I graduated from Queen's University Belfast, School of Pharmacy in 2015 with a Master of Pharmacy (MPharm) degree (1st Class Hons) and completed a three-year DfE funded PhD-Studentship in the same institution, within the Biofilm Research Group. Following this, I was employed as a Research Fellow in environmental microbiology at the School of Biological Sciences, Queen’s University Belfast, under Professor John McGrath.  

Since October 2020, I have been working as a Research Fellow in the School of Pharmacy at Queen's University Belfast, under the supervision of Professor Brendan Gilmore. My current research involves using bioinformatics approaches to understand bacterial responses to external stresses and exploring the cellular responses of bacterial biofilms to cold atmospheric plasma using in vitro and in vivo models. I have published several papers, given presentations at national and international conferences, and maintain a strong network of collaborators in various fields, including bioinformatics, organic chemistry, microbiology, and physics.  

I am also a qualified pharmacist with experience in academia, community, hospital, and industry settings. Additionally, I have been a Research Fellow with a secondment at the Wellcome-Wolfson Institute for Experimental Medicine, Queen’s University Belfast and Belfast Health and Social Care Trust, in response to the COVID pandemic, where I was involved in a part-time secondment to support the COVID-19 Genomics UK (COG-UK) consortium. 

In my free time, I enjoy staying fit by training and competing in Olympic fencing. I have participated in local and national competitions in both individual and team events.