![]() ![]() I am passionate about improving career prospects for early career researchers (ECRs), and as a board member of the British Society for Gene and Cell Therapy, I have established and run a subcommittee devoted to development of Early Career Researchers, as well as updating the BSGCT facebook page ( and twitter feed ( as part of my role on the BSGCT communication & promotion subcommittee. I have also written lay articles for both the BSGCT blog ( ) and ASGCT educational resources. My involvement and engagement activities have featured in a School of Medicine Case Study (see ). In my role as a STEM ambassador, I regularly attend my local school to engage the students in gene therapy and my role as a scientist, and helped out with mock interviews. I play a leading role in a range of engagement activities, including presenting at the annual BSGCT public engagement day preceding the annual conference, and also at events “in house” at Cardiff University, where I have featured in several blog articles (e.g. I am a registered STEMNet ambassador (), and passionate about the need to engage with the lay community to convey science. Developing new serotypes of Adenoviral vectors with new and exciting tropisms for translational applications. ![]() Developing targeting technologies that efficiently enable adenoviral vectors to infect cancerous cells, leaving "normal" cells non-infected.Defining and genetically precluding dose limiting interactions between virus and host cells, proteins and receptors.Research within my group focusses on several aspects of adenovirology, with the overarching aim of developing more selective and efficacious virotherapies for translational applications in cancer, namely: I was promoted to Senior Lecturer in 2014, to Reader in 2018, and to Personal Chair in 2020. Immediately following my recruitment, I began to develop a team, which now numbers almost 20. I relocated to Cardiff University in 2013, driven by a long term ambition to lead a world leading team developing “virotherapies” for treatment of cancer. Prior to relocating to Cardiff, I was studying adenoviral vectors for translational applications in cardiovascular disease, where my research had pinpointed key virus interactions with host blood coagulation factors (most notably Factor X) that dictate the tropism and toxicity of intravenously administered viral vectors. I have a long standing interest in virology and how this can be applied to cancer therapies using "oncolytic" adenoviral based vectors ("virotherapy"), that stems back to my PhD (awarded in 2003 from the University of Birmingham.) ![]()
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