Profile

I started my PhD in 2019 following a 5 month trip around the world! I love to travel and have visited 30 countries so far. I’m also a very sporty person, and regularly travel to Mayo/Sligo to surf. I have also started training in aerial silks and aerial hoops, and play tag rugby every week on a team of researchers from my department. I also love to read and listen to music. I really like having lots of different hobbies and activities to keep myself happy and healthy and to give me a break from the long days of studying science!

I’m studying temporal lobe epilepsy, which is epilepsy that starts in an area of the brain called the temporal lobe, which is found just behind your ears! This type of epilepsy involves the hippocampus (a structure found in the temporal lobe) that is involved in learning and memory.

My research links together genetics and neuroscience, specifically looking at how seizures can cause changes in the expression of certain genes. Your genes control everything that happens in your body, depending on which genes are switched on or switched off at different times. I want to know what happens to gene expression after a seizure that causes people to then develop epilepsy and try and figure out if its possible to reverse it and stop a person getting epilepsy.