Researcher Details |

Paul Leonard

Dr.

Contact Details

Associate Professor
School of Biotechnology
Lonsdale Building
Dublin City University
Glasnevin Campus, Dublin 9.
T:Ext. 5708

E:Paul.Leonard@dcu.ie
W:https://paulleonardlab.com/

Executive Summary

v Associate Professor in Biotherapeutics at Dublin City University (DCU) leading research in biomolecular interaction analysis, technology development (including software and hardware), single cell analysis, biologics discovery and diagnostics across multiple application areas including oncology, cardiovascular and infectious disease.

v Innovative entrepreneur and technology inventor with 20 year’s post Ph.D. experience in academic and industrial research and senior management roles in clinical and pre-clinical stage companies. Co-founder and previous CSO/CTO of Remedy Biologics Ltd. Spun the company out of Dublin City University, raising >€15M in non-dilutive and equity-based financing.

v Consultant to the life sciences industry including roles as advisor to senior management, entrepreneur in residence, scientific and business strategy advisor, including business positioning and communication, IP and technical expert.

v Previous director and head of R&D at Vaccinogen Ireland responsible for leading Vaccinogen’s overall cancer therapeutics strategy in Ireland including scientific, operational and financial.

v Lean Six Sigma Green Belt, experienced leading process improvements using Lean Six Sigma principles and building and managing multidisciplinary teams of research scientists in the areas of single cell analysis, cancer vaccine development, manufacturing improvements, antibody engineering, high throughput screening, therapeutic discovery and assay design.

v Lead inventor on granted and pending patents filed in the US and Europe. Expert assessor for various Health and Life Sciences funding programmes, including for SMEs. External Examiner (2023-2024 to 2026-2027) for Technical University Dublin’s TU866 BSc (Hons) Biomedical and Molecular Diagnostics.

Book Chapter

	Year	Publication
	2011	Leonard, P., Hearty, S. and O'Kennedy, R. (2011) 'Measuring protein-protein interactions using surface plasmon resonance' In: Protein Chromatography: Methods and Protocols (part of the Methods in Molecular Biology book series). : Springer.
	2011	Fitzgerald, J., Leonard, P., Darcy, E. and O'Kennedy, R. (2011) 'Immunoaffinity Chromatography' In: Protein Chromatography: Methods and Protocols (part of the Methods in Molecular Biology book series). : Springer.
	2011	Darcy, E., Leonard, P., Fitzgerald, J. and O'Kennedy, R. (2011) 'Purification of antibodies using affinity chromatography' In: Protein Chromatography: Methods and Protocols (part of the Methods in Molecular Biology book series). : Springer.
	2010	O'Kennedy, R., Finlay, W.J.J., Hearty, S., Leonard, P., Brennan, J., Stapleton, S., Townsend, S., Darmaninsheehan, A., Baxter, A. and Jones, C. (2010) 'Applications of Sensors in Food and Environmental analysis' In: Sensors for Chemical and Biological Applications. : CRC Press.
	2005	O'Kennedy, R., Leonard, P., Hearty, S., Daly, S., Dillon, P., Brennan, J., Dunne , L., Darmaninsheehan, A., Stapleton, S., Tully, E., Quinn, J. and Chakraborty, T. (2005) 'Advances in biosensors for detection of pathogens in food and water' In: Rapid Methods for Biological and Chemical Contaminants in Food and Feed. The Netherlands : Wageningen Academic Publishers.

