Jane Osbourn, OBE, is a scientist and former chair of the UK BioIndustry Association. A Natural Sciences graduate of Queens' College, Cambridge, Osbourn completed several post-graduate qualifications before moving into industry at Cambridge Antibody Technology, that became MedImmune and AstraZeneca. In the Queen's Birthday Honours list of 2019, Osbourn was awarded the Order of the British Empire medal for services to "Human Monoclonal Antibody Drug Research and Development and Biotechnology".
Early life Osbourn was born in Bingley, West Yorkshire, and attended Bingley Grammar School. She is married to John Richer, Professor of Physics at the Cavendish Laboratory, Cambridge. She is the sister of Professor Anne Osbourn FRS who investigates plant natural product biosynthesis.
Academic career Osbourn went on to study at the Queens' College, Cambridge, where she obtained a 1st class degree in Natural Sciences (Biochemistry). She was recognised in 1986 for playing netball at Queens, and was awarded both a third year Foundation Scholarship and The Henry Mosseri prize. She went on to complete a PhD degree at the John Innes Centre for Plant Science Research in Norwich, which resulted in the publication of Evidence that nucleocapsid disassembly and a later step in virus replication are inhibited in transgenic tobacco protoplasts expressing TMV coat protein. Following this, she completed a post-doctoral position at Rutgers University, New Jersey, United States, undertaking research directed towards clarification of the sequence elements responsible for the translational enhancement effect conferred by the 5' untranslated region of Tobacco Mosaic Virus known as omega. Osbourn then moved into medical research through a British Heart Foundation Post-Doctoral Fellowship at the Department of Medicine at Addenbrooke's Hospital in Cambridge.
Career in industry In 1993 she moved to a small, Cambridge-based, start-up biotechnology company called Cambridge Antibody Technology. CAT, as it was called, would pioneer the use of Phage Display technology that ultimately discovered important drugs such as Humira. She was the key author of several scientific papers, including Human Antibodies with Sub-nanomolar Affinities Isolated from a Large Non-immunized Phage Display Library, Nature Biotechnology, 1996 and Human Antibodies by Design, Nature Biotechnology, 1998. She is co-author of several others pertaining to antibody discovery and development:
A Biparatopic HER2-Targeting Antibody-Drug Conjugate Induces Tumor Regression in Primary Models Refractory to or Ineligible for HER2-Targeted Therapy, Cancer Cell, 2019 Engineering of a GLP-1 analogue peptide/anti-PCSK9 antibody fusion for type 2 diabetes treatment, Sci Rep, 2018 A novel in vivo method for isolating antibodies from a phage display library by neuronal retrograde transport selectively yields antibodies against p75(NTR.), MAbs, 2013 Applications of ribosome display to antibody drug discovery, Expert Opin Biol Ther, 2015 Signal amplification in flow cytometry using biotin tyramine, Cytometry, 1999 Aquaporin-1 is expressed by vascular smooth muscle cells and mediates rapid water transport across vascular cell membranes, J Vasc Res, 1999 Directed selection of MIP-1 alpha neutralizing CCR5 antibodies from a phage display human antibody library, Nat Biotechnology, 1999 Pathfinder selection: in situ isolation of novel antibodies, Immunotechnology, 1998 Generation of a panel of related human scFv antibodies with high affinities for human CEA, Immunotechnology, 1996 Osbourn is listed as an inventor on several patents, which are (in chronological order):
EP0865492B1 - Specific binding members for human carcinoembryonic antigen, materials and methods EP0906571 - Labelling and selection of molecules US5994519A - Labelling and selection of molecules EP1353180B1 - Labelling and selection of molecules US7074557 - Ribosome Display EP1268766 - Improvements to Ribosome Display WO2001075097A2 - Improvements to Ribosome Display Osbourn also created a technique to assist with the discovery of proximity-guided selection of antibodies, so called Proximol. CAT was acquired by AstraZeneca in 2006 and in the following year was merged with a US-based company called MedImmune to form AstraZeneca’s global biologics R&D arm. During this time Osbourn began to speak about opportunities for diversity in science. In 2013, AstraZeneca announced its decision to relocate its headquarters to Cambridge, UK. Jonathan Burroughs, of Creative Places, wrote in 2015 that Osbourn had an influence over this decision. In February 2019, it was announced that Osbourn would be leaving AstraZeneca. Since November 2019, Osbourn has been Chief Scientific Officer (CSO) of antibody therapeutics discovery company Alchemab Therapeutics.
Recognition Her early interest in science has grown into a passion for science education, supporting and championing life science education programmes and she is established as an advisor and mentor to many young researchers in the life science sector. She has been acknowledged by a number of different pharmaceutical media groups for these qualities.
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