Mark Selwood makes a medal winning appearance at the World Transplant Games
Congratulations to DPAG's Mark Selwood whose fantastic performance at the 24th World Transplant Games brings home gold and bronze medals for Great Britain and Northern Ireland.
Wade-Martins Lab's Apprentice Laboratory and Facilities Technician Mark Selwood ran five incredible track events representing Great Britain and Northern Ireland at the 2023 World Transplant Games in Perth, Australia.
On Thursday 20 April, Mark ran the 400m, 100m and 4x100m relay. He achieved a personal best in the 400m before helping his team win a Bronze Medal in the relay event.
On Friday 21 April, Mark achieved a personal best in the 200m event, before he and his team stormed to victory in the 4x400m relay, winning Gold for Great Britain and Northern Ireland.
The World Transplant Games is the world's largest bi-annual awareness event of its kind, bringing together thousands of transplant athletes, their families and supporters to promote registration and support for organ donation, and help those with a transplanted organ improve their health and fitness.
Mark was born with a genetic liver disease called Alpha 1 Antitrypsin Deficiency which resulted in a liver transplant at the age of 14. He takes part in the British Transplant Games (BTG) each year, and after winning medals in the 100m, 200m, 400m and 4x100 relay at BTG 2022, he received an invitation for the first time to represent Great Britain and Northern Ireland internationally.
Mark Selwood said: "The spirit of the games is to come together and celebrate a second chance at life and remember those who donate so that others might live. I got talking to a runner after the race who was on the same leg as me in the 4x100m from Australia. It turns out that he needed a liver transplant like me due to the exact same liver disorder. That is the first time I have met someone who has had the same liver disorder and had a liver transplant due to it. That is the importance of the games; to know there are others who have gone through what you have gone through and to meet them."
Source: DPAG Website
Since April 2021, Oxford University's KAVLI Institute for Nanoscience Discovery is proudly serving as a hub for research groups from seven different departments spanning both the medical and physical sciences, including Professor Richard Wade-Martins from the Department of Physiology, Anatomy and Genetics.
