Professor Stuart Clarke
Msc, PhD, FFPH, FRCPath
Professor of Microbiology and Public Health
Honorary Consultant in Public Health


Profile page(s)
Professor Clarke has research interests in the epidemiology of infectious diseases, particularly in relation to vaccine development and the evaluation of new vaccines. He works mostly with Streptococcus pneumoniae and Haemophilus influenzae both in the UK and across Southeast Asia.
In 2009, Dr Clarke won the Bupa Foundation's award of ‘Best Emerging Medical Researcher in the UK’ for his work on the molecular epidemiology of pneumococcal infection around the introduction of pneumococcal conjugate vaccines.
He is also an Adjunct Associate Professor at the International Medical University in Kuala Lumpur and an Associate Editor of the journal Pneumonia.
Landmark publications:
Changes in serotype prevalence of Streptococcus pneumoniae in Southampton, UK between 2006 and 2018.
Cleary DW, Jones J, Gladstone RA, Osman KL, Devine VT, Jefferies JM, Bentley SD, Faust SN, Clarke SC.
Sci Rep. 2022 Aug 3;12(1):13332. doi: 10.1038/s41598-022-17600-6.
PMID: 35922536 Free PMC article.
Gladstone RA, Lo SW, Goater R, Yeats C, Taylor B, Hadfield J, Lees JA, Croucher NJ, van Tonder AJ, Bentley LJ, Quah FX, Blaschke AJ, Pershing NL, Byington CL, Balaji V, Hryniewicz W, Sigauque B, Ravikumar KL, Almeida SCG, Ochoa TJ, Ho PL, du Plessis M, Ndlangisa KM, Cornick JE, Kwambana-Adams B, Benisty R, Nzenze SA, Madhi SA, Hawkins PA, Pollard AJ, Everett DB, Antonio M, Dagan R, Klugman KP, von Gottberg A, Metcalf BJ, Li Y, Beall BW, McGee L, Breiman RF, Aanensen DM, Bentley SD; The Global Pneumococcal Sequencing Consortium.
Microb Genom. 2020 May;6(5):e000357. doi: 10.1099/mgen.0.000357. Epub 2020 Apr 29.
PMID: 32375991 Free PMC article.
Lo SW, Gladstone RA, van Tonder AJ, Lees JA, du Plessis M, Benisty R, Givon-Lavi N, Hawkins PA, Cornick JE, Kwambana-Adams B, Law PY, Ho PL, Antonio M, Everett DB, Dagan R, von Gottberg A, Klugman KP, McGee L, Breiman RF, Bentley SD; Global Pneumococcal Sequencing Consortium.
Lancet Infect Dis. 2019 Jul;19(7):759-769. doi: 10.1016/S1473-3099(19)30297-X. Epub 2019 Jun 10.
PMID: 31196809 Free PMC article.
Global emergence and population dynamics of divergent serotype 3 CC180 pneumococci.
Azarian T, Mitchell PK, Georgieva M, Thompson CM, Ghouila A, Pollard AJ, von Gottberg A, du Plessis M, Antonio M, Kwambana-Adams BA, Clarke SC, Everett D, Cornick J, Sadowy E, Hryniewicz W, Skoczynska A, Moïsi JC, McGee L, Beall B, Metcalf BJ, Breiman RF, Ho PL, Reid R, O'Brien KL, Gladstone RA, Bentley SD, Hanage WP.
PLoS Pathog. 2018 Nov 26;14(11):e1007438. doi: 10.1371/journal.ppat.1007438. eCollection 2018 Nov.
PMID: 30475919 Free PMC article.
Pneumococcal vaccine impacts on the population genomics of non-typeable Haemophilus influenzae.
Cleary DW, Devine VT, Morris DE, Osman KL, Gladstone RA, Bentley SD, Faust SN, Clarke SC.
Microb Genom. 2018 Sep;4(9):e000209. doi: 10.1099/mgen.0.000209. Epub 2018 Aug 6.
PMID: 30080135 Free PMC article.
Major grants:
2021-23
Clarke, Faust, Cleary
Pfizer
Epidemiology of carried and disease-causing pneumococci during pneumococcal conjugate vaccine implementation
£377,714
2021-23
Clarke, Faust, Cleary
Pfizer
Epidemiology of carried and disease-causing pneumococci during pneumococcal conjugate vaccine implementation
£631,814
2015-16
Clarke
British Council (Newton Fund Institutional Links Award)
Assessing the risk of emerging microbes during vaccine implementation and climate change through population-based carriage studies of the upper respiratory tract in all age groups
£123,410
2011-14
Wilkinson, Bourne, Clarke, Sutton
GSK Bio
An epidemiology study to assess the contribution of bacterial and viral pathogens to Acute Exacerbations of Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (AECOPD) in adults and elderly between 40 and 85 years of age in the UK
£3,820,000
2011-16
Wilkinson, Bourne, Clarke
GSKBio
5 year collaborative agreement to establish quality managed readouts of immunometrics and molecular microbiology and to develop proof of concept for COPD vaccine programme
£2,219,946
Impact example:
https://www.southamptonbrc.nihr.ac.uk/post/new-study-to-support-pneumonia-vaccines-in-thailand