THE TEAM
Co-Chairs
UKRSA Chair, HREiR representative & previous midlands representative
Alison is a Research Fellow in Plant & Crop Science at the University of Nottingham. Her main interest is in flower development, looking specifically at pollen development within Arabidopsis and Oilseed Rape. Her research has focused on gene development networks, using bioinformatics, advanced microscope techniques, TILLING and genetic modification to test these models.
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Alison is currently the chair of the SB Campus Early Career Research and Teaching Committee, and also sits on the Fixed-term Staff Committee at the Science Faculty level. In both these roles Alison aims to aid in career development, as well as ensuring the voice of early career researchers and academics is heard within the University.
Concordat representative, and previous UKRSA co-Chair (2019-2022)
Anjali obtained her PhD in childhood leukaemia trends from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, and continued working in cancer survival for 10 years. Since then she has worked at the University of Oxford in childhood cancer epidemiology, maternal health and currently in musculoskeletal epidemiology. She is Co-Chairwoman of the Oxford Research Staff Society where she is responsible for advocating for researcher’s views, with special interests in the revision of the Concordat to support the career development of Researchers and the impact of Brexit on research.
Vitae Liaison
Rachel Cox
UKRSA Vitae Liaison
Rachel Cox is the Engagement and Policy Project Manager at Vitae, she is a key contact for Vitae Member institutions across the world, helping stakeholders to engage with Vitae initiatives, resources and events, championing professional development and researcher careers. She is passionate about improving research culture through facilitating collaborative working groups and related projects, as well as working with researcher networks such as the UK Research Staff Association, for which she is the Vitae liaison.
Regional Representatives
Nicola Small
North West representative based at the University of Manchester
Nicola is a 5 year post-doc Research Associate working within the
Centre for Epidemiology Versus Arthritis at the University of Manchester. Nicola has research interests in understanding patient experience in the National Health Service with a particular interest in developing insight and patient-reported outcome measures to improve mental and physical health outcomes in people with multimorbidity.
Nicola contributes a huge amount to the wider life of the Centre for Epidemiology, the School and Faculty, and the University of Manchester. Nicola is currently Chair to University Ethics Research Committee 4 and a Research Ambassador on the Social Responsibility Steering Group for the Division promoting school visits with undergraduate and postgraduate students to give talks on their research to promote becoming a ‘different type of doctor’ as a career.
Nicola’s research profiles are available here: :PURE https://bit.ly/Profile:RGhttps://bit.ly/Profile
Regional representatives wanted
To apply for this position please contact us
London
South East
South West & Wales
Yorkshire & North East
Doug Browning
Midlands representative based at the University of Birmingham, previous UKRSA co-Chair
Doug is a Research Fellow in the School of Biosciences and the Institute of Microbiology and Infection (IMI) at the University of Birmingham. He has broad research interests, focusing on the control of gene expression in bacterial pathogens, the biogenesis of outer membranes in Gram-negative bacteria, synthetic biology and industrial biotechnology. In addition to his roles in UKRSA, Doug is a member of the University of Birmingham PERCAT Committee, facilitating the career development and training of Postdoctoral Researchers, and is an elected member of the Microbiology Society Professional Development Committee.
Joshua Kaggie
East England representative based at the University of Cambridge
Dr Kaggie is an MRI physicist who is funded by GlaxoSmithKline to develop novel imaging biomarkers for joint imaging. He is implementating and evaluating improvements of MR fingerprinting, T1rho, ultra-short echo time, and sodium MRI in the joint. He is currently involved in stem cell research for joint repair. Dr Kaggie also works in implementing new MRI hardware, for non-proton MRI (such as carbon-13 and sodium imaging) or for other specialised applications.
UKRSA projects
Anna Slater
Parental Leave;
Previous co-Chair of UKRSA
Anna joined the UKRSA in 2014, after contacting Vitae to ask about advice for researchers taking maternity leave. She is currently leading a UKRSA project to better understand the experiences of researchers taking maternity, paternity, adoption, and parental leave. She is based at the University of Liverpool as a Royal Society-EPSRC Dorothy Hodgkin Research Fellow. Her research interests span flow chemistry, materials science, supramolecular self-assembly, and organic synthesis.
Angela Midgley
Research Staff Associations; Recruitment and Engagement
Dr Angela Midgley is a Research Staff Developer at The Academy at the University of Liverpool. Angela’s role involves implementing researcher development initiatives and high quality development activities, which are aimed at cascading effective practice and developing the capabilities of all research staff across all career stages and faculties. Angela also works closely with and supports The Academy’s Research Staff Association (UoL RSA) in partnership with UKRSA and acknowledges that it is important for researchers to have a voice nationally which can be gained through collaborative working groups.
Other Roles
Louise Stephen
HREiR UKRSA representative;
previous co-Chair of UKRSA
I am currently a research fellow at the Roslin Institute where I am studying bone development and disease. During my time as a postdoc, I have chaired Research Staff associations and represented postdocs on a number of committees aimed at furthering researcher development and giving postdocs a greater voice. I am particularly interested in improving the researcher experience to make academia a more inclusive and realistic career option.
Luca Morini
Twitter Account
Luca Morini is a research fellow in Coventry University's Centre for Global Learning, Education and Attainment (GLEA). The diverse foci of his current work are the intersections of critical digital literacies, decolonisation of the curriculum and the impact of competitive epistemologies on Higher Education policies, cultures and pedagogies.
Blanca Perez-Sepulveda
Recruitment and Engagement Officer
Blanca is Postdoctoral Research Associate at the University of Liverpool, where she works studying the molecular mechanisms of virulence and environmental reservoirs of invasive non-typhoidal Salmonella and their phages. After completing a BSc and MSc (Res) in Biochemistry at the University of Chile, Blanca moved to the UK and obtained her PhD in Marine Molecular Microbiology at the University of Warwick. Blanca is the Co-Chair of the University of Liverpool RSA, and the UKRSA Recruitment and Engagement Officer.