Peer Reviewed Journal

	Year	Publication
	2016	Darcy, E; Leonard, P; Fitzgerald, J; Danaher, M; Ma, H; O'Kennedy, R (2016) 'Purification of Antibodies Using Affinity Chromatography'. Methods in molecular biology (Clifton, N.J.), 1485 . [DOI]
	2016	Leonard, P; Hearty, S; Ma, H; O'Kennedy, R (2016) 'Measuring Protein-Protein Interactions Using Biacore'. Methods in molecular biology (Clifton, N.J.), 1485 . [DOI]
	2016	Fitzgerald, J; Leonard, P; Darcy, E; Sharma, S; O'Kennedy, R (2016) 'Immunoaffinity Chromatography: Concepts and Applications'. Methods in molecular biology (Clifton, N.J.), 1485 . [DOI]
	2015	Fitzgerald, V.; Manning, B.; O'Donnell, B.; O'Reilly, B.; O'Sullivan, D.; O'Kennedy, R.; Leonard, P. (2015) 'Exploiting highly ordered subnanoliter volume microcapillaries as microtools for the analysis of antibody producing cells'. Analytical Chemistry, 87 . [Link] [DOI]
	2015	Larragy, R; Fitzgerald, J; Prisecaru, A; McKee, V; Leonard, P; Kellett, A (2015) 'Protein engineering with artificial chemical nucleases'. Chemical communications (Cambridge, England), 51 (65). [DOI]
	2014	Fitzgerald, J; Leonard, P; Danaher, M; O'Kennedy, R (2014) 'Rapid Simultaneous Detection of Anti-protozoan Drugs Using a Lateral-Flow Immunoassay Format'. Applied Biochemistry and Biotechnology, 176 (2). [DOI]
	2012	Hayes, C.J., Leonard, P., and O'Kennedy, R. (2012) 'Overcoming antibody expression limitations by smart design'. Protein Expression and Purification, 83 :84-91.
	2011	Fitzgerald, J., Leonard, P., Darcy, E., Danaher, M. and O'Kennedy, R. (2011) 'Light chain shuffling from phage pool allows 185-fold improvement of an anti-Halofuginone scFv'. Analytical Biochemistry, 410 :27-33.
	2011	Fodey, T., Leonard, P., O'Mahony, J., O'Kennedy, R. and Danaher, M. (2011) 'Developments in the production of biological and synthetic binders for immunoassay and sensor based detection of small molecules'. 30 :254-265.
	2011	Welbeck, K., Leonard, P., Gilmartin, N., Viguier, C., Arora, S. and O'Kennedy, R. (2011) 'Development of a surface plasmon resonance-based immunoassay for detection of N-acetyl-B-D-glucosaminidase in milk'. Journal of Immunological Methods, 364 :14-20.
	2011	Skottrup, P., Leonard, P., Kaczmarek, J.Z., Veillard, F., Enghild, J., O’Kennedy, R., Sroka, A., Clausen, R.P., Potempa, J. and Riise, E. (2011) 'Diagnostic evaluation of a nanobody with picomolar affinity towards the cysteine protease RgpB from Porphyromonas gingivalis'. Analytical Biochemistry, 415 :158-167.
	2011	Leonard, P., Hayes, C.J. and O'Kennedy, R. (2011) 'Rapid selection of temperature stable Fab fragments using Biacore A100'. Analytical Biochemistry, 409 :290-292.
	2010	Hearty, S., Leonard, P. and O'Kennedy, R. (2010) 'Barcodes check out prostate cancer. Nature Nanotechnology'. 5 :9-10.
	2010	Guo, W.L., Leonard, P. and O'Kennedy, R. (2010) 'Simple ‘on plate' growth for improved antibody screening'. Journal of Immunological Methods, 359 :61-64.
	2010	O'Kennedy, R., Townsend, S., Donohoe, G.G., Leonard, P., Hearty, S. and Byrne, B. (2010) 'Speedy, Small, Sensitive and Specific - reality or myth for future analytical methods'. Analytical Letters, 33 :1630-1648.
	2009	Conroy, P., Hearty, S., Leonard, P. and O'Kennedy, R. (2009) 'Antibody production, design and use for biosensor-based applications. Seminars in Cell and Developmental Biology'. 20 :10-26.
	2009	McDonnell, B., Hearty, S., Leonard, P. and O'Kennedy, R (2009) 'Cardiac biomarkers and the case for point-of-care testing. Clinical Biochemistry'. 42 :549-561.
	2008	Reeves, E.P., Ali, T., Leonard, P., Hearty, S., O'Kennedy, R., May, F.E.B., Westley, B.R., Josenhans, C., Rust, M., Suerbaum, S., Smith, A., Drumm, B. and Clyne, M. (2008) 'Helicobacter pylori Lipopolysaccharide Interacts With TFF1 in a pH-Dependent Manner'. Gastroenterology, 135 :2043-2054.e2.
	2007	Leonard, P., Säfsten, P., Hearty, S., McDonnell, B., Finlay, W. and O'Kennedy, R. (2007) 'High throughput ranking of recombinant avian scFv antibody fragments from crude lysates using the Biacore A100'. Journal of Immunological Methods, 323 :172-179.
	2007	Skottrup, P., Hearty, S., Frøkiær, H., Leonard, P., Hejgaard, J., O'Kennedy, R., Nicolaisen, M. and Justesen, A.F. (2007) 'Detection of fungal spores using a generic surface plasmon resonance immunoassay'. BIOSENSORS & BIOELECTRONICS, 22 :2724-2729.
	2007	Healy, D., Hayes, C., Leonard, P., Dillon, M. and O'Kennedy, R. (2007) 'Biosensor developments: application to prostate-specific antigen detection'. TRENDS IN BIOTECHNOLOGY (TIBTECH), 25 :125-131.
	2006	Hearty, S., Leonard, P. Quinn, J. and O'Kennedy, R. (2006) 'Production, characterisation and potential application of a novel monoclonal antibody for detection of virulent Listeria monocytogenes'. Journal of Microbiological Methods, 66 :294-312.
	2006	Tully, E., Hearty, S., Leonard, P. and O'Kennedy, R. (2006) 'The development of rapid fluorescence-based immunoassays, using quantum dot-labelled antibodies for the detection of Listeria monocytogenes cell surface proteins. International Journal of Biological Macromolecules'. 39 :127-134.
	2005	Leonard, P., Hearty, S., Quinn, J. and O'Kennedy, R. (2005) 'Sensitive detection of Listeria monocytogenes using fully engineered recombinant scFv antibody fragments. 92nd Annual Meeting of the International Association for Food Protection Book of Abstracts'. .
	2005	Leonard, P., Hearty, S., Quinn, J. and O'Kennedy, R. (2005) 'Development of a surface plasmon resonance-based immunoassay for the direct detection of Listeria monocytogenes'. Journal of Food Protection, 68 :728-735.
	2005	O'Kennedy, R., Carolan, N., Hearty, S., Leonard, P., Finlay, W., Dillon, P. and Daly, S. (2005) 'Applications and future developments of sensors in relation to postharvest analysis of fruits, vegetables and other crops. Stewart Postharvest Review, Issue 3 online October 2005 [www.stewartpostharvest.com/October_2005/OKennedy.htm]'. .
	2005	Dillon, P.P., Killard, A.J., Daly, S.J., Leonard, P. and O'Kennedy, R. (2005) 'Novel Assay Format Allowing the Prolonged use of Regeneration-Based Sensor Chip Technology'. Journal of Immunological Methods, 296 :77-82.
	2004	Leonard, P., Hearty, S., Quinn, J. and O'Kennedy, R. (2004) 'A generic approach for the detection of whole Listeria monocytogenes cells in contaminated samples using surface plasmon resonance'. BIOSENSORS & BIOELECTRONICS, 19 :1331-1334.
	2004	O'Kennedy, R., Leonard, P., Hearty, S., Brennan, J., Fanning, L., Dillon, M. and Porter, A. (2004) 'Exploiting monoclonal and recombinant antibodies for the development of surface plasmon resonance-based biosensor arrays for bacteria, drugs and tumour markers. Human Antibodies'. 13 .
	2004	Paul P. Dillon , Anthony J. Killard , Stephen J. Daly , Paul Leonard , Richard O'Kennedy (2004) 'Novel assay format permitting the prolonged usenext term of regeneration-based sensor chip technology'. Journal of Immunological Methods, 296 :77-82.
	2003	Leonard, P., Hearty, S., Brennan, J., Dunne, L., Quinn, J., Chakraborty, T., and O'Kennedy, R. (2003) 'Advances in biosensors for the detection of pathogens in food and water'. 32 :3-13.
	2001	Leonard, P., Hearty, S., Quinn, J.G., and O'Kennedy, R. (2001) 'A pathogenic life cycle of Listeria monocytogenes. INCO COPERINICUS News'. 3 :1-2.
	2000	Fitzpatrick, J., Fanning, L., Hearty, S., Leonard, P., Manning, B.M., Quinn, J.G., and O'Kennedy, R. (2000) 'Applications and recent developments in the use of antibodies for analysis. Analytical Letters, 33(13):2563-2609'. Analytical Letters, 33 :2563-2609.
	1999	Leonard, P., Estrada Rendon, C.M., Amara, G., Roussy, J., Tobin, J. and Degorce-Dumas, J.R. (1999) 'Natural attenuation study of the impact of acid mine drainage (AMD) in the site of Carnoulés. Process Metallurgy'. 9 :587-594.
	1999	Estrada Rendon, C.M., Amara, G., Leonard, P., Tobin, J., Roussy, J. and Degorce-Dumas, JR. (1999) 'Acid Mine Drainage (AMD) treatment by sulphate reducing bacteria. Process Metallurgy, 9(2):577-585'. Process Biochemistry, 9 :577-585.

Research Interests

Research interests include:

(i) Single-cell analysis for biological discovery

(ii) Technologies for improved antibody and cell therapy discovery

(iii) High throughput biomolecular interaction technologies and studies

(iv) Immunoassay development and validation for biomedical and environmental analysis

Research Projects

Title	Role	Start date	End date
Biotherapeutics for Inflammatory Skin Diseases	Co-PI	01/02/2024	31/12/2027
AquaBioSens	Co-PI	01/01/2024	31/12/2026
Patient-guided immunological studies for the development of colon cancer therapies	Co applicant and industry supervisor	01/10/2018	30/09/2022
Monoclonal Cell Array Technology	DCU PI	30/09/2019	29/09/2021
Antibody-based testing hub for serological assay validation	DCU PI	01/09/2020	31/12/2020
IMI Stakeholder Forum 2019	DCU PI	11/06/2019	31/07/2019
BBISolutions_DiCast Platform	DCU PI	16/06/2014	15/09/2014
Protein engineering using novel artificial metallonucleases. TIDA 2013.	DCU PI	01/01/2014	31/12/2014
Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD) Drug Monitoring at Point of Need	DCU PI	01/06/2013	12/07/2013
Innovamab - Innovation in monoclonal antibody discovery	DCU PI	01/10/2012	31/07/2013
Direct Clone Analysis and Selection Technology	DCU PI	14/03/2012	11/04/2012
TIDA Training for PAul Leonard DiCAST - leading the way in drug discovery	DCU PI	01/06/2012	30/11/2012
BDI PP2 - DiCAST	PI	01/10/2010	31/03/2012