Dr Amparo Güemes

Dr Amparo Güemes is a Royal Academy of Engineering and Rosetrees Research Fellow at the Bioelectronics Lab, led by Prof George Malliaras. Dr Güemes received her B.S. in Biomedical Engineering (2016) from the Polytechnic University of Madrid (Madrid, Spain), and her M.S. in Biomedical Engineering (2017) and PhD in Electrical Engineering (2021) from Imperial College London (London, UK), where she was supervised by Prof Pantelis Georgiou. Her PhD research focused on the design of mathematical models of the neural regulation of glucose homeostasis. During her doctoral training, Amparo was a visiting PhD research fellow in the Computational Sensory-Motor Systems Lab led by Prof Ralph Etienne-Cummings at Johns Hopkins University (US), where she gained knowledge on the in vivo impact of neural stimulation on blood glucose fluctuations.

Dr Güemes is author of more than 15 publications and presentations, in highly recognized journals and international conferences, such as the Journal of Neural Engineering and the IEEE Journal of Biomedical and Health Informatics. She has won multiple awards from leading institutions including Imperial College and John Hopkins University, such as the Ash Prize for the best academic performance and the Stella Bagrit Centenary Memorial Prize for the best MSc individual project in her MSc in Neurotechnology in Imperial College London, and received the 3rd Prize in the prestigious Spanish National End of Degree Excellence Awards in 2020. She has also been recipient of the Rafael del Pino Felowship to pursue her master and PhD at Imperial College London. In 2021 Amparo was awarded the prestigious 1851 Research Fellowship by the Royal Commission for the Exhibition of 1851 to continue her research as a postdoctoral researcher for three years at the University of Cambridge. In 2023 Amparo's work has recognized with the Engineering Award from the L’Oréal-UNESCO UK and Ireland For Women in Science Rising Talent Programme, which encourages the contribution of women pursuing their research careers. She has recently been a recipient of the Royal Academy of Engineering and the Rosetrees Foundation Research fellowships to her work as a group leader at the Bioelectronics Lab.

As a researcher, Dr Güemes distinguishes herself in the field of metabolic treatments based on neuromodulation. The interdisciplinary nature of her work includes signal processing, modelling, bioelectronics and electrophysiology to develop advanced algorithms and neurotechnology to be integrated into a closed-loop platform aiming to improve metabolic control.

Bioelectronic medicine is a cutting-edge field that combines biology and engineering to develop treatments for diseases using electrical interfaces to interact with the body's nervous system. Pre-clinical and clinical studies employing electrical impulses to stimulate the brain and the vagus nerve, which plays a key role in regulating internal body functions, showcase its potential for glucose control in diabetes, and reduce the frequency and severity of seizures in epilepsy. Bioelectronic medicine seeks real-time closed-loop control to enable precise monitoring of biomarkers and the ability to modulate multiple biological circuits dynamically, resulting in highly tailored therapies for chronic illnesses. Despite not yet implemented, this approach offers a holistic way to manage complex diseases like diabetes and epilepsy more effectively, where the close interplay between the nervous system and metabolic processes challenges an optimal single-system targeted treatment.

Her engineering solution will provide adaptive therapies translatable to other conditions, empowering patients to actively manage their health and creating opportunities for economic growth in the healthcare technology sector. NeuMeC ultimately aims to pave the way for a shift from a medication-centric model to innovative, personalized solutions powered by advanced neurotechnology.