Professor Eamonn Mallon

Supervisor Details

Contact Details

Department of Genetics and Genome Biology, University of Leicester

Scientific Background

Research Interests

Epigenetics is defined as the heritable change in expression of a gene without any change in the DNA sequence. Everything we do - diet, habitat, social interactions, even aging - causes chemical modifications on genes that will turn those genes on or off: epigenetic changes. Many diseases including cancer and Alzheimer's show epigenetic changes between the normal or healthy state.

Professor Mallon’s group research epigenetics in insects, mainly bumblebees and wasps. This is done both as a model of more complicated systems, e.g. humans, and because of insects’ importance to humanity’s survival. For example, insect pollination services are worth 14.2 billion euros to Europe's economy.

Scientific Inspiration

Thomas Huxley. He came from a much more deprived background than his scientific peers, yet through talent and work made a contribution to knowledge.

Research Groups

Social Epigenetics Lab

Supervision Style

In three words or phrases: Work-life balance. Always focussed on the student’s scientific career. Making the path the goal.

Provision of Training

Initially we will look to see where formal training can fill any holes in your knowledge. After that, the PhD will give you the most important skill, how to develop yourself.

Progression Monitoring and Management

Its your PhD. I have weekly lab meetings, but these are to help iron out problems not as a check on your progression against some arbitrary goal.

Fundamentally, I want you to feel that a good day’s work is success, no matter the outcome. Allowing yourself to only be content when experiments work, will lead to a lot of discontent.

Communication

A quick email or dropping into my office can usually get a meeting that day or at the latest the next day. I tend not to check my email after 6 or on the weekends, so you should not get emails from me outside of work hours (although I do start early!)

PhD Students can expect scheduled meetings with me:

In a group meeting

At least once per week

In year 1 of PhD study

At least once per fortnight

In year 2 of PhD study

At least once per month

In year 3 of PhD study

At least once per month

These meetings will be a mixture of face to face, via video chat or telephone, and I am usually contactable for an instant response on every working day.

Working Patterns

The timing of work in my lab is completely flexible, and (other than attending pre-arranged meetings), I expect students to manage their own time.

Notice Period for Feedback

I need at least 1 week’s notice to provide feedback on written work of up to 5000 words.

MIBTP Project Details

Primary supervisor for:

Slowing the Clock: How Diet and Metabolism Reprogram Epigenetic Ageing

See the PhD Opportunities section to see if this project is currently open for applications via MIBTP.

Please Note: The main page lists projects via BBSRC Research Theme(s) quoted and then relevant Topic(s).

Slowing the Clock: How Diet and Metabolism Reprogram Epigenetic Ageing

Secondary Supervisor(s): Dr Richard Hopkinson, Dr Ko-Fan Chen

University of Registration: University of Leicester

BBSRC Research Themes: Integrated Understanding of Health (Ageing, Diet and Health, Pharmaceuticals)

Project Outline

Can diet and metabolism really slow down the pace of ageing? This project gives you the chance to tackle this question by exploring epigenetic clocks, the most accurate biomarker of biological age, and uncovering how metabolic pathways influence the ageing process.

Recent work shows that supplements such as calorie restriction mimetics, α-ketoglutarate, and NAD+ boosters can extend lifespan in mice and may even slow their epigenetic clocks. Yet the precise mechanisms remain unresolved: do these compounds work by reprogramming the epigenome, or through alternative metabolic pathways? Answering this question requires powerful models where lifespan and epigenetic change can be tracked rapidly and at scale.

You will use the jewel wasp Nasonia vitripennis, a unique insect model that combines the short lifespan of invertebrates with mammalian-like DNA methylation, making it ideal for studying epigenetic ageing. Using high-throughput behavioural monitoring, lifespan and healthspan assays, and cutting-edge sequencing technologies (Oxford Nanopore for DNA methylation, CUT&Tag for histone marks), you will test whether interventions such as α-ketoglutarate, AICAR, and histone demethylase inhibitors alter both lifespan and the rate of epigenetic ageing. Advanced statistical and machine learning approaches will be used to refine and apply epigenetic clocks to these experiments.

This is a project at the frontier of ageing biology, offering you the opportunity to generate data with real translational relevance. You will gain expertise in molecular biology, epigenomics, bioinformatics, and quantitative analysis, while also contributing to a broader effort to establish new models for drug discovery in ageing research.

If you are motivated by big questions, excited by state-of-the-art genomics, and want to make discoveries that could shape the future of healthy ageing, this project will give you the tools and training to do it.