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CV

QUALIFICATIONS

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PhD in Ecology

University of Reading (UoR), UK, 2016 - 2020

Thesis: Modelling the functional connectivity and population dynamics of butterflies across landscapes using population and genetic data.

Supervisors: Prof Tom Oliver, Prof Michael Bruford, Dr John Day and Dr Kevin Watts

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BSc in Zoology

1st Class Honours Degree, UoR, UK, 2013 - 2016

Dissertation: Comparing butterfly behaviour and biodiversity at different habitat types.

 

PROFESSIONAL APPOINTMENTS

  • ​Postdoctoral Research Associate in Insect Ecology, UoR, March 2023 - Present

  • Research Assistant, UoR, UK, April 2022- March 2023

  • Survey Lead - Lepidopterist, Operation Wallacea, Romania, July 2022

  • Postdoctoral Research Associate, EMPOWER Project, UoR, UK, Jan 2022 - Mar 2022

  • Postdoctoral Research Associate, SysRisk Project, UoR, UK, Jan 2021 - Jan 2022

  • Freelance Digital Assistant, Royal Institution of Great Britain, December 2020

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AWARDS & ACHIEVEMENTS

  • NERC Digital Sprint Hackathon 3 (Ecosystem Services) - 2nd Place, 2020

  • Nominated for SBS PhD Researcher of The Year, University of Reading, 2020

  • University of Reading Celebrating Success Award in the EEB department, 2019

  • University of Reading 3 Minute Thesis - 1st place and national semi-finalist, 2019

  • University of Reading Research Video competition - 1st place, 2019

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RESEARCH EXPERIENCE

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Postdoctoral Research Associate - Insect Ecology

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I am currently a postdoc on the project Escaping the enemy: spatial ecology of rainforest tree–insect interactions. In this role I am involved in the collected of seeds and fruits from tropical forest trees located on Barro Colorado Island, Panama, and the rearing and identification of insects from these samples. I will be conducting lab work that will allow the identification of samples through DNA barcoding, as well as investigations into the population genetics of selected insect species.

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Research Assistant

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In this role I worked with differential GPS systems, assisted with the flying of fixed wing drones for multispectral imaging of landscapes, and carried out extensive fieldwork in both temperate (Wytham Woods, UK) and tropical (Barro Colorado Island, Panama) location as part of a project investigating Janzen Connel effects at previously untested scales.

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Postdoctoral Research Associate - EMPOWER

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Using a systems thinking approach to include local citizens in decision making and processes to protect their homes and livelihoods from the risks of local-scale climate change effects. My role included liaising with participants, developing participatory systems maps, contributing to project methods, assisting in the organisation and running of online workshops, consolidating workshop outputs, collating survey responses and writing up project results.

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Postdoctoral Research Associate - SysRisk

Using a systems thinking approach to include the environment in measures to improve resilience to COVID-19. My role included liaising with relevant experts, developing participatory systems maps, contributing to project methods, assisting in the organisation and running of online workshops, consolidating workshop outputs, collating survey responses and writing up project results.

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PhD

I developed a range of skills including fieldwork (sample collection), lab work (DNA extraction and microsatellite analysis), and data manipulation and statistical analyses in R (including linear, general linear and mixed effects modelling). I also carried out mapping in QGIS and a wide range of genetic analyses using programs including R, FSTAT, STRUCTURE and ResistanceGA. During my PhD collaborated the UKBMS, Butterfly Conservation and multiple research organisations across Europe.

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NERC Digital Sprint Hackathon

Week-long research hackathon seeking environmental solutions to Covid-19. My group assessed the effect of public usage of green space on Covid-19 transmission rates using generalised additive models and available data on mobility, green space access and public health. Our entry came in second place and the outputs have been published.

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Twitter Research Projects

Between my PhD and first Post Doc position I began an independent research project using Twitter data to answer environmental questions. We carried out two separate analyses to determine whether environmental messaging on Twitter by specific parties was related to a) how politicians vote on environmental matters, and b) how sustainable large companies are. For both analyses we used the R package rtweets and carried out logistic regressions and generalised least squares regressions. The work has been written up and is under review and under revision respectively (see publications).

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Undergraduate Degree

For my undergraduate dissertation I investigated the effects of different habitats on butterfly biodiversity and behaviour. I recorded butterfly biodiversity via fixed position point counts and monitored individual behaviours for set periods of time. I carried out the analysis in R.

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Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program

During my undergraduate degree I was the successful applicant to six-week summer research project investigating the effect of novel crop rotations on pollinator biodiversity and crop yields as part of the EU LIBERATION project. Project Title: Ecosystem services and novel crop rotations: benefits for yield, weed control and biodiversity. Supervisors: Dr Sam Leigh and Prof Simon Potts. 

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TEACHING POSITIONS &

DEPARTMENTAL SERVICES

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Lecturer

  • R in under an hour, Key Skills Module - Undergraduate lecture (UoR- 2020).

  • 3 Minute Thesis webinar - Postgraduate lecture (UoR 2020) .

  • Introduction to coding in R - Three-day workshop for PhD students (UoR 2019) .

  • Introduction to SciCom and Podcasting - Workshop for PhD students (UoR 2019 & 2020) .

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Practical Demonstration

  • Regularly assisted in a range of practical classes at the University of Reading with large groups of undergraduate students, both in the classroom and in the field.

  • Topics included ecology, statistics, biodiversity, species ID, genetics, and evolution.

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Field Teaching

  • Operation Wallacea, Romania, 2022. Taught butterfly species identification and survey skills to groups of 5-10 students

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Departmental Activities

  • Virtual seminar series and journal club - organised weekly postgraduate research activities during the summer 2020 COVID-19 period (UoR).

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FUNDING

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British Ecological Society Regional Fund 2020

  • Successful application to the British Ecological Society Regional Fund, during a call for science communication projects that could be carried out during the COVID-19 pandemic. Awarded £140 towards development of a podcast focusing on ecological fieldwork.

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FIELD AND SURVEY EXPERIENCE

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Postdoctoral Research Associate - Barro Colorado Island, Panama, May-Aug 2023

  • Twelve-week field season in lowland tropical forest in central Panama.

  • Located and tagged Prioria copaifera trees across the island.

  • Set up seedling plots under focal P. copaifera trees

  • Counted number of fallen fruits, hetero and conspecific seedlings within seedling plots

  • Collected fallen fruits from under the canopy shadow of multiple tree species.

  • Reared insects from collected fruits for identification.

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Research Assistant - Barro Colorado Island, Panama Sept - Dec 2022

  • Eleven-week field season in lowland tropical forest in central Panama.

  • Identified and located previously mapped Jacaranda copia individuals across the island using GPS units.

  • Collected seeds and seed pods from these individuals, following a repeatable protocol for the latter.

  • Assisted with the setup, maintenance and censusing of exclusion plots at a number of locations across the island.

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Research Assistant - Wytham Woods May 2022 - April 2023

  • Assisted with the flying of a fixed wing drone taking multispectral images of the entire woodland.

  • Carried out mapping of Hawthorn trees using a differential GPS system.

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Survey Lead: Lepidopterist- Operation Wallacea - July 2022

  • Lead surveyor for Lepidoptera during four-week residential field course in Transylvania, Romania.

  • Carried out Pollard Walk type surveys between 10am and 4pm daily for four weeks.

  • Role included navigation using GPS to find previously recorded points.

  • Taught butterfly identification and survey methods to research students.

  • Responsible for student safety and welfare during surveys.

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British Trust for Ornithology - Breeding Bird Survey 2017 - 2019

  • Assisted with species identification and data collection on two separate transects.

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PhD Data Collection 2016 - 2019

  • PhD fieldwork taking yearly collections of butterfly samples in the Chiltern Hills.

  • Live sample capture using butterfly nets.

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Undergraduate Dissertation Data Collection - June - Sept 2015

  • Dissertation fieldwork surveying plant and butterfly biodiversity.

  • Fixed point butterfly surveys and plant quadrat surveys.

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Agroecology Research Placement Data Collection - June - Aug 2015

  • Fixed point count pollinator surveys and plant surveys for summer research placement.

  • Additional metrics including crop yield measured in a field lab.

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Undergraduate Tropical Field Course - 2014

  • Two-week residential based at Centre ValBio, Ranomafana National Park, Madagascar.

  • Conducted bird surveys along transects of decreasing human activity.​

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TRAINING

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Preparing to Teach, University of Reading, 2019

Programme to support doctoral students who participate in teaching activities at the University of Reading.

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Communicating Your Science, The Genetics Society, 2019

Developing techniques to communicate research effectively to non-scientific audiences.

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Statistics and R, Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, 2018

Two-day course covering topics including multivariate statistics, linear modelling, and R as a GIS.

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Science Communication Digital Internship, The Royal Institution, 2018

Three-month placement developing science communication skills. Produced episodes of the Ri Science Podcast and managed and produced content for social media accounts including Twitter and YouTube with over 70,000 and 500,000 followers respectively.

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Data and Computational Literacy Course, Natural History Museum, 2017

Five-day course on data collection, manipulation, and management in R.

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Get Going With GIS, ERT Conservation, 2016

Two-day introduction to QGIS for use with ecological data.

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OUTREACH ACTIVITIES & SCI-COM

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Highlighted Conferences and Symposia

  • Monitoring spatiotemporal patterns in the genetic diversity of a European butterfly species (Talk)

Butterfly Conservation International Symposium (2023)

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  • Exploring the values and ethics of the trophy hunting debate (Poster)

​​​British Ecological Society, Annual Conference (2022)

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  • ​Developing an indicator of genetic diversity for UK wildlife using the meadow brown butterfly (Talk). ​

​Butterfly Conservation International Symposium (2018)​

​British Ecological Society, Ecological Genetics Group (2018)

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  • Developing an indicator of the genetic diversity of UK wildlife: the 2020 BGEMS pilot scheme (Poster).

British Ecological Society, Nature for Future Generations (2018)

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  • The Butterfly Genetics Monitoring Scheme, 2020 BGEMS pilot study (poster).

British Ecological Society, Annual Conference (2017)

UKBMS 40th Anniversary Symposium (2016)

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Podcasts

Just Another Science Show 

Co-presenter and producer of a Sci-Com podcast interviewing research students and academics about their life and research. 2016 - 2020.

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Field Notes

Producer of a BES funded podcast focusing on fieldwork expeditions. Ongoing.

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Pint of Science

Event Manager 2019

Event manager leading a team of volunteers to run three nights of talks at the Pint of Science Festival in Reading. Responsible for the 'Planet Earth' theme curation, speaker recruitment and volunteer coordination. Event ran successfully, selling out on two nights and receiving positive feedback. Subsequently asked to manage and chair additional one-off event with astronaut Michael Foale.

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Blog Contributions

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Presentations and Invited Talks

  • Measuring Barriers to Movement, Animals on the Move Exhibition

  • The aliens are among us: The biology of alien invasive species, Science Oxford

  • Lethal Sampling & Ecological Tipping Points: Heat & Regional Final - FameLab Oxford

  • How to measure what we can't see: University of Reading 3 Minute Thesis

  • How To Butterfly: University of Reading Research Video Competition

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SPECIES IDENTIFICATION

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Great Crested Newt Identification and Surveying Course - 2019

  • Comprehensive two-day training course on newt ecology, ID and survey techniques.

  • Course carried out by the Berkshire Reptile & Amphibian Group.

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Undergraduate Degree Modules

  • Introduction to Ecology - Achieved highest mark in class on UK bird species spot test

  • Introduction to Entomology - Insect order and family identification

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Postgraduate Demonstrating

  • Experienced in teaching insect and bird species identification to undergraduate students.

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