I am a third year PhD student at the School of Clinical Dentistry at the University of Sheffield. My interest in research budded from an MSc I had undertaken after completing my dental surgery degree.
Research on how materials interact with the oral environment led to an interest in how oral microorganisms interact with our body, in our mouths and beyond. This interest steered my move to the University of Sheffield in 2017 and my current PhD project. Under the supervision of Prof. Craig Murdoch and Prof. Graham Stafford, my PhD aims to study the role of oral microorganisms, particularly gum disease bacteria in the initiation of cardiovascular disease.
Research on how materials interact with the oral environment led to an interest in how oral microorganisms interact with our body, in our mouths and beyond. This interest steered my move to the University of Sheffield in 2017 and my current PhD project. Under the supervision of Prof. Craig Murdoch and Prof. Graham Stafford, my PhD aims to study the role of oral microorganisms, particularly gum disease bacteria in the initiation of cardiovascular disease.
Myself in Brighton for the 2019 British Society of Periodontology Conference
The association between gum disease and heart disease is nowadays widely accepted by both the scientific and clinical community. None the less, there are several debates on how gum disease can affect blood vessels and the heart when bacteria and their secretions make their way from our mouths to our circulatory system. Through my PhD, I am researching the effects of periodontal pathogen infection on endothelial (blood vessel) cells, as well as the effects of systemic infection in zebrafish embryos. Changes in the cells and in the zebrafish’s health allow us to understand more the mechanisms that might drive this association.
One of my favourite and first zebrafish images I took
I am very passionate about translational and clinically applicable research. Following completion of my PhD I’d like to pursue a career in clinical academia.
