HOOKE - Key Persons
Aaron Deere is a uniquely accomplished Nutritionist and Sports Nutritionist who draws on his experience working with a diverse group of clients, from globally renowned athletes to Hollywood actors, to cultivate and optimise performance through targeted nutritional planning.
Aaron holds a degree in Sports Science from Australia's Edith Cowan University and a Master's degree in Nutritional Medicine from the University of Surrey, along with a performance background that includes a career as a professional basketballer and holding a black belt in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu. His academic and athletic background allows Aaron to offer highly effective expert nutritional advice, from elite athletes to those experiencing complex health issues, curating unique nutrition programmes to help address each client's specific needs.
His experience in managing chronic illness and supporting body composition change is informed by the industry-leading education programme he runs for fitness professionals, in which he teaches advanced coaching, evidence-based wellness and the integration of key fitness principles with nutritional science.
Alexis Kemp has a first degree in English and a Postgraduate in Fashion and Lifestyle journalism. Alexis quickly realised that her skills lay with people, not prose, so she became a publicist at leading communications agency Public Eye. There, Alexis looked after some of the most high-profile talent worldwide and developed her expertise in communication and people-management skills.
With an impeccable track record for client service, Alexis moved from the media world to that of UHNW and spent the next 12 years working for Concierge London (now Somerset White) in both the UK and US. During her tenure, Alexis successfully balanced the unique demands of working in elite client management alongside developing a growing business. She guided the company's PR coverage, sourced and trained all company staff worldwide and built partnerships with top banks, private offices, funds and trusts. Her efforts grew the business across both London and New York and established Concierge as a leader in its field.
It is her acute business acumen and finely honed people-management skills that Alexis brings to the HOOKE team-along with a passion for exercise, nutrition and wellness. She is a firm believer in taking a holistic approach to all facets of health and wellbeing, starting from the inside out, and enjoys exploring new avenues for such.
Playing an integral role within HOOKE's team of psychologists, Dr Andrew Cruikshank works with members to optimise a positive symbiosis between the biological and social aspects of health. Through a range of Cognitive-Behavioural Therapy, Rational Emotive Behaviour Therapy and Brief Solution-Focussed Therapy, Dr Cruikshank assesses and tracks cognition, expectation, emotion and motivation to support psychological health and performance.
Job Titles:
- Chairman of Multidisciplinary Team
Doctor David Porter brings incomparable expertise managing one of the most successful multi-disciplinary health teams at Chelsea Football Club to his role at HOOKE. Developing ground-breaking programmes focussed on personal optimisation and integrated medicine has made him uniquely positioned to chair HOOKE's MDT. Dr Porter also specialises in musculoskeletal health and is a pioneer in stem cell therapy.
Dr Porter's international reputation as a sports medical physician and specialist in orthobiologics has seen him nurture the careers of some of the world's most famous footballers.
Graduating from University College London Medical School and acquiring specialist training in emergency and intensive care medicine, Dr Porter joined Chelsea FC, supporting the players throughout the seasons as the Men's First Team Doctor.
Continuing to study Sports and Exercise Medicine, he also taught emergency protocols while serving on the faculty of the FA's Advanced Trauma Medical Management in Football (ATMMIF).
Job Titles:
- President and CEO of the Buck Institute for Research
Dr. Verdin is the President and CEO of the Buck Institute for Research on Aging. His laboratory studies the relationship between ageing and the immune system. A native of Belgium, Dr. Verdin completed his clinical and research training at Harvard Medical School. He has held senior appointments at several international medical schools, and is also a professor of medicine at University of California, San Francisco. Dr. Verdin has extensive experience working with biotech companies, including Novartis, Roche, Pfizer, and now Hooke.
Dr. Satchidananda (Satchin) Panda is a leading expert in the field of circadian rhythm research. He is a Professor at the Salk Institute and a founding executive member of the Center for Circadian Biology at the University of California, San Diego. Dr. Panda is also a Pew Scholar and a recipient of the The Julie Martin Mid-Career Award in Aging Research. He is the author of the book "The Circadian Code" and has made several notable contributions to the field of chronobiology, most notably by establishing a link between obesity and the timing of eating.
Dr. Satchidananda (Satchin) Panda is a leading expert in the field of circadian rhythm research. He was born and raised in India and migrated to the United States for his higher studies. He joined the graduate program at the Scripps Research Institute in California, where he studied the circadian oscillator mechanism in plants and after receiving his PhD in 2001, he pursued postdoctoral research in Dr. John Hogenesch's lab at the Genomics Institute of the Novartis Research Foundation, San Diego.
His research focuses on how circadian clocks in every organ and brain region work together to orchestrate the optimum timing for gene functions. He also studies how our daily habits or our environment affect circadian clocks. His research has led him to make several notable contributions to the field of chronobiology. In particularly he established that ‘time restricted feeding' can be pivotal to preventing or curing metabolic disease and avoiding the chronic diseases of old age. He also discovered the pathways by which blue light affects our circadian clock, regulating mood and sleep patterns.
