Rate My Professor Nick Powell

Professor Nick Powell is a Professor of Gastroenterology in the Department of Metabolism, Digestion and Reproduction at Imperial College London’s Faculty of Medicine, serving as Head of the Section of Hepatology and Gastroenterology. He qualified from the University of Birmingham Medical School with honours and prizes in Medicine and Pathology, and holds an MSc from Imperial College London and a PhD in immunology from King’s College London. After completing specialist training in gastroenterology and internal medicine at Hammersmith and St Mary’s Hospitals in London, he worked for ten years at King’s College London and Guy’s and St Thomas’ Hospitals before joining Imperial in 2019. Powell is an honorary consultant gastroenterologist at Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust and the Royal Marsden Hospital, where he runs inflammatory bowel disease clinics and specialist clinics for patients with immune checkpoint inhibitor-induced colitis.

Powell’s research centres on the molecular and cellular mechanisms driving chronic intestinal inflammation, with a focus on inflammatory bowel diseases such as Crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis, and gut inflammation induced by cancer immunotherapies like immune checkpoint inhibitors. His work explores cytokine-responsive transcriptional networks, host-microbe interactions via the gut microbiota and metabolome, and molecular signatures to advance precision medicine for predicting disease outcomes and therapy responses. He has obtained substantial funding, including a Wellcome Trust Senior Clinical Research Fellowship exceeding £3 million over eight years, alongside awards from the Medical Research Council, NIHR, Crohn’s and Colitis UK, and the Leona M. and Harry B. Helmsley Charitable Trust. Powell chaired the British Society of Gastroenterology guidance on immune checkpoint inhibitor colitis management, serves as Deputy Chair of the BSG IBD Clinical Research Group, and sits on the European Crohn’s and Colitis Organisation Scientific Committee. Key publications include Lo JW et al., 'Immune checkpoint inhibitor-induced colitis is mediated by polyfunctional lymphocytes and is dependent on an IL23/IFNγ axis' (Nature Communications, 2023); Liu Z et al., 'Infliximab and Tofacitinib Attenuate Neutralizing Antibody Responses Against SARS-CoV-2' (Gastroenterology, 2023); and Powell N et al., Immunity (2012).