James Goodwin, Ph.D.

James Goodwin, Ph.D., is Visiting Professor at Loughborough University where he holds a Chair in the Physiology of Ageing and is the Head of Research at Age UK, the largest charity for older people in Europe. Dr. Goodwin sits on numerous expert bodies, including a UK Ministerial Advisory Group on Research, a UN Research Agenda for Ageing panel, the UN Digital Health Group and a WHO Advisory Group. He led the user involvement element of the EC funded FUTURAGE project which wrote the ‘road map’ of ageing research for the next 10-15 years.  He was a founder member of the Age Friendly City initiative in which Age UK was one of the two original co-funders of the project. He is a member of the editorial board of the UK journal ‘Quality in Ageing’.  He presented evidence to the House of Lords Inquiry on the Scientific Aspects of Ageing (Select Committee on Science and Technology) in 2005 and 2009, and to a US Congressional hearing in 2006.

He helped to develop the new research impact assessment for universities in the UK (REF 2014), chairs a WHO expert advisory group on knowledge translation and has recently been appointed an Impact Assessor by HEFCE for the forthcoming REF assessment of research impact in UK universities. Dr. Goodwin graduated with a bachelor’s degree in Biology from Keele University, UK.  After graduation and a Queen’s Commission in HM Forces, he read for a Master’s in human biology at Loughborough University and then for a PhD in medical science in Professor Sir John Tooke’s department at the Postgraduate Medical School, University of Exeter. His research area was the effects of temperature variations on the autonomic cardiovascular responses of older people, an area highly relevant to the issue of climate change and older people’s health.

He has been a visiting scientist to the Met Office for over 10 years and was recently asked by NICE to submit expert evidence on excess winter deaths, an issue of great importance for public health.  In 2014 he was elected to Academician status by the Council of the Academy of Social Sciences for his work on research translation.  After 15 years in the university research, he was appointed Head of Research at the Help the Aged in 2002 and subsequently at Age UK in 2009.