Profile

I create lots of art for charities that protect the flying foxes (giant bats from Australia!) and bird sanctuaries. I adore animals and really wanted to be a vet, I volunteered in a clinic since I was a teen – but seeing them go every day was too hard for me! I now work on improving research models to reduce the need for animals.

I work on trying to obtain cell types that only appear briefly in development. They will make part of our face, heart, and innervate the body (make sure your brain can control your organs). These cells wander around as we develop to build this complex nervous system and they become different cells when they reach their final destinations. This very fascinating group of cells are also very sensitive to any changes in our genes – even a subtle change can change the way we look (think – each person looks different even though we have almost identical genes). Our DNA is only 1-2% of genes and we still know very little about all the rest of it – it can help DNA fold or regulate when and where genes will be active. We want to understand how small changes ot errors in regions of DNA that control the gene activation can change behaviour of these unique cells and therefore change our bodies!

Lots of the experiments I do involve looking at how much of a specific gene is expressed and where and when. We can see what happens in human development thanks to little models we make out of cells that allow us to observe some of these hidden from view events. Thanks to these cells we can check how a specific genetic change can cause someone to lack a specific cells and therefore miss a part of their body – this can be very small or very detrimental.