I studied my undergraduate degree at Warwick, completing an MChem in July 2011.

After graduating and much deliberating, I decided to enrol onto the AS:mit course. (Even after hearing many horror stories throughout my undergrad days). I heard that AS:mit was a cruel, hard and uncompromising master; wielding tight deadlines as a whip and sheer workload, its chains. Upon enrolling I discovered how true these metaphors were, very. Walking in, fresh and po-faced, I was struck by the rigor, falling head first into the abyss that I later learned was stats. This was only the first day....

All exaggeration aside, the course can be tough, that is if it weren’t for the help and support of the AS:mit cohort. Everybody is really friendly and helps each other out, as we're all in this together.

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Research

My research in the Gibson group is all about small molecules that stop ice crystals growing. The idea is that small molecules can slow the growth of ice, which can lead to cell damage during cryopreservation. And more importantly, large ice crystals make ice cream taste bad. In general, small ice crystals are better than larger crystals. I measure the ice recrystallisation inhibition activity of small sugar-based molecule. As you can imagine, this involves standing around in a cold, cold room. I carry out something which is scientifically called the "Splat Assay", this involves dropping a sample of my compounds in solution onto a freezing cold plate then looking at the ice crystals under a microscope.

The image on the left has no inhibitor present and has lots of large ice crystals, the one on the left has a good inhibitor and most of the ice are small crystals.

My work is on what makes the inhibitors, potent inhibitors.

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Future

I would like to stay in acedemia and undertake a PhD but who knows what can happen...