Hello, my name is AJ & I’m a scientist.  I love solving puzzles, or at least finding individual pieces that help make a picture complete.  Discovering the best approach, finding the right evidence to drive changes in health and social care, sharing understanding, knowledge, and supporting the next generation are key driving forces.  I’ve been fortunate to have received support from The Northern Ireland Kidney Research Fund that helps us learn more about kidney disease.  Link to short video showcasing some of our team’s kidney research: https://youtu.be/6Ifc3KCU8W0

I graduated from The University of Aberdeen in 2000 & came home to NI with a PhD studentship funded by the NI Department for the Economy researching genetic risk factors for diabetic kidney disease with Professor Peter Maxwell and Dr David Savage.  I got the bug for kidney research and was generously funded by the NIKRF for a postdoctoral fellowship (2003), during which I also completed a Masters degree with distinction in Bioinformatics at the University of Manchester and a postgraduate certificate with distinction at the University of Leeds. In 2006 I started as QUB’s first Lecturer in Bioinformatics, becoming tenured in 2009, and moving relatively quickly through Senior Lecturer, Reader and Professorial roles. Life wasn’t quite a straightforward as it seems – my family life is complicated and I’ve had a series of personal health complications that naturally disrupted research.  For example, in 2015 I had a spinal injury and was paralysed from the waist down for a while…2018 I had cerebral oedema (excess fluid on the brain)…2020 the COVID-19 pandemic was declared so our molecular labs were repurposed to facilitate sample reception and staff seconded to help deliver COVID-19 testing…2021 my daughter was born earlier than expected…perhaps it is not surprising I’m a strong advocate for including voices from people with lived experience and flexibility in the workplace!

Today, I run a busy multidisciplinary research team. I co-Lead the Epidemiology and Public Health research team within the Centre for Public Health at QUB, which has ~30 staff and I am also the Director for Postgraduate Research within the School of Medicine, Dentistry and Biomedical Sciences at QUB. I (mostly) love my job. There are always challenges to meet, I get to work with superb local and international colleagues making new discoveries, and best of all, I see the real impact that research funded in Northern Ireland has on our local population.

Three major research achievements: 

1. Helping drive forward progress for rare kidney diseases in Northern Ireland, including delivering research that informed the NI Rare Disease Action Plan. That includes helping deliver new diagnoses for kidney patients with inherited kidney disease. More of our Rare Disease Research.
2. Identifying new clinical, environmental, and biological features that help identify people at higher risk of developing kidney disease and / or progressing to end stage kidney disease.
3. Bringing together networks of experts to help answer critical questions for kidney disease, including setting research priorities with people who have lived experience of diseases, having people with lived experience as formal investigators on funded grants, and setting up All Ireland adult, children and young person’s rare disease advisory groups.

Direct funding from NIKRF has supported the:

• Purchase of state-of-the-art equipment, without which many of the discoveries for inherited risk factors for kidney disease in NI would not have been possible.
• Potential for seed funding that helps generate pilot / preliminary data, making us more successful securing funding for larger-scale international research.
• Next generation of kidney researchers in NI, helping us build a critical mass of researchers with diverse skills interested in kidney disease. NIKRF provides valuable training support for clinical and scientific focused junior colleagues.  Colleagues who have benefitted from this support include:
  • Dr Diane Currie for a PhD studentship – Diane helped identify novel genetic markers associated with kidney disease, obtained five publications from her PhD project (2007-2010), and is now a School teacher, conveying her enthusiasm for science to the next generation of students.
  • Dr Laura Smyth for postdoctoral fellowship support – Laura identified many biological markers associated with kidney disease, is now a lecturer at QUB (2023), and plans to have three PhD students working on kidney research from October 2024.
  • Tiernan Coulter for a summer studentship -> Tiernan explored associations with telomere length and kidney disease. He has two publications from his summer project and received a scholarship for a Masters degree (2023).