PreScouter provides innovation consulting and contract research services to Fortune 500 companies. As a Project Manager, I lead a team of graduate students on projects in the medical, personal care and food & beverage spaces. I also collect and organise information gathered by the team, write intelligence reports and present these to the client. Within the Project Management team, I am the lead on the food and beverage vertical. See publication list for posts in the PreScouter Journal on related topics.

"The Self-assembly Pathways of a Peridinin Chlorophyll-a Protein and a Lutein Aggregate"My PhD focused on the biophysical characterisation of photobiological systems. The unfolding and assembly pathway of Peridinin Chlorophyll-a Protein (PCP) was investigated for applications in bio-imaging. The self-assembly pathway of a lutein aggregate was probed in terms of the spectroscopic states and their relation to the aggregate morphology and structure. Such data could be valuable for formulation of lutein supplements, for understanding the pathology of AMD and for understanding the roles of lutein in plants. These projects have equipped me with a high level of proficiency in; molecular biology (cloning, PCR and SDM), protein expression and purification, protein and small molecule biophysics (UV/vis absorption, fluorescence and CD spectroscopy), large scale assays (liquid handling robots), structural characterisation techniques (Dynamic Light Scattering and Atomic Force Microscopy) and data analysis (Microsoft Office Excel and GraphPad Prism).

I was selected for a Summer Vacation Studentship funded by the Society for General Microbiology (SGM). The project investigated an archaeal DNA ligase from Ferroplasma acidarmanus. The techniques used during this project range from molecular biology (cloning, PCR and SDM) to protein biochemistry (protein expression, detection and purification). In addition to equipping me with an introduction to basic biochemical techniques, this project also motivated me to pursue a PhD.