Dashboard – I'm a Scientist 2024

About Me:

I live in Lancaster. For my job, I use computers to look at biology questions. I like drawing, reading and playing board games and video games. I love sweet food so much I want to eat chocolates and cakes for every meal (and I do around Christmas)!
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I like drawing comics and making oil paintings. Runaway Labbook is my science webcomic blog that was supported by “I’m a Scientist, Get Me out of Here” when I took part almost 10 year ago.

I currently spend most of my free time playing video games or board games. I tend to play RPGs for video games, and like a variety of board games. When it comes to reading, I enjoy fantasy and science fiction books; I try to read one book a month. My favourite sweets are triple chocolate cookies. My least favourite are cupcakes – they always look prettier than they taste, so I feel they lied to me.
My pronouns are:

she/her
My Work:

I am a lecturer in Bioinformatics – I use computers to answer biology questions and teach people about it.
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My experience goes from working in operation theatre with doctors to collect samples, doing experiments in the labs, through to my current job, which is to use computers to understand biology. You can use my website to see an example of these type of computer analysis (click on “Example 1” and then “Analyse”). https://bshihlab.shinyapps.io/evergene/

I have worked on a large variety of projects, such as wound healing, Dupuytren’s disease (fingers curl towards the palm), sunburn, fingerprints, cattle disease, COVID, brain immune cells, cancers.
My Typical Day:

I wake up and have breakfast before getting to work sometime between 8am and 10am. As soon as I get into my office, I have my second breakfast while checking emails. I would usually have a couple of meetings throughout the day. Around lunch time, I hope that I packed a lunch and didn’t accidentally eat my lunch as my second breakfast. I then catch up with writing (too often) or coding (not often enough!). I go home sometime between 4-5pm, and often do more work at home in the evenings.
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As a biomedical scientist, I wouldn’t say there is a “typical day”. Things that need to be done change weekly or monthly.

Teaching: Coming up to teaching lectures or workshops, I spend my days figuring out how to teach computer biology to students. I try to focus making something interesting, but at the same time gets the key messages across. The last activities I made was “grouping star fish by their genes”. After exams and coursework deadlines, I mark through essays from students.

Computer experiments: I use a number of different computer tools to analyse large data, typically RNA-sequencing data – a type of data that looks at how genes are used. I would first look at how good the data is and make note of any problems. Then, I compare anything that might be interesting to what other scientists have found, and see if I add new knowledge to the research areas.

Writing up: I write up experiments I have already done, as well as plans for doing new experiments.
What I'd do with the prize money:

I would build a working Lego microscope and take it to science fairs (example here https://github.com/IBM/MicroscoPy ). The activity would not only allow us to show microscopy images on a bigger screen so more people can see it, but also demonstrate the use of coding in biomedical research.

Candidate CV questions (extra)

Education:

Clifton College, Bristol (1999-2003): GCSE to A-Levels

University of Manchester (2003-2013): undergraduate, Master’s and PhD
Qualifications:

GCSEs (Biology, Chemistry, Physics, Maths, Additional Maths, English, English Literature, Art, Design and Technology, Latin)

A-level (Biology, Chemistry, Math, Art)

BSc Cell Biology

MSc Immunology and Immunogenetics

PhD by Published Work
Work History:

University of Manchester (2007-2015): Lab technician, Research assistant and Postdoctoral researcher

University of Edinburgh (2015-2023): Postdoctoral researcher

Lancaster University (2023-now): Lecturer
Current Job:

Lecturer
Employer:

Lancaster University

My Interview
- How would you describe yourself in 3 words?
  
  Curious, creative, cheerful.
  
  What did you want to be after you left school?
  
  Immunologist.
  
  Were you ever in trouble at school?
  
  Not that I am aware of.
  
  If you weren't doing this job, what would you choose instead?
  
  Illustrator or web-designer.
  
  Who is your favourite singer or band?
  
  Two Steps From Hell.
  
  What's your favourite food?
  
  Chocolate.
  
  If you had 3 wishes for yourself what would they be? - be honest!
  
  Rich, draw like a pro, all my loved one can stay healthy and forever young.
  
  Tell us a joke.
  
  I never wanted to believe that my dad was stealing from his job as a road worker. But when I got home, all the signs were there.