease (MND), dementia and other rare inherited diseases.
This year's event returns after a two-year break due to the Covid-19 pandemic. It is the sixth Big Walk hosted by the University since 2015. The annual event has raised over £400,000 in total supporting a variety of life-changing projects such as Yorkshire's first MRI-Pet scanner as well as student scholarships so that everyone, regardless of their financial position, can access university education.