He is a Professor at the Salk Institute and a founding executive member of the Center for Circadian Biology at the University of California, San Diego. Dr. Panda is also a Pew Scholar and a recipient of the The Julie Martin Mid-Career Award in Aging Research.
Dr. Panda is the author of the book "The Circadian Code".
A leading general practitioner, Dr Ummer Qadeer embodies a 21st century take on the traditional family doctor. Working as an integral part of HOOKE's multidisciplinary team, Dr Qadeer is an attentive and accessible touchpoint for members as they embark on this ever-evolving conversation around their health. He consolidates the information delivered to him by the team, examining key biomarkers to create bespoke treatment plans and support members in achieving their health goals.
Qualifying from St George's University London with a Bachelor in Medicine and Surgery (MBBS) and first class honours in medical sciences, Dr Ummer Qadeer's wide experience of specialities includes A&E, Anaesthetics / ITU, Geriatric, General and acute medicine, Obstetrics, Gynaecology, Orthopaedics, Psychiatry, Ophthalmology and General Practice.
During the Covid-19 pandemic, he was part of the rapid digital transformation in primary care, where patient consultations were moved from in-person to virtual appointments. He has since gone on to teach fellow GPs and trainees to use digital software to improve efficiency, accuracy and speed of clinical documentation.
Job Titles:
- Executive Director
- Trustee
- Management
KATE WOOLHOUSE comes from a legal background, having qualified as an intellectual property solicitor and spending a decade at leading UK and US law firms. Kate advised a broad range of clients, from listed companies to start-ups to sole traders, giving her an understanding and enthusiasm for taking commercial enterprises from inception through launch and expansion.
While practising as a lawyer, Kate focussed on intellectual property, regulatory and corporate/commercial matters in industries including digital/IT, retail, medical devices and biotech. A significant portion of her practice was dedicated to navigating the perils and pitfalls of privacy and data protection.
Kate joined HOOKE because she loves working with innovators and disruptors to realise a vision. She advised HOOKE from the point of incorporation and took up a non-exec role with the company in September 2019, before becoming Executive Director in January 2020. She now manages the financial, commercial and regulatory aspects of the business.
Outside of work, Kate is a trustee of a family charity that supports education and the arts. She is a keen cook and in her spare time endeavours to work off the calories in spin class.
LEV MIKHEEV is a Russian-educated polymath. His curious mind has taken him from his beginnings in theoretical physics to a successful career in finance, before his current obsession with developing HOOKE as a prototype for 21st-century medicine.
From his early fascination with Euclidean geometry, Lev was driven to build simple models of our complex world. He honed this art working towards his PhD in 1989 with the top scientists of the Landau School in Moscow, before moving to the US and discovering that this skill was in high demand on Wall Street. In 1995, he joined the infamous Fixed Income Arbitrage group at Salomon Brothers, then went on to manage hedge fund portfolios at Moore Capital in London.
Having started regular endurance training at the age of 48, Lev was fascinated to uncover an enormous untapped potential in himself. This led him to become a keen student of geroscience and to an increasing realisation that the potential of modern medicine is barely understood or realised. In 2019, Lev launched HOOKE to prove that everyone's life can be enhanced and extended by thoughtful application of the modern life sciences.
Lev continues training seriously, trying to be an exemplary HOOKE member himself. He is also engaged with a few other curious Salomon Brothers alumni, collectively known as the Horn Fellowship, in helping the University of Cambridge bridge the gap between science and policy. Long term, Lev hopes to help start a revolution in school education, which he believes is even less fit for our age than medicine.
Job Titles:
- Psychotherapist and Executive Coach
Mark Boyden trained at Columbia University and is a certified assessor in the Neethling Brain Instruments (NBI) and Hogan Psychometric testing. He gained extensive training in psychoanalytic therapy and Cognitive Analytic Therapy(CAT) at Guy's Hospital. Mark has nearly 18 years of combined experience working in the health professions and psychotherapy and as an addictions specialist.
Before his training, Mark held senior management roles at several blue-chip organisations, giving him a deep, personal understanding of the challenges inherent to leadership and business responsibility. Since 2014, Mark has been a Director of Lionheart Consulting, providing specialist coaching to family offices, companies, philanthropic foundations, universities and government.
Mark's approach focuses on building a secure, collaborative relationship as a framework for the therapy, through scrupulous attention to confidentiality and professional boundaries. He works at the member's pace, attending to strengths and resources as well as areas of difficulty.
When not working with members remotely, Mark has been creating a dedicated yoga space in his home in Dorset - an imaginative response to his favourite gyms being shut during lockdown.
Job Titles:
- Strength & Conditioning Coach
With nearly 30 years of experience as a strength and conditioning coach, sports nutritionist and medal-winning athlete has helped Mark Roberts to cultivate a 360 approach to fitness. Mark's philosophy that no single discipline works in isolation, encourages members to create long-term change through uniquely personalised programmes tailored to individual goals that deliver both quick and lasting results.
