Profile

I am involved in quite few projects which all aim to study the link between fat tissue in the body and the development of diseases such as cancer or cardiovascular disease. My work involves experiments in the lab using cells isolated from different tissues and looking not only at the expression of specific genes involved in inflammation or stress but also at the effect that some molecules secreted by the fat tissue have on the ability of cells to survive or duplicate in culture. By understanding these links, we hope to be able in the future to design therapies which could stop the development of such diseases in obese individuals.

Another aspect of my work is outside the lab and working with real people!! I am involved in a project in which we interview volunteers and ask them, among other questions, about their food shopping habits and choices of food, and we also take a 3D scan/image of their body. By combining the answers and the image of their body, we hope to understand more about the relationship that people have with food in the context of their daily lives, their communities and where they live, and how that relates to their own biology in terms of body size/shape and general health.

My day does not start until I have a cappuccino!! Only then I am ready to face what the day brings. First of all, I go to the lab to check if my students are fine or need anything for the day. Then it is emails, lots of them…. and then it is thinking time….come up with new ideas to test in the lab in order to explain how the fat tissue in the body, its distribution and the molecules it secretes could increase the chances we have to develop diseases such as cardiovascular disease, diabetes or some types of cancer. In between the above, I attend meetings, lecture on-line to post-graduate students about obesity science and management and mentor early career researchers to develop their research interests and skills. I also spend time writing proposals to get the money  to do the experiments and research I like. On a regular basis, I also get involved in outreach activities with school and communities as one great part of being a scientist is to be able to translate what I do in the lab into clear messages which could help the general public to make informed decisions about their health. I like the mixture of research and education that my job involves and to think that, maybe one day far far away in the future, my research might make a difference to people’s life.