Education and Employment
Education
April 2021- Qualified at the Practitioner level of the PRINCE2 project management system
Oct.1997- Dec 2001- PhD from the University of Nottingham entitled ‘Investigating the Mechanism of Auxin Transport in Arabidopsis thaliana’. Supervised by Professor Malcolm Bennett and Dr Richard Napier (HRI Wellesbourne)
Oct.1996- Sept.1997- MRes in Analytical Biology from the University of Warwick.
Oct.1993- July 1996- BSc (Hons.) class 2.1 in Biological Science with Virology from the University of Warwick.
Sept 1986- July 1993- Bryntirion Comprehensive School, Bridgend, South Wales.
Photo of PhD graduation ceremony with colleague Antony Yemm
Research Experience and Employment
October 2022- Present: President, Global Plant Council
Strategic planning for the GPC, which represents a coalition of organisation with ~30K members.
Focus on engagement with UN Climate Change Policy, provision of equitable access to digital sequence information and promoting uptake of new breeding technologies
https://globalplantcouncil.org/
March 2021- Present: Executive Officer, Association of Applied Biologists
Leadership of a learned society that engages with community of applied biologists who have a focus on improving agricultural productivity.
Activities involve management of AAB team, budgeting of society activities, organisation of annual events with ~2000 attendees, management of AAB-owned publications and engaging with the wider community through interactions with Royal Society of Biology (Chair of Plant Science Group, member of Plant Health Committee), as WG leader of two EU COST-Actions, Secretary of Multinational Arabidopsis Steering Committee, member of the SEB and BSPP. https://www.aab.org.uk/
October 2020- Present: Director, Arabidopsis Events UK Limited company
Event organisation and project management with a focus on excellence in plant science. In 2022 managed £300K in revenue as part of conference organisation.
Current activity includes management of MEMBRA UKRI-funded Treescapes project. https://www.arabidopsisevents.uk/
May 2015- present: National Coordinator for the GARNet Community http://www.garnetcommunity.org.uk
GARNet is a BBSRC-funded network that supports plant science in the UK. This role includes organisation of workshops and meetings, maintenance of high-profile online visibility, providing technological updates for the community and acting as the de facto voice for UK academic plant scientists. I write and edit the biannual GARNish newsletter that promotes UK plant science worldwide and maintain the GARNet blog receiving 5K unique clicks/mth: http://blog.garnetcommunity.org.uk/
March 2016- present: Principal Investigator for Cardiff_Wales iGEM synthetic biology team. This involves obtaining funding and leading the scientific program for the inaugural Cardiff University undergraduate iGEM synthetic biology team.
March 2011- present. Lecturer in Plant Science: University of Liverpool, UK. See Parry Lab Research
Nov 2009- Jan 2011. Post-doctoral research in the laboratory of Dr Scott Michaels: Indiana University, Bloomington
Research focused on the relationship between histone modification and DNA replication.
Jan 2002- Oct 2009. Post-doctoral research in the laboratory of Professor Mark Estelle at Indiana University, Bloomington.
Investigating cellular regulation of the auxin receptor and also of the relationship between the auxin response and the nuclear pore complex.
Oct.1997- July 2001. PhD research at the University of Nottingham and at HRI Wellesbourne.
April 1997-Sept. 1997. MRes research project entitled ‘Hormone crosstalk in Arabidopsis’ supervised by Dr Linda Barnett and Dr Malcolm Bennett.
Volunteering
April 2007-March 2011- Volunteer Front Office Receptionist at Volunteers in Medicine clinic for the uninsured (4hr/week). Roles involve liaising between patients, doctors and administrative staff with the aim of ensuring that uninsured patients are able to receive the best treatment options.