Having worked with more than 80 world-class and Olympic athletes, professional teams, musicians and dancers, Professor Dave Collins brings a multidisciplinary and psychophysiological focus to the health programme at HOOKE, designed to enhance integral aspects of a rich and fulfilled life.
His career began in the military before Dave became a teacher, psychologist and academic. With his research focusing on the promotion of peak performance, he published over 350 peer-reviewed papers and 70 books and chapters, with schools and colleges using his more recent work on human development as the basis for their personal development programmes.
Dave is the Director and founder of Grey Matters Performance Ltd, a company he set up and is a Professorial Fellow in Human Performance Science at Edinburgh University.
A global specialist in the field of longevity, Dr Michael Ristow brings his pioneering work on the effects of oxidative stress, mitochondrial ageing and endocrinology to the HOOKE members' programme. Now leading some of the most innovative studies in repurposing existing drugs as anti-ageing compounds, he is completely transforming the longevity landscape.
Having trained and completed a residency at the University of Bochum Medical School, Dr Michael Ristow worked as a post-doctoral scientist at Harvard Medical School, going on to become a full professor for human nutrition at the University of Jena and a full professor of Energy Metabolism at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH).
A board-certified physician, specialist in internal medicine and expert in longevity, Dr Ristow continues to research biochemical and molecular effects. With particular focus on the role of mitochondriain healthspan regulation and prevention of metabolic diseases, he was the first to correlate the effects of low calorie intake, physical activity and sirtuin stimulation. Through his extensive research, Dr Ristowh has identified FDA-approved compounds and new phytochemicals as critical influences on extending human healthspan.
Professor Paul Fletcher is the Bernard Wolfe Professor of Health Neuroscience at the University of Cambridge and holder of a Wellcome Trust Investigator Award. His research uses combinations of neuroimaging, behavioural studies, psychopharmacology and computational modelling. Paul was also part of the development team for the multi-BAFTA winning video game Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice which features a character suffering from psychosis.
Professor Paul Fletcher trained in medicine and psychiatry before taking a PhD in cognitive neuroscience and was elected the Bernard Wolfe Professor of Health Neuroscience at the University of Cambridge in 2008. He uses combinations of pharmacological challenges, neuroimaging and larger scale behavioural studies in healthy and clinical populations, with the aim of understanding the basis of learning and decision-making in the human brain. His work is supported by a Wellcome Trust Investigator award.
A central principle of his research is that the brain is occupied in the process of forming predictions and associations to minimise error and uncertainty and to maximise reward. The cognitive and reflective processes engaged with this goal can conflict with underlying automatic and habitual processes. The end result may be that our behaviours can seem irrational and in conflict with our longer term goals and plans. Given that major global non-communicable diseases are profoundly influenced by health-harming decisions and behaviours, understanding how body, brain and environmental signals are integrated and how they shape these behaviours will be a crucial part of improving health.
Paul is also very interested in how video game and related technologies may play a key part in representing and promoting mental health. Working with the video game studio, Ninja Theory Ltd, he was a member of the team who made the video game Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice which won five BAFTAs and several other awards for its portrayal of mental illness.
Paul has been elected as a Fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences.
A leading authority on the interplay between the neuroendocrine response and all aspects of human physiology and psychology, Professor Pierre-Marc Bouloux has educated generations of the UK's top doctors. A fellow of the Royal College of Physicians, he brings an unrivalled breadth of expertise in internal medicine to HOOKE acquired through an incomparable wealth of experience.
Following up his training at St Bartholomew's Medical College with postgraduate degrees from both the Hammersmith and Brompton Hospitals, Professor Bouloux studied Cardiology in Brussels before being awarded a Medical Research Council (MRC) Fellowship in Endocrinology at St Bartholomew's Hospital.
He qualified as MBBS with Honours Distinctions and subsequently gained an MD in 1984 and honoured with a Fellowship of the Royal College of Physicians (FRCP) in 1991. He was appointed to the Royal Free Hospital as Senior Lecturer in Endocrinology in 1991 before being awarded a personal Chair in 2002.
Professor Bouloux's pioneering research into neuroendocrinology and reproductive medicine has been published in over 200 peer-reviewed papers and 204 chapters, reviews and textbooks. He has overseen the tutelage of 14 PhD students and three MDs, has served on committees for the Royal College of Physicians and the Society for Endocrinology and garnered an international reputation as a visiting professor in the United States and the Pasteur Institute in Paris.
With more than a decade's experience working with high net worth clients, Sarah Curbison is the touchpoint for HOOKE members, overseeing and facilitating a personal and seamless journey from the outset.
Sarah's career has seen her develop a unique understanding of how to manage bespoke client relationships. She was able to cultivate this singular skill working as the Business Relations Director at Concierge London, delivering a range of complex, multi-faceted services to businesses and individuals. It was here she formed a close working relationship with Alexis Kemp, with whom she now operates the client services aspect of HOOKE.