Dr Francesco Colucci

I trained as a doctor at the Medical School of the University of Bari (M.D. 1991) in Southern Italy and learnt immunology at the University of Umeå (Ph.D. 1997), researching on type 1 diabetes. 

During my post-doc at the Necker Hospital in Paris I worked on development and function of natural killer (NK) cells. I was recruited at the Pasteur Institute in Paris (2000), then the Babraham Institute in Cambridge (2004) and joined the Clinical School at the Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology in 2010. My team continues to study how NK cells work in immunity and reproduction. 

I am a fellow of King's College, Cambridge and supervise Biology of Disease for second year medical students and lecture in the Part II Pathology course.

Project/study information 

Half a kilogram of immune cells live in tissues. Working night and day, tissue immune cells keep skin, lungs, gut, liver and all other organs healthy. When pathogens breach barriers, they start immune responses. In the uterus, special immune cells called natural killer (NK) cells help with the cyclic destruction and rebuilding of the inner lining. 

When fertilization occurs, NK cells are involved in critical tissue modifications which lead to the formation of the placenta that supports the growth of the fetus, including brain and heart development. We work to understand the basic mechanisms of uterine NK cell function, including how they influence birth weight, which is linked to healthy adult life